Chesterfield

It makes a fair bit of noise, well, a church bell comes to mind, so it would certainly be noticed if someone decided to use it at the dead of night to nick wheels. I have to say I was very impressed with it, and if I were purchasing manager for Kwik Fit or the like, Id be snapping their arm off.. I phoned 8 garages and two dealers, who all said they would have to chisel them off. Not what you want to hear.

Guys and Gals. Have you ever lost the key to your locking wheel nuts? Ever had to drill them off or try and get these things off by some other method? I have recently hadto do this, and let me tell you now, the standard mcgards on the Z are bloody hard. They are immune to hammering on a small socket and wrenching off. They are immune to the hardest drills, as they are made of carbon steel. Try chiseling and you are likely to damage your wheel and only shatter a small piece off. They are also immune to those new reverse threaded hardened steel sockets, as they have rotating tapered collars. I managed to get one of mine off with a good deal of hammering, swearing, drilling, twisting, more swearing and a few knocks to my alloy. And it took about 12 hours in total. Nissan said they would get the others off by more chiseling! Then I found this company: http://www.dynomec.co.uk/ They have a tool, which sells at around £125. Though a call to them resulted in an appointment with one of the owners/inventors who used this tool to remove the nuts in around 5 minutes flat. The tool did not touch the alloys, and more amazingly did not damage the nuts either! The AA have bought 2500 of these, and to be honest I am amazed that every garage on the face of the planet has not got one. If you own a garage and have ever been asked to get off locking wheel nuts, you have to buy one of these. End of. A big thanks to Dave at Dynomec, I can get my Rays on. And to Nissan dealerships. Buy one of these now.

Oh how the mighty fall.

Quite a few sites advertise plates that they do not own. They wait until someone puts an order in and then try to get it for as little as possible. Ive seen plates that I know people own, up for sale on sites before.

Just look for the teeth through the tinted glass.

They will never need that spoiler though. How would they be able to drive that fast while doing their lipstick?

So have we all seen it then? Looks like they started with the back end of a Z, tried to hammer it into the shape of a porshe 911 back end, then welded the whole lot to an A4 front. Not that hot on the looks in my opinion.

Cant the UK just set up a vigilante organisation that police can post details of peole like this to - perhaps an anonymous PO box. Then the matter can be taken care of, no questions asked, and the Police can rest easy knowing that they dont have to deal with folk like this again. It would save millions Im sure. And probably save lives too.

Its been that cold up until now that Ive never really seen anything other than the ruddy temperature! Below 3 (is it?) and it switches to that anyway. At least thats what it does on the UK guage, dont know if the JDM one does this too.

Thats where the spares are all the time. I suppose we could just put the others in there at night too. Im pretty confident that we will not be the first target on the estate, especially with at least three M3's, a couple of S4's and some new mercs on the dirves nearby, with not even a steering wheel lock on them! Ill park a tonne and a half of Golf in front of the garage that the Z is in, disclock them both and put the keys in the safe. Makes me mad that people just cant have decent things in life without some scumbag just taking them. It seems to be getting worse too.

Yes it was a colour we (myself and the missus) were interested in. But have never seen one. The car we sold to make way for the Z was red, and to be honest I think it looks very nice. Just we fancied a change, so Blue it was. I think its more just rare, rather than unpopular.

Looks good. I think there are other imobilisers that have keycodes as well. You type in a four digit code and it lets you drive off. type in the wrong code or "theft" code, and it lets you drive for three minutes or something. I suppose the one saving grace I have is that the Z is a fairly uncommon car, and although highly desireable, theives would have a hard time shifting it without notice, also there are M3's and New Merc SLK AMG's parked on the same road as me, and they leave them on the drive - mines in a garage, which although they can get in with the keys, would just make it that bit more difficult than simply driving the car off the drive. Plus, now I have taken delivery of the "emergency" tool to remove my locking wheel nuts, the car wont have any wheels on after tomorrow night. WHich may add just that little bit more difficulty for any pottential theives.

Ill be setting up my camera and PC stuff again. Its a set up that when it detects motion, starts taking pictures and uploading them to a web server. Even if they nick the camera or smash the computer the images are stored on a web server for retreival later. So much for the government being tough on crime eh? Just think - Im 19 stone, have a baseball bat and a katana, and live just 30 meters from a nice park with lots of wooded areas etc.. Guess where any moron coming upstairs for my keys is ending up.

Just had a tip off from the police that there is a group from the Manor estate (those near sheffield will know about it). Targetting vehicles on our estate in Chesterfield. Whilst we were away an Audi A4 was nicked. Aparently they are the "break the door down and swipe the keys" type of gang. So, looks like the keys are being taken upstairs, and my katana is coming out on standby. Before I got home the other day, the missus took a photo of two dodgy looking geezers who had pulled up at the side of our house and were looking it over.

heres my guess...

We do have a few members from the US, but as the US is fairly large, it would be coincidence to have someone from L.A. here. I was in Vegas a week ago and saw at least half a dozen Z's, so they seem to be popular out there, I would assume that there are a few owners in and around the L.A area. 350z-tech.com may be a good place to start? They are US based and may be able to point you in the direction of any other L.A members they know of. Be sure to post up pictures if you do get a meet organised - it would be great to see pics from our friends on the other side of the pond.

Timber protection is a must from the start, in orderto prevent greying. I swear I spend haf my waking life in B&Q - my other hobby is DIY. Thanks for all the comments folks, its nice to know you enjoy the site, and, as always if theres something you feel could be improved, or even somehing brand new you think would benefit the site - just pipe up, and we will see what can be done.

Good idea!

