pixel8r

oops...shouldn't post after long boring day at work...I'll attempt to fix up my own post (rather than edit it since that would mean Jetwreck's post wouldn't make sense) brain fart #1 - stagea is actually 1658kg making it only ~145kw/tonne. oops...how can they both be 180 rw if one is 240 and the other is 270? the stagea would indeed have less power at the wheels...sorry. My guess would be roughly 170-180rwkw for the stagea (if 240kw atc) and 210rwkw for the ss? not sure what drivetrain loss the ss sportwagon has... I'm assuming the RWD one is losing some traction at takeoff...and this is from one member's experience on the 1/4 mile. In stock form a RWD stagea may not lose traction in which case RWD would be slightly quicker. I'd still take the AWD any day of the week though. re: traction control - wouldn't this just cut power whenever the wheels slipped, meaning the car would stutter a lot before finally getting going? IMO traction control is a fantastic idea that is implemented very badly on most cars that have it...

I've run nothing but BP ultimate in it, at least for the past 3 months. ECU has been reset recently - no difference. Only thing I can try is o2 sensor - but I'm guessing that is near impossible to do myself on the M35 - can anyone confirm this? Other than that, its really not worth my while taking it to a workshop for the sake of hoping for ~1-2L/100km improvement - which is why I was looking at DIY options...if I cant improve it I'll just put up with it. I've heard a LOT of good stuff about the subaru engine cleaner. I'll give it a whirl next service - which should be due in the next few months.

SS sportwagon is only 270kw (according to redbook). using your figures - 240kw/1600kg = 150kw/tonne (ss sportwagon = 270kw/1797kg = 151kw/tonne) - its right on the money. you're also confusing AWkw with RWkw. As a rough guide, removing the front driveshaft in the stagea will give you approx 20kw extra - so if you want to compare power figures at the wheels, it would be ~180rwkw for either car. But its not that simple. If you were to compare 2 otherwise identical stageas, one with front driveshaft removed, one with it in, the AWD one would be faster. The traction benefits of AWD outweighs any drivetrain loss. Continuing with the comparison, a turbo car will rev faster than a v8 once its on boost, meaning its into the peak of its torque curve much sooner. The v8 may have a slight advantage off the line due to more torque at low revs, but that is also offset by the increased wheelspin...the torque of the v8 is a 2-edged sword here. If you're on a drag strip then wheelspin would be minimal due to the stickiness of the road surface but on a normal road I'd suggest wheelspin would be difficult to keep under control in a v8, and non-existent in the stagea. I'm not saying I agree that a stock manual s2 is as fast as a 6L V8 sportwagon, but the above figures suggest that you shouldn't need to modify a stagea all that much in order to match it (obviously comparing auto with auto or manual with manual) Another point to make is that in the original review - both cars were auto. However I still disagree with the performance figures in the review. The stagea figures are about 1second too optimistic in both cases.

Thought I'd dig up this old thread... Went from 14.4L/100kms to 13L/100kms just by putting new tyres on the car. The old ones (Firenza = crap) made a lot of road noise and basically would've had higher rolling resistance. The new TOYO's are super comfy and quiet too. Highly recommended!! I'd still like to improve on 13L/100km if possible - just because that was kind of a "best case" figure - after babying the car around for a week. I recently came across a thread in the V35 section talking about all the carbon build-up in the intake manifold and how it can affect things like power and fuel economy. I intend to try the "subaru upper engine cleaner" sometime to see if that helps without having to take it all apart. Today I grabbed some caltex techron 5000 ($13 from any caltex servo) and put it in the tank to see how that goes... Apparently this stuff is also added into Caltex Vortex & Vortex 98 fuels (in much smaller qtys) as a cleaning agent - maybe why some people mentioned black stuff coming out the exhaust when using this fuel?? Could be cleaning all the crap out of the engine? The caltex down the road from where I live has just got Vortex 98 so I think I'll give that another go to see if it improves with ongoing use. Just some little things that should hopefully clean up the engine internals can only be a good thing. Has anyone else used the subaru upper engine cleaner? where do you spray it in? is there any reason not to use it on the M35?

