scathing

That's true. You can start weight reducting other panels to get your weight distribution back to stock. But, the way I see it, if you kept the VQ and weight reduced the front with CF panels, you can then also use lightweight panels on the rear as well without adversely affecting the weight distribution. Not only do you get to keep your weight distribution near stock at that point, but you can also reduce the total weight of the car. Which can only be a good thing, because you feel the weight of the 350Z most keenly. It is more a "bench tuning" discussion than any kind of fact, though. Adding twin turbos, various heat exchangers, and all that extra plumbing will add more weight to the front of the car. The VQ will do it less, but if you're after a car that's great handling you're still going to have to do stuff to offset this weight imbalance. As an aside, APS is currently developing a 700rwhp kit for the Z. No idea how much it'd cost, but generating 520+rwkW out of an RB26 isn't a trivial exercise either. Of course, pretty much everyone knows how to do that in an RB (you could probably get the entire shopping list by posting the question in the FI forum) whereas you'd be hard pressed to ask someone who's not doing R&D at a tuning company how to do it in a VQ.

Looks like a product for the person who's already bought a cheap imitation GT-R front bumper and rear wing (with the appropriate badges) for their GTS-t, and is ready to take their automotive masturbation to the next level.....

I was thinking that if I could afford to go all out on my car, I'd respray it in matte black. It'd give the car that "prototype" look, like you see in all the mags and stuff. After that, I'd just need to get my car on the Nurburgring

I regard drifting as a motorsport, but for a lot of the reasons given (i.e. there's no objective measure of the winner) I don't have much respect for the motorsport itself. Just like I don't rate surfing, or gymnastics, etc. I wouldn't deny that they're sports, just like I don't deny that Daewoos are cars. They just not particularly good cars..... Having crossed up my car and chucked a couple of wobblies, and taken to the skid pan, I have nothing but respect for those people that can hold those massive slides and link corners from high speeds consistently. But that should be a means to the end, not the end itself. I look at drift as the "half time show" of motorsport. Kind of like the Lingerie Bowl, or NBA Slam Dunk Competitions. Great to watch, gets the spectators all fired up, but its only a warm-up to the real thing. But just like those double spin, around the back, and over the head moves before putting the ball in the basket is just a bunch of fluff that serious players wouldn't do in a real game (unless they're trying to deceive the defender), hooking it sideways around a corner is something a serious racer would never do unless they make a mistake.

I do find it quite amusing that everyone is writing off the VQ35 motor. "Get an RB26!!!" etc. Considering the car's only 2WD, there's a much lower limit as to how much power you can make before the numbers are for wanking anyway. The guy who owns the blue APS TT Z featured in several magazines already says that he has powerdown issues on full throttle in a fair few gears. That's with standard internals and cams, and relatively low boost. With a stronger bottom end and some head work to get it breathing better (mods that aren't uncommon on hard-tuned RB26's), you could make more power up top or run more boost through the midrange. But, with almost an extra litre of capacity the car's a lot more responsive and drivable down low. In a street car, that's a bit more important than a bigger top end. As for handling....unless I have been grossly misled on the laws of physics, putting a longer, heavier engine into an already front heavy car isn't going to do it any favours in the handling department. I'm not saying that the RB26 won't make more power if you throw the catalog at it (and I've already said that I would take the R34 over the Z33 any day). It has got over a decade head-start when it comes to R&D and a lot of the parts and methodologies are well known. But for a daily drivable Z33 that power-wise isn't too heavy, or too light, getting a TT kit for the VQ would be a much better option.

If I had the choice between a 350Z and an R34 GT-R, I'd take the GT-R. But then, it suits my intended purpose in a vehicle. I realise that I just want something fast first, comfortable second (or third). I don't know of anyone who has fitted TT kits to auto 350Zs (aside from the occasional one-off jobs in Japan), so I can't say how well the gearbox will handle it. The manual TT Z's are pulling a fair amount of power these days though.

There are plenty of tradeys out there that have a head on their shoulders. Most of them show up relatively punctually, and don't need to be called up 2 days later when whatever they worked on falls apart. They're also less likely to go carving up busy traffic in their underbraked and momentum-rich vehicles, since they're also industrious enough to not want to waste time and money in court when they inevitably punt their van or ute into someone's car, nor do they want to have a whole bunch of potential customers see them acting like tools or rubberneck them after they've crashed. I hoped it was evident enough that I wasn't talking about those kinds of people, but clearly you need to spell it out in monosyballic words sometimes.

Given that quite a few of your posts are of the keyboard warrior type, especially recently, that's rich. I never said they didn't work harder. I just said they didn't work as smart(or with any level of competence). Of course they have to work harder, since they can't get the job right the first time and so have to waste time fixing their f**kups. I don't doubt it. "Violence is the last resort of the incompetent", as they say. Since they can't lucidly argue against my assertion, the fact that they'll "take a few braincells out" just proves me right about how useful these people are. I do love how you skipped the first message having a go at tradeys, and decided to go straight for me. Maybe its because you didn't get it the first time, and needed two attempts at comprehension before realising what was being said? Hmm....not getting it right the first time, and acting all aggressive when you (slowly) start interpreting. You're not one of those crazy, van driving 20-30 year old loons who can't show up to a job on time are you?

