How's it going Chris?! Nice to hear from you bud! This car has a ways to go before I can reliably beat on it at the track or auto-X. For starters the clutch slave and/or master cylinder(s) are shot. During the summer time down here it only takes one or two pulls before the clutch pedal becomes soft (never good).

The ST-60 front calipers need to be looked over and possibly rebuilt. I've experienced pad knock back for a while now. Basically the lateral forces during corning (spirited driving) cause the brake pads to press up against the caliper pistons, thus pushing the pistons into the calipers (we're talking micro/millmeters). This leads to inconsistent brake feel which feels very much like brake fade.

The gem of an engine Nissan put in my Z drinks oil like I consume water (only slightly exaggerating lol). Lastly, the suspension needs to be dialed in to perform at the track. Front needs to be raised, or at the very least I need to dial in some more negative camber with the SPL A-arms. These are the excuses I can think of at the moment, but I'm positive there are more like tires, crappy driver etc. haha! What I really want is a ride in a real race car (i.e., your Nismo) that way I can mimic your suspension settings lol.

I'm actually holding on to the OE front bumper mainly cause the splitter is still intact. You'll be the first to know if that changes though. And you already know what's up with the TC105n's

 

I would definitely raise your front end, have the alignment set up to around -2 square as a starting point, and then just go autox to start. Get in the seat and get going, it's extremely addicting to do and you'll get sucked in almost instantly.

 

I hear you and why I have since gone to the KISS method with these cars. I simply put my KW, sways, diff wheels and tires and took second(by .012 ) in the State championship. Wasnt a large group but beat out some "veterans"(3+ years of autox > my 1 year). I have a bunch(ask Jon at Z1) of parts waiting to be installed but I want to learn what the car does when I add parts instead of dumping parts into it.

And its getting cold out... These 70's are killing it hahaha. Get over here bud lets see whats wrong and some cold ones.

Chris

 

2nd at a State Championship event?! You going pro soon LOL. That's awesome man, congrats! You're definitely going about it the right way. Much more satisfying to put the car together peice by peice and really get a feel for what each component has to offer. I really want to make it out there, but I was just looking at the gulf coast auto cross schedule and it looks like they shut down after the first week of December.

 

"And its getting cold out... These 70's are killing it hahaha."

I hate all of you so much. It's going to hit 20's next week. Optimal time to start gutting the car hahaha

 

always a treat coming here to catch up!

 

Merry Christmas everybody! Hope you all had a great holiday! I asked Santa for a BNR32, but apparently I wasn't good enough this year. I took things into my own hands this holiday season and decided to upgrade the clutch hydraulic system in the Z because I've been having issues with the clutch pedal going limp after long drives in the heat and spirited drives.

Went with the Tilton Racing Clutch master cylinder, OEM slave cylinder, and stainless steel lines to replace the convoluted factory hard-lines.




Install was pretty straightforward. Most challenging part was getting under the dash to adjust the clutch engagement point. After fully bleeding out the system the clutch pedal feels nice and firm like when the Z was new 10 years ago.

Hard-lines:


Stainless steel lines (notice the provided hardware to cleanly secure the line to the inner fender):


New Slave Cylinder:
I reused the heat sleeve that was on the OEM line just to protect the line from the heat coming off of the header.


Here is a pic of the Tilton master cylinder tucked away in its new home. I had to cut the rubber hose that connects the master to the reservoir.




Overall I'm very satisfied with the upgraded components, but its still early days so we shall see how well they hold up. Not sure what 2017 has in store for the Z but if you want to follow closely check out my IG account: griptomakeitstick_z33. Hope you all have a wonderful New Year!

 

god that shaved trunk...got more pics? those are goals right there

 

this Z Speed Tilton CMC looks pretty nice...should really save up some money and get myself one of these in the future. how hard was the installation of it?

 

Thanks homie!! There are plenty of photos on pervious pages in this thread documenting the process of that part of the project, check it out! Other than that I have a few on my Instagram: griptomakeitstick_z33

I got it on sale at Zspeed during the holidays. It wasn't difficult, but I guess thats very subjective and depends on how comfortable yo are turning a wrench.