Not sure if they know them inside and out but I've had my M35 stagea auto box serviced here... http://www.wsautomatics.com.au Located at Rocklea. They seem to know their stuff ok.

Have to disagree. The ford XR6T's have 533N-m at just 2000rpm compared to 530N-m at 4400rpm in the SS. The ford 6 turbo would be quicker as it reaches peak torque much sooner. The weight of both is pretty similar too. Adding to that - in both cases, all of this torque at low revs means both these RWD cars are just going to sit there spinning the wheels on anything but a dry & sticky drag strip. The turbo would have an advantage in that the car is off the line and in motion before the turbo (and hence the full amount of torque) kicks in.

Just checked out the 2006 (blue) one on their website. 350RX model. The wheels are the same as previous M35's - no difference there. The dash is much improved - including the gear lever - looks very nice Even the clock section is slightly different... Also noticed this model has the powerduct fitted already - is this a factory item on the n/a models? I do like the improved styling of the front grille/lights etc. Its subtle but looks much nicer

I thought the VQ25DET was the only turbo model of the M35 and only available until 2003? The later model M35 is n/a only.

You raise a valid point. My speedo is out by around 7% so that when it says 100 I'm actually only doing about 93. I wonder if they factored that kind of thing into their timing. Smaller wheels would exaggerate this even further...

Surely the 14sec 1/4 is slow for the V8 though...because the M35 realistically can do just below 7sec 0-100 and just under 15 sec down the 1/4 mile - which is pretty good if you consider the M35 is running about half the displacement of the V8 (even if you factor in boost). I think a fairer comparison would be the new 3.6L SIDI VE wagon. Still way more expensive, although if you wait 6-8 years it may be around the same price as our stags on the 2nd hand market. M35 2.5T = 206(+)kw @ 6400rpm & 407N-m @ 3200rpm - 1680kg = 122.6 kw/tonne VE 3.6L = 210kw @ 6400rpm & 350N-m @ 2900rpm - 1767kg = 118.8 kw/tonne Another interesting one (even though we cant get it here) is the VQ30DD (direct injection) model. M35 3L DI = 190kw @ 6400rpm & 324N-m @ 3600rpm VE 3.0L DI = 190kw @ 6700rpm & 290N-m @ 2900rpm Who said 6 years newer tech? the M35 3L direct injection came out in 2001 with the same power (at lower revs) and more torque than the VE in 2009. Fuel economy in this model M35 is also very good. One owner on here was getting less than 10L/100km in city driving alone - whereas the 3L VE is listed as 12L/100km. I cant compare the "ADR combined" fuel economy figure because the M35 doesn't have one.

Not a big deal on a road car - that review never mentioned racing on a circuit Haha, yeah, but the other way... Find me something any Holden has that Nissan or some other Jap manufacturer didn't invent in the 90's. agreed...but is the VE one better? Yep, such as: * no awd (= traction issues in the wet that gets worse the more torque you have) * no climate control * lack of boot space (the review says it has more but I disagree - the M35 has loads of room under the boot as well as the full use of all boot space to the roof due to the rear boot shape). * fuel usage * no turbo * excessive price I've been through this exercise many times, especially when deciding on the M35 vs another car. No other car can offer ALL of the features of the M35 (or C34 for that matter) at anywhere near the price.

Ok - there you go. I wouldn't be surprised if it was modified - 5.6sec 0-100km seems a little low for me. Maybe I'm just not familiar with the VE SS? The thing is the new sportwagon with the V6 SIDI (wondering if holden know of anything other than "spark ignition" but we'll let them think they have something special) has similar specs on paper to the M35...but it's heavier. A guy at work here who has one proudly asked me the specs of my M35 and became a little less enthusiastic thereafter...still, in the mind of the average holden enthusiast - 4 extra kw means the holden is faster right? I'd agree with all the comments made regarding ride & handling, the M35 really does drive so much nicer than any other wagon I've ever been in. I'm willing to bet that if the M35 was sold here locally it would be more often compared with the likes of VW, Subaru, Audi, BMW than Ford/Holden.

http://www.testdrivenau.co.cc/?p=553 I'm guessing the M35 they tested was slightly modified - as is visible by the non-standard exhaust and rims. However going by the comments made regarding turbo noise, I'd say the turbo itself was the factory item. This also means that boost is likely to be unmodified and therefore there is no reason to believe there are any other modifications to the engine/driveline. Some impressive performance stats, but it still leaves me wondering - because I doubt very much my (stock) M35 would come close...

