ThomasSoerensen

got the first @*!# out. a Dayton navigation computer with screen that sat in my front cubby hole. I had the centre dash off and all and I did not break anything. Lost 1 screw though. I will find it when I take the whole thing apart :-) I'm a modder!!!!!!!! And I guess it counts as weight reduction. Probably a whole 1 kg or so.

I agree on the stripping of the interior as it should be cheap and DIY and even reversible if needed. I might even get a bit of extra headroom from removing the roof lining

I want to keep it street legal.

Hi all I am trying to draft a plan for my car for what modifications I would like to do but I am a bit stumped for ideas. Ideally the end result of all my mods would be a car that looks (almost) standard on the outside to the general public, but is a true racecar on the inside. I like to be stealth and not cause too much attention but I also like to feel like I am a race car driver. On the exterior I am going to black out everything apart from lights. Black badges will be ordered soon from Chili Red. But it is on the interior/feel side of things that I look for some ideas. I already have sufficient power for now with the super charger. And I upgraded the brakes to Dixcel discs and Ferodo pads in the summer so I feel the brakes are fine. I have the D-spec throttle controller (in setting SP7) and I love that a lot. The problem is that I live in Germany and most mods have to be approved by the TUV (a standards organisation that approves and tests a lot of things) So to feel like a race car I thought I should get a roll cage and a nice race bucket seat that sits me lower in order to make room for me wearing a helmet. (I'm 194cm tall) i then read in the German 350z forum that because of some rules for the seat mountings only some of the Recaro seats are approved for German street use. And I read that in those seats with the approved seat mountings you actually sit higher than in the standard electric seats. And there is no way I can sit in the std seats (or even higher) with a helmet on. As it is now I fill the car pretty well with my height. So the aftermarket seats seems to be not such a hot idea. And I read on the wise interweb forums that if I fit a roll cage I should definately have a 4 point harness and a helmet so as to not smash my skull on the roll cage if I have an accident. So a roll cage with the standard seats is not a good idea. Anyway I find the standard seats very comfortable for long drives and most of my driving is "normal" driving anyway. This race car feel is mainly for my little boy inside and for the occational laps on Hockenheimring or Nurburgring. But what else could I do that will improve the race car feel? I once took you the mats in the trunk and that made me hear more of the car from inside and I liked that. Should I go down the route of getting rid of the interior/sound deadening material? I would like that, but if you strip out the interior don't you get in trouble with the curtain airbags and stuff? So guys, do you have any ideas of modifications that could improve the race car feel and might be legal in Germany? - I can always check your suggestions for legality myself.

Hi all please be carefull if you have to drive the Zed in the morning after a night of snowfall. Yesterday evening we got a lot of snow here in the Frankfurt area, approx. 15 cm, and this morning I had to be very careful with the throttle because many small sideroads were snow compacted into ice. I almost had to change the D-Spec throttle controller away from SP7. So be carefull with the throttle. I was happily surprised about the brakes and ABS. It worked very well. cheers

Lenovo Thinkpads are very sturdy. Mine has been on a lot of flights and drives over the past 2 years and it is still very solid and does not even look used. I swear by lenovo ThinkPads. For computing power get a W model.

this is how to do a full lap of Road America - sideways!!!

I plan to pop over and meet up with you guys.

one option is to go to the Ring in our nice Zeds - once there - rent from RSR or rentracecar or one of the others, I think 200 EUR gets you a few laps in a Scirocco, then deliver rented car - then enjoy the rest of the day and area in the Zed.

Remember that the track is basically a public toll road which resuilts in loads of serious accidents, also there are long queues on most public days especially if the weather is good and if it is a public holiday or at weekends. There are many, many clubs that organise private events and these are much safer and better than the public days and are easy to sign up to. I personally would not go out on a public day. This might help you understand better what I am trying to say. http://www.rmatrackdays.com/?id=nurburgring It is not that bad on the public days. I have recently been there on 3 occasions and as long as you treat the track with respect and admit that you do not "know" it, and drive just like on a country road then we should all be more than fine. Just don't try to impress anyone, I have seen some of those return, on top of a pick up lorry with some dents in their UK reg BMW (usually). Regarding insurance, it has been discussed here. http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topi ... 0questions

Yep a set of TE37's should be a good one.

Welcome Luuk I am in Frankfurt so we could meet up for the Ring and Spa at some point

I see there are more wheels on page 2 in the original thread - I will update the file later tonight. The list is complete. the ones from the subsequent pages are repeated in the first post on the thread and they are all included in the excel file.

Hi all I found a great thread on wheel weights here http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=265756 And I thought id would be nice to have the weights in a list so I cooked up a small excel file. [attachment=0]Wheel weights.xls[/attachment] I always thought I had heard that BBS LM was one of the lightest wheels and that is why all the racing cars were using them. So I was quite surprised when I saw this. The weight is in US lbs. What do you guys think? Maybe if someone has additional weight data we can add to the file.

I think they are great. Good grip, reasonable price, durable.

I also thought it was a good idea for normal road use. I find it annoying to check pressures manually.

please remember that I live in the civilized part of the world ;-)

http://www.tiremoni.eu/ What do you guys think about this one? I can get the TM-100 incl 4 sensors on Amazon.de for 139 EUR. It seems sensible to me.

Mine have done 24000 km (15.000 miles) and they are fine. (approx 10mm in Front and 6mm on rears) 275/35/19 rear and 245/35/19 front. I have done mostly autobahn + 3 laps of the Ring :-)

and what would you recommend for a Supercharged engine? I have the Novidem supercharger based on a Garett R.48 increasing the output of the engine to 380 hp and 450 nm torque. I currently use 5W30 Shell (not sure if it is mineral or synthetic) and it does not use oil ( in 12000 km it has only reached the middle of the dipstick section H to L)

Hi I have a 2004 with now 104.000 km. Last time I had an oil change was at 92.000km. I went today to an oil change place (not a garage) and as soon as he saw that I had 5W30 oil he recommended that I only change oil circa every 30.000 km. This is a new schedule to me, has any of you guys heard anything similar? In the US servicing guide I believe I read that the service intervals for the premium service plans is every 6.000 km/3750 miles and it states to replace the engine oil and filter every time. Am I the only one who finds this inconsistency strange. I was just trying to take care of my car and now I am all confused. When the oil change guy checked the oil level it was perfectly in the middle in between H and L so in the 12.000 km I have driven since the last oil change it has not used much oil so I am not too worried. So have any of you guys heard of only changing 5W30 every 30.000 kms?

I just did this with 2 5EURcent coins i neach. Nice result. Good guide.

Sounds good. If you want a truly mental car I can only recommend the D1-spec Throttle controller

Welcome Nik It's nice to see another Super charged car. Do you have specs and stats? Tell tell.

thanks