Dicky

I get a slight rattle from my gear stick under heaven acceleration. I read somewhere that this is normal. Is it true?

Oooooooo drove through there myself a couple of weeks ago (in a Zafira though .....Ughhhh) hope you didn't speed though a mate told me it's a 40 zone ( as I recall) and they have cameras in there

It is a nice offer and if you think its genuine then take him up on it. BUT if they guy couldn't undo the nut I'd not trust him doing my tracking/alignment as he won't take the rap for ruining my tyres if he then does the alignment wrong. Point taken! cheers

Sorry for being out of step here ( I am a lot older than most) but that looks an absolute dogs dinner to me, it's trying far to hard! I'm now going to ground now until the flack dies down ha ha

Well, rang the service manager this morning and complained that the only item to be "seized" as they put it was the track rod locking nut. Told him it took me 5 mins to loosen it using a cheap B&Q gas bottle that was almost empty. He seemed furious that the tech assigned to the job had not used heat and having just returned from hol would investigate and discipline the guy. Told him I wasn't looking for a dismissal only to make sure the guy realised that some people do check their work. Anyway he said he will carry out the tracking free of charge, which is good and of course I'll accept, but I think my main dealer days are done now!

Ooooo that was interesting, thanks

We should start a campaign to discredit " main dealer service history" as a neccerary when selling our cars. Some may be decent but I've had new cars for 40 odd years now and used several dealerships and to be honest I don't have many good words to say about any of them. Weve become slaves to the industry's marketing machine and our own worst enemy's. They guy who fixes your car is several people deep into the organisation and he doesn't have to face your wrath should he do a poor job cos some other dip will get it when you bring it back. With a smaller company the guy doing the work is generally the one who faces you if they f--k up.

By the way Alex, thanks for your pm the other day about this. You now know the score And why I no longer need your track rods. Thanks anyway, your a very helpful guy!

Your quite right! The cars 10 yrs old now anyway but apart from that I believe people are getting fed up with these main dealers as most either rip you or turn out substandard work. They display all their course certificates, hang a telly on the wall, offer the odd cup of coffee and charge the earth. I can see now how they can afford to do all that. I think " main dealer service history" has had its day. As it happens I have a garage in mind that comes highly recommended by a pal of mine. The garage specialises in bmw's but they said they could do most of my work but I may have to go back to Nissan dealers if specialised equipment needed. Going to see him Monday.

That's interesting Fluke. It seems to have been a positive experience then. I believe Abbey's guys trained them so did you get the feeling they knew what they were about, did they seem to pay attention to detail and behave professionally ? I assume you can recommend them then?

Lost the back end in mine once, going around a long slow corner, wasn't going to fast either. Lost confidence after that. But since fitting 20mm spacers all round my confidence level has shot up as the car seems much more planted. Might be worth splashing out!

Bummer! But on the positive side........Fancying a curry tonight.....any chickens going spare!

Asked the stealer to check and adjust the tracking last Thur. They rang later saying the N/S track rod was seized so couldn't do it and would have to order a new one in (£91.90) (total job including tracking £189.84) Lifted the car this morning and using a crappy old B&Q gas bottle, heated the locking nut up next to the track rod end, after which it slackened off no probs. Now are they trying to pull the wool or could there be another point that's seized which needs to be adjusted during tracking set up ?

You could have humoured me a little first, ha ha

Anyone used Abbey m/s northern agent "TDI North" to have the UPREV done? Been putting off doing this for ages for various reasons, insurance hassle, is the car fast enough already, what if the engine gets damaged etc Now thinking the cars done 64k so better sooner than later. I'd really prefer to get Abbey to do it but their a bit to far down the road from Geordie land. Got the plenum spacer, new exhaust and the dosh so if TDI are as good may just go for it. Not really looking to go faster but would just like to know that the performance is optimumised. By the way how do you stand if during the remap the engine/other gets damaged, is it down to me or are these companies insured against such things. PS: could have sworn I posted this a couple of days ago so if I did and it's landed in the wrong place......apologies

UGGGGGGGGGGGGGLY

Oooooooow you've given me an idea Mr Jetpilot. If I did have an accident I could tell the insurance assessor that the wife must have had the car remapped while I was at the shops and I was completely unaware of it. Yeah that could work! ha ha

If I get my car remapped and say the initial run indicates 276bhp and the final dyno run matches the published oem figure 287bhp (I think that's what it is for a 2004 car) then is it fair to say there has been no gain?

Thanks for your input guys

That's interesting about the 10% bit, didn't know that. I've got the plenum spacer, but having to change Ins Co is a bit of a pain as mine won't insure you if the engine' s been tuned. I just thought that if the remap only achieved the oem figure then you should be Ok

From what I've read the 350z engine leaves the factory with the bhp output set to some arbitrary value but by no means optimised. If we later perform an UPREV we can achieve a bhp gain in some cases but not in all, being dependant upon how the engine left the factory. Also bhp can be lost as the engine ages, in this case the UPREV would at least return some and possibly approach the optimum. So now to my question! If I tell my insurance Co I've had the UPREV done can I argue that the engine performance has not been improved only optimised and as it should have been when it left the factory. They seem to accept some changes, typically with my cars new st st exhaust (made locally) without any penalty, so if the above reasoning holds should I be paying more for my insurance or not because of the UPREV?

Bugger Bugger Bugger, please tell me I'm not the oldest Z driving Chav on here ! Im now writing in a whispering manner but can't find a smaller font. I'm 66 but on the +ve side I'm devilishly good looking nd highly intelligent as well nd often get the eye from lady's in wheel chairs or pushing zimmers as I wheel spin past in the Z.....Ha ha

I fitted them after spinning the car one day going around a slow bend on a wet road. After fitting my cornering confidence has risen dramatically. They definitely make a big differance IMO. They look good on the car as well. One of my best mods!

Premier motors down Walker Gate just off the coast road have been good for me

If it looks like your going to have to pay for a respray why not have a go to repair it first, you've nothing to loose. I'm no expert but I would rub down the edges of the laquer with fine wet and dry. Any underlying paint work that' gets finely scratched during the process I'd polish that out using T cut. When it all looks normal again mask off where necessary and spray over the area with clear laquer. Once that drys go over it again with T cut to remove any edges left by the masking off. If it works, job done if not you've got the respray to fall back on. As I said I'm no expert but that's how I'd tackle it. However Id be concerned as to why the original laquer is flaking off in the first place. My bumper's pretty chipped and has been for a while but the laquers still holding up.