This is true for the M35 but not sure about the C34. The M35's have a similar turbo but run slightly higher boost (11.7psi for RS/RX and 15? for ARX) so presumably this would have an effect on the lifespan of the turbo. Mine has now done nearly 110,000 and the turbo still appears to be going strong (completely stock). Fingers crossed. So far the only actual diagnosed "fault" has been the throttle body getting clogged up making the butterfly a bit sticky - which caused it to stall occasionally. I cleaned it out myself, carried out the idle-relearn procedure (see the DIY/howto thread at the top of the stagea section) and it was all fixed. Total Cost: $0 The kms on my M35 stagea are more than likely genuine since I imported it through someone I know and trust, and who has been dealing with the same agents in japan for years. My last stagea was a series 2 which I bought from a dealer on the Gold Coast. 28000kms for a 1999 model seemed a bit too far fetched - however it did go all the way to 100,000km without the timing belt breaking so either they changed it before I got it, or it had really done somewhere around 128,000km. Interior condition was very good - however there was a slight oil leak from the rocker cover.... That stagea proved to be pretty reliable although it did have a cracked exhaust manifold and suspect turbo, both which needed replacing. One of the shock absorbers also needed replacing - which was done under dealer warranty. Other than these initial problems (which existed when I bought the car), I really had no major issues at all in the 2 years I owned the car.

Oh lets get all technical about it..... Autos do generally have a quite inflated torque readout on a dyno and this value is usually completely meaningless unless the dyno is set up with all the parameters specific to that car's gearing etc (which is never going to be the case). As far as "multiplying torque" what I meant was - when taking off from a standing start, ie where engine speed is much higher than the transmission speed, the torque converter actually multiplies the torque of the engine by 2 or 3 times. http://auto.howstuffworks.com/auto-parts/t...-converter4.htm

Just thinking aloud - the speed of the air would be higher through a more narrow opening than through a larger one. If the overall pressure is reduced, then even though there is more air, it may well be flowing slower. Of course, if the pressure is the same as before, then the air will be faster (ie. more air, same pressure = higher velocity)...but the point being made is that the turbo will spool later - which _could_ happen if there is less overall pressure due to the increased volume in the plenum. Does that make sense? However.....IF this extra volume in the plenum helps the engine to breathe better etc, you may well find it revs FASTER, therefore getting onto boost SOONER albeit just higher in the revs... Just throwing some ideas around - I'm sure you've already done the same while you were thinking about it

sorry - I was incorrectly interpreting the formula... torque = power / revs So basically this is why on a dyno graph, the power curve will be steeper up until max torque, at which point it starts to flatten out. I was getting confused thinking that the torque curve of a turbo car is very different to a non-turbo car...(but was forgetting the power curve is also different and corresponds to the torque curve) and also that the power/torque characteristics of petrol cars is very different to diesel cars...then when I used your formula I must've typed something wrong... But I got it now. Disappointingly, my stagea reaches 407N-m at just 3200rpm but by the time it hits 6400rpm (peak power) the torque will have dropped back to just 307N-m or thereabouts. Of course this is assuming the 206kw is correct at 6400rpm...(which it most likely isn't). I realise this. Just got confused trying to translate that into the formulas. I got stuck thinking how can torque go down if both power and revs are going up? Then I realised that obviously power is increasing by a lesser rate than revs...meaning torque will decrease. as an aside, the torque readout on a dyno (especially on an auto) is usually fairly meaningless....because its measuring your entire drivetrain, not just the engine. You'll never get the figures quoted from the factory, and with an auto the torque converter often multiplies torque...making it even less useful in any comparison...

