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Hey guys, just checking in as a 'new owner'... I made a crash thread in the General forum for my old 2006 Grand Touring coupe, which I owned from Oct 2013 to Oct 2020, and this is a bit of a First Impressions thread on the 2007 roadster.
I suppose I've been driving VQ's continuously, year in year out, for 15 years now and I'm only 36. Started with a 2000 Maxima SE (2006-2010), then a 2006 G35x sedan (2010-2016), bought my first Z (2013) then upgraded the G to a 2013 G37xS sedan (2016-now). Over 10 years with my old friend the 5AT, which I was glad to meet again in this new-to-me, clean-title Grand Touring roadster. As of Winter storage she has 63K miles on the clock and both the front bumper and the hood need a respray within the next 5 years... you'll see a gap in the pics and start vomiting, whereas I look at it and I keep smiling. You think the American Northeast is bad for potholes? Ontario and Quebec roads do not forgive lowered cars, they hurt them and that's the end of it. I've seen too much at car meets here to think otherwise, if you're lowered here you're either a track guy or an idiot.
Previous owner
-60 plus years old, lived about 100 km away from Montreal, 2nd owner (2010-2021) and stored it in heated garage, full stock
-Not mechanically inclined, and not inclined to push the car either as he stated no VDC/wheel spin issues (see next points)
-Didn't like the stockers so took 370Z roadster wheels (non-sport 18's) with the same exact tires from the 370, and put them on
-The rears (9") are a +15 offset so not too bad, but the fronts (8") are +43 offset so very much caved in
-The fronts still had the 225/50 tires from the 370 and he didn't drive the car at night... I did, and EVERYONE flashed me. It had raised the front that much!
-Air filters were blackened OEM from another decade, no spacers on the Z34 wheels meant cutting it super close to the Brembo calipers
-Tires were Toyo Proxes 4 Plus on their 3rd Summer; taking off at mid-throttle would make them squeak, anything past that I would stay there and spin
-Putting the trans into 2nd ahead of a 90 deg corner, anything beside a slight touch of the throttle after hitting my line and it's a drift special
-Putting the trans into 3rd before passing in a 80 km/h zone, mid-throttle would make the car fishtail at 80-90 km/h which got scary pretty fast
-Pads had 1 mm left front and rear (!!!!) and rotors were toast, car has 61K miles (US car). Lots of traffic stop & go for the old man, sitting on highway 20.....
Passing Safety - Wheels & tires, Full brakes + lines and fluid
-Akebono ACT-Pro rotors, Centric posi-quiet pads (pics below)
-Z1 SS brake lines
-Motul RBF660 fluid (3)
-Enkei Kojin 18 X 8.5 (+25), 18 X 9.5 (+15)
-Continental ECS 245/40, 265/40
Coupe --> Roadster
-Cowl shake! The old man says he had the hinges replaced at one point. Low speed, high speed anything in between I see the hood shake on and off... I've accepted it.
-Weight distribution is... different? I'm going on the same roads, same speeds and I know the ZR is heavier but... more planted from the rear? Is that possible? Like 52/48 instead of 53/47?
-First time ever going out at night in a roadster with the top down, and it was IMAX out there with the stars everywhere JFC that makes up for the lesser rigidity, that and nice 20 celsius afternoons...
-Not anywhere as noisy as I thought it would be on the highway; I can roll the windows up, crank up the flat-eq'ed stock Bose to 19-20 and have a blast going down the highway at 70-80 mph.
-I can hear the OEM exhaust...?!?? At least past 3K, I hear it loud and clear. Never the case in the 3 years of coupe driving that I had the stock exhaust on. Having the OEM on almost sounds original nowadays.
FBO DE --> Stock HR
-From full stock to FBO with questionable choices & a great tune by Radek in TO, I felt a big difference with the old coupe and it showed at the track in my ETs (14.6 stock, 14.0 FBO; same lame *** Ontario Fall weather for all times).
-The DynoDynamics graphs over the years of modding, which ideally should have just been done once, showed I had gained 45 WHP over baseline and peak was moved to 6500 RPM, redline adjusted at 7K and TCM tuned.
-It had Admin intake, NWP TB, 5/8" spacer no bar, Borla headers (I know...), Stillen HFC and Borla catback. After final mod/tune it felt awesome, went through a full set of PS4S then went back to old RE050A's and crashed.
-This is something else. And the car is heavier. On country road twisties of varying degrees, throughout the full range of 40-to-80 mph and only 2nd/3rd used with 4th on the straights, this feels faster than the FBO coupe.
-I can tell it's choked past 7K. It's actually more rewarding to upshift the stick at 7K than it is stretching it to 7400, there's nothing past 7K. The aFe filters may have helped but the stock exhaust system remains...
Photo dump...
*Edit - forgot about the top, it works. It works perfect, so all those threads in the vert forum have me worried about shelling out big bucks for that in the future.
Went from DE coupe to HR roadster