Oh I have no doubt that its sporty, for an SUV. Most of the reviews say that the car handles like a station wagon. Impressive for a high ride height, 2 ton car....but still average in the grand scheme of things. And that attachment is from 5th Gear, where they ran the X5 against the Cayenne S. The X5 beat it around the race track at Anglesea, but in both Tiff ended up demonstrating the vehicles' off road ability by understeering off the track around one corner and making an excursion through the grass.

Yeah, I love doing that too. The best one I ever had was driving from Top Ryde out towards Macquarie. Some bloke in an old Falcon was driving like a loon slicing up the traffic and doing a fair whack over the speed limit. Every now and again I'd just baulk him because he'd been cutting people off with not much space to spare, and in busy traffic. He didn't look too impressed. With some good lane choosing I still managed to stay ahead of him and disappear at the Macquarie area of North Ryde. He looked like he was about to go berko when he saw me giving him the thumbs up while I was filling my car up at Pymble Shell.

The only 4WD drivers that try and drag me at a set of lights are the softcoks in BMW SUVs. They somehow think that because BMW make great affordable European sports cars, that their overweight, soft roading pieces of crap have managed to magically inherit the legacy handed down by the 3 Series, 2002's and M cars of old. I had a guy in an X3 diesel repeatedly try to go me heading down the Pacific Highway through the North Shore once. Aside from them, no-one bothers. The Jap 4WDs tend to just move slowly and build pace until they're exceeding the speed limit, and the Cayenne Turbo drivers know that they'll chop me so they don't bother either.

Actually, I'd forgotten about that. I'd definitely consider a Cayman S to replace my car, if I could guarantee getting a decent amount of power out of it without having to do something major (like a 996 TT engine conversion). Perhaps a Boxster too.

Sell them to a GTS-t owner (they should fit on Silvias too) and get a set of rims with the right offset then.

Yeah, I can see how that would make you feel like a target. If I had people almost crash into me trying to gee me up to street race them, and it happened all the f**king time, I'd probably get jack of it too. Maybe SAU should go make some "If you want to race, meet me at WSID" bumper stickers up, or something.

Interested, but we'll see closer to the event.

Being a smaller and narrower rim would potentially make it weigh less too, reducing unsprung weight and modifying your weight distribution.

Depending on how much they're in by, you could just fit spacers (and use longer wheel studs if necessary). Its should be cheaper to buy spacers and new wheel studs than replacing your rims.

Were you planning on learning to drift with this car, or trying to compete with it? If you're only trying to learn and maybe run in some low level comps, then you can "drift" anything. I used to get my old Volvo sideways, and that thing was a dead stock auto. They weren't the most elegant drifts and I wouldn't try linking all of Wakefield Park together in it, but for the EC skid circuit (I haven't been out to Driftland yet so I can't say) it would have been fine wet or dry. It certainly taught me the basics of countersteering, and balancing the car on the throttle / brakes. If you wanted to get into some serious competition events you may want more power and torque than what a stock RB25DE is going to offer you.

You and some other "drivers" (and I use the term loosely) want to look at some writing to settle an argument as to what car does a better job in the twisties, rather than just going somewhere and figuring it out......?

Its because they're incompetent, shiftless bastards who need double the amount of time to do a job as a person who's got 3 working braincells.

The major problem is that people get annoyed over it, and they care what everyone else thinks. If some little snot in their shopping trolley wants to go you, let them go. Get over it. Why do you care what they do, as long as it doesn't (physically) impact on you? I pretty much never get lined up by Lancers, Excels and the rest at a set of lights. The last time some random person gave me "the look" and decided to demonstrate how monumentously large their wang was by wheelspinning across an intersection, it was a pair of dimwits in an R34 GT-t and an R33 GTS-t. I'll let you make an educated guess as to if they were P platers.... The time before that.....some losers in a WRX and Silvias. Both times, I just let them go and thought nothing of it by the time they reached the horizon. I figure Skylines, WRXs and Silvias historically seem to be telegraph pole magnets anway, so hopefully everything will work itself out.

If I were to buy from that range, I'd want the convertible. While I realise the hard-top is faster, the classic British sports car is a roadster and for a street car I want fun. The Elise 111R is fast enough, and roofless motoring is always cool.

What Snoman said. I assumed from you asking for "semi comps" that you were after a motorsport tyre, for which the RT215s are not suitable. However, if you're just after something for "daily driving" street use, the RT215s will do a better job. They've got better wet weather grip and don't require as much heat. Its not impossible to get Comp R semi slicks up to temperature on the street, but generally it'll only be if you go on a fast-paced cruise or whatever. However, every time it rains you're in for an adventure. And the noise will drive you insane.

Fark, if I'd known about these before I ordered my new rims I'd definitely be interested. Good luck with the sale. What are the offsets, by the way?

If I look here at the product page, I can from this table the available sizes and offsets. If you're after dish, the lower the positive offset (i.e as close to +0 as possible) the more dish you'll get. Of course, you need to consider if they'll still fit under your guards.