Funny that - on a skyline forum and all. I've seen the opposite, ppl will bag nissans to impress the rich guy (NOT referring to the starter of this thread) - although comments in this thread have been pretty fair mostly...on both sides. I think what you have to remember is that the cars people prefer are not often the best in their category. Many of us like nissans because we own and relate to them. Whilst most of us couldn't afford an R35, we still feel proud that the same company that built the car we drive now could build something special like the R35. Sometimes this proudness clouds the better judgement and thats why people (myself included) will stick up for nissan well past the point where its competition is better.

How does that work? there are cars with much less power than mine that get more torque at a lower engine speed... also, it doesn't really work on turbo cars because torque output reaches its maximum long before the engine reaches max power output - after reaching max torque, the torque output actually decreases as both power and engine rpm increase... maybe i'm reading it wrong? torque would need to factor in (overall/effective) engine displacement and also the energy contained per qty of fuel used etc.

JDM makes a lot of sense when referring to cars like the R35 GTR which also has an ADM (australian domestic market) version. The other reason to use JDM is because some of our imports were ONLY available for the japanese domestic market, and were specifically designed for it. The stagea is one example of this. It wasn't sold outside japan at all. That said, I would only use the term to differentiate between versions of the same car...

ouch!

I thought this was no longer the case. I've been told the V8 supercars are actually bigger than their road car cousins and really they are a dedicated race car that is shaped and painted to "look" like the road cars...but the resemblence stops there. The V8's on qualifying laps get around 2:08 and sometimes high 2:07's but when you consider the differences between them and the R34GTR, that 2:13 is very very impressive. nice work!!

You will find the search feature very useful to answer most such questions...as I'm sure this sort of thing has been covered a lot of times before... However, to get you started: S1: - shares the engine, gearbox and related parts with R33 S2 (1996 onwards) S2: - shares the engine, gearbox and related parts with R34 S1 Both S1 and S2 use the ATTESA AWD system from the R33 GTR (although modified to suit the stagea). Other than the above, both s1 and s2 are very similar. Externally the only differences are the front grille & bonnet shape, the rear indicator colour, and the standard rims. Internally there's even less difference. If you need more info than that, the search function is your friend

Correction - diesel is not really a by-product of petrol. It is refined in a separate process. Sure, diesel might be produced FROM a by-product of petrol, but in the same way, if diesel was more popular, then we could also say that petrol was a by-product of diesel. Its just that both come from crude oil. As an aside, diesel requires more crude oil to produce than petrol. This is likely outweighed by the better fuel economy of diesel cars, but only if they actually do have better fuel economy and are driven accordingly. But the fact remains that even with the DPF's, the particulates output is still much higher than with a petrol engine. The Nitrogen and Sulpher oxides have been reduced in what they call "clean diesel" - but that diesel requires even more crude oil than normal diesel did before.... Basically if all things are considered, I see petrol and diesel as both being potentially clean-ish fuels, and both roughly equal in terms of environmental damage. If we could produce more efficient petrol powered cars, this would give petrol the advantage. 1L of petrol produces less CO2 than 1L of diesel. There are already some petrol-powered cars with better fuel economy than their diesel equivalents. Conversely, if we could eliminate 99% of the harmful particulates from diesel, this would give diesel the advantage (bio-diesel is an interesting area to look into). Note that the damage caused by particulates is known and documented, whereas the damage caused by CO2 is still being investigated. I found this interesting: http://www.slate.com/id/2187806/ Neither fuel is renewable though...so really I guess it doesn't matter which is better, and another reason why I think neither should be touted as the new "green" fuel. Even bio-fuels are not sustainable, because if everyone switched to (m)ethanol-based fuels, the demand would far exceed supply. For example, there isn't enough land available to farm enough sugar-cane to produce ethanol for even half the number of cars on the road. There are much better ways to produce ethanol than sugar cane, but the supply/demand argument still applies. I'm not saying diesel is bad at all - just trying to provide a more balanced argument than all the 1-sided marketing hype from car manufacturers these days. If you paid them enough money they'd promote jelly-beans as the new clean fuel.

Is this "family" car required for a "new" family or older family? I dunno about you guys but the amount of stuff I regularly need to cart around in the boot of my stag would never fit in a sedan (not without things getting broken). You can survive with a sedan, but I reckon boot space is one of those things you never think you need, until you have it - and then you'll never go back.