Hmmm I have brown hair and am curvy. Just like the Michelin man. You dont have to make a rod for your own back, anyone who fancies organising meets in their regional area can become a meets organiser. If anyone is interested in sorting out regular (or irregular) meets in their area, let us know. People who want to attend a meet could then contact that particular person for their area for info, instead of having the admins or mods try and organise the entire UK.

A littlw searching on the net provided these figures... Sorry, no figures on the Miltek. Legal Limit in the UK is 110db as far as I can see from various parts on the web. TYPE- - - - - - db@IDLE - - - - -db@3K RPM Standard - - - 81db- - - - - - - - 89 db 5Zigen- - - - - 87db- - - - - - - - 105db Injen- - - - - - 83db- - - - - - - - 99db Nismo- - - - - 84db- - - - - - - - -95db Stillen- - - - - 84db- - - - - - - - -93db Borla- - - - - -88db- - - - - - - - -92db

Well if there are 15 cars attending, it would be rude of me not to attend, its only a trip over the snake pass to Manchester for me. So - who wants the title of NW meets organiser?

Oi, I have a MK4 golf... Though mine still has all its standard parts in tact!

As far as I am aware the LED lights can be retro fitted, but there is some confusion over whether the wiring clips will need modification. Even if the wiring clips need slight changes made, or complete cutting and refitting, the job should be relatively straight forward. I too have my eyes on a set of these LED lights, but I have yet to see a set in the flesh, so will reserve judgement. Some LED lights can look a bit naff in my opinion, while others really do look nice. If I like them, then a set will be going on mine at some point.

You certainly know your oil! Thats some good info. I suppose thats why my oil pressure is quite high if the revs go over 3500 inside the first few minutes of driving - i.e. before it warms up thoroughly, Once its warm, the pressure gauge does not regsiter as high during acceleration.

I hope the following post will provide people with an insight into how this site came to exist, and the reasons for its existence. It may be long, but I hope that if people take the time to read it, they will gain an understanding of our community, and how it came to be. Please dont let this thread turn into another keyboard war, so far it has been a great discussion, perhaps one of the most reasoned discussions of this issue for some time. Anyway, here goes.... I don't proffess to know the "goals" of the other side, so cannot state whether we are heading toward different ones to the other site or not. I can simply speak for this site. There seems to be some train of thought by people on both sites that 350z-uk.com was created with the sole purpose being competition or as grounds for a battle. It wasn't. This site was originally created by myself, on my own lowly personal webspce that I got free with my ISP. It wasn't even called 350z-uk.com. In fact I couldnt think of a name for it. So there was no logo or name. LOL. I had created a forum on my personal web space as a personal challenge to understand phpbb, and how to manage a forum. It was only due to the fact that I had recently purchased a 350z that I decided to try and theme it around my car. Had I decided to learn phpbb a few months earlier, it could very well have been about decking. I became member of the "old" 350Z site just a few weeks before it closed. I had owned the car about a week when it finally closed. I did read the posts and arguments for and against an "owners" club, where people would have to pay to be a "full" member. I personally had, or at least the missus had, been a member of the MX-5 owners club previously, and to be honest we werent all that impressed with what we got. Sure it was only a few quid, but Im just one of those people that wants the moon on a stick, for the price of a lollipop. So I wasn't too thrilled with the idea of a paying club. Now I'm not stating that the 350Z owners club would or will turn out to be the same. Had my experience of the MX-5 club been very positive, then my feelings would have probably been different, but we all draw assumptions in life from our previous experiences, so thats what I did. I was quite dissapointed at this point, because I had been (and still am) a member of www.uk-mkivs.net for my VW Golf. A great forum, with discounts, meets, trips to the nurburgring etc etc.. and it was all available for free. Therefore I had really been overjoyed when I found that there was a similar forum for my newly bought Z, though when I found out about its pending closure, and rebirth as a paying members club, my experience of the MX-5 owners club just made me feel like the rug had been pulled from under my feet just as I had bought my new Z. Therefore I became a recluse for a while, working on my own site, and I emailed someone else that was upset at the old site closure to see if they wanted to help with my forum. I thought it was a daft idea. It would never work. Of course people would follow the crowd, and my site would be nothing more than a personal hobby, and full of my own posts about "where I went with my Z today". But then something strange happened. Someone else joined. Then another. And another.. This cant carry on I thought. Why are all thes people joining? My site is rubbish, theres only five of us.. Then more.. and more.. Soon I needed to ask one of the first who joined if they wanted to help me manage it, and they did. We then decided that as people were joining we needed a name, and it was decided that we needed something short, and yes, it was similar to the old name, but people thought that this didn't really matter, the name represented what we were. Which at the time was a group of about 20 owners or enthusiasts. Thats it I thought, a small group of people who may one day drift off, or decide they want to be part of the new paying club that had been set up. Then it continued to grow. We had to move to a host we need to pay for, and people offered to pay for it! Then we moved again and more people offered to chip in. The rest, as they say, is history. I never thought this place would attract as many members as we have, and it continues to gain more every day. It seems that what has been created is a site that people enjoy. Something I feel proud of, and Im sure the other Moderators and Admins do too. It was never created for the sole purpose of competition or as a platform to start arguments from. It was created by a group of people who wanted to share with others their suport and enjoyment of what is a fantastic car. It now transpires there are quite a number of those people who want to do the same! So there you go. Thats how this place was born. Some may say I created a monster, others may want to give me a hug for doing it (though if you see me you wont!). It now looks the way it does because of help from lots of others, a true group effort. Whatever your stance on our existence, it is here because of continued input from the people who have given their time to post here. It is down to each and every person that has ever taken the time to make a post on this board that we continue to grow. For my part, I thank you all, it is great to see this site continue to grow, and continue to gain more benefits for those that have taken the time to sign up. I look forward to a great future and sharing my enjoyment of the best car Ive ever bought with like minded individuals, whatever communities they are part of. Chris.