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The Caravan Catcher v3.0 (370z) - MY17 Nismo!


mattross1313

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Just back from getting the alignment done after installing the springs. A few owners on here fit springs without camber arms, so I went with that to see how it came out. The camber is maxed out at 2 rear and 1.5 fronts, with all other adjustments correctly setup. They are all in tolerance, just barely, so will run like this for now and if needed in the future will reduce some of the camber with arms. But it drives nicely ATM so not toooo bothered, as long as I don't chew through too many tyres.

Had an amusing conversation with the guy once he had completed the alignment -

 

Guy - 'Have you lowered this?'

Me - 'Yes, had springs fitted earlier this week'

Guy - 'Yeah, you've broken it....'

 

:lol: He didn't like the lack of adjustment on the rear hehe.

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Just back from getting the alignment done after installing the springs. A few owners on here fit springs without camber arms, so I went with that to see how it came out. The camber is maxed out at 2 rear and 1.5 fronts, with all other adjustments correctly setup. They are all in tolerance, just barely, so will run like this for now and if needed in the future will reduce some of the camber with arms. But it drives nicely ATM so not toooo bothered, as long as I don't chew through too many tyres.

Had an amusing conversation with the guy once he had completed the alignment -

 

Guy - 'Have you lowered this?'

Me - 'Yes, had springs fitted earlier this week'

Guy - 'Yeah, you've broken it....'

 

:lol: He didn't like the lack of adjustment on the rear hehe.

 

Same spec as mine mate and I got 15k out of my Potenza's

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  • 2 weeks later...

The car went in for it's P2 service this week at Nissan. Had all the usual items done, along with brake fuild (as it was black), and clutch fluid as the mechanic thought this had never been done!! Came out with a good feedback from the mechanic. Just need to replace the brake pads all round (already ordered), and the rear tyres are low to the limit - pretty standard if you ask me :lol: Fronts are also a tad perished so will be ordering up Falken 453's all round, or maybe Goodyears.

 

This may well bring the wheel refurb forward a few months too as I don't see the point is paying someone to fit 4 new tyres now. To then get them taken off by the refurb place a few months later. I have done the man maths on this and I am effectively saving myself £40 on the refurb (assuming the garage charge £10 per wheel to swap a tyre over). Man maths FTW! Just need to decide on the final colour once the refurb guys do some test wheels for me.

 

So, the car is ready for Japfest! The better half kindly booked the car in for a detail yesterday as a birthday present :) The guy does some great work (will try and get some of his pictures and post them up later). The car has literally never been so clean since I have owned it!! The colour is amazing when the sun hits it. I gave the interior a good clean today, wiped over the engine bay, and gave the ARK a good polish. So happy with the car at the moment :D

 

As predicted with a detail session booked - it rained.....ALL day! Emergency Gazebo the rescue!

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BEFORE

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AFTER

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Also, now with the car being so low it was a faff to clean the exhaust. So made my own mini ramps with some wood I had knocking about. Much less hassle than having to jack the car up etc etc. Just high enough to get under and reach the ARK.

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I started researching audio options recently in an attempt to find a neat way of getting audio from my phone into the aux input. The solution since I bought the car was a simple 3.5mm ->3.5mm cable plugging my phone into the car. This was great but my phone had to live in the centre storage area which meant changing tracks was a PITA. I found this neat ANKER bluetooth -> 3.5mm jack unit with its own USB power plug. So I am charging it via the 12v power socket in the centre storage area, then pluggin the 3.5mm jack right next to it. I mounted the bluetooth unit above the heater controls (might move it but will see how I get on). The phone can now live up on the windscreen but I dont have to interact with it while driving. The Bluetooth unit connects on one press and allows me to use SIRI (never do really), but more importantly can skip tracks easier. Sound quality is pretty decent, and for £10 it's more than enough B)

 

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Look forward to seeing some other Zeds tomorrow at Silverstone :D

Edited by mattross1313
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Good to see you guys today, all be it briefly :lol:

 

Was a good day with heaps of nice cars to have a nose around! Quick snap of mine as it is still nice and clean (won't last!). Some lovely Zeds on show, I may have been the only LeMans blue - unless I missed one, which is more than likely given the size of the show!

 

IMG_9752-2.jpg

Edited by mattross1313
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  • 4 weeks later...

Stunning colour mate, new to the forum, just wondered what the ride comfort was like with your lowering springs. It looks like a perfect height, but I didn't want to sacrifice ride comfort.

 

Hi Tom. The ride with the lowered springs is slightly stiffer than the stock suspension but overall I am very pleased. I was expecting the new setup to be a much firmer ride but it is still pretty soft all things considered. You will find that your front chin spoiler will catch on everything, but its only a bit of plastic so not the end of the world :)

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Stunning colour mate, new to the forum, just wondered what the ride comfort was like with your lowering springs. It looks like a perfect height, but I didn't want to sacrifice ride comfort.

 

Hi Tom. The ride with the lowered springs is slightly stiffer than the stock suspension but overall I am very pleased. I was expecting the new setup to be a much firmer ride but it is still pretty soft all things considered. You will find that your front chin spoiler will catch on everything, but its only a bit of plastic so not the end of the world :)

 

Cheers mate, yeahh i've read alot of posts on here saying the small wheel wind deflectors at the front always rub.

Cheers for that

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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Quick update. I popped to a friends over the bank holiday weekend to get my brake pads swapped over as they were advised as being low on my recent service. Took us an age to get the pins out of the caliper's as 40k miles of brake dust had pretty much locked them in place. After much fuss, we had everything swapped over and the car is driving well again. Obligatory comparison picture below - my old pads were just about to this the wear marker so good timing all in all.

 

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Not so good update. I am a complete tw@ and when reversing earlier this morning managed to shatter my rear light cluster. Luckily the cluster was the only part of the car that took damage - all paint work I think is OK, which I guess I can be thankful for as it would be a different situation should I have bent the boot lid or rear quarter. Just sourcing a replacement second hand unit at the moment as option 1, the other option is to get a new case/shell from Nissan at similar cost and swap over my clusters electrics.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Picked up the new light from Nissan this week and found time over the weekend to fit. Was a pretty easy job all said and done.

Had a tip from a mechanic at Nissan to treat any rust under the rear lights whilst I was swapping them over. Apparently as the car drives/flexes one part of the light lightly rubs against the bodywork and can cause rust. Quick fix is to flat it back with wet&dry then cover with anti rust treatment. So whilst replacing my damaged drivers side lamp, I quickly whipped the passenger side to treat any rust.

Sure enough both sides had a very smaller spot of surface rust, got rid of that and covered over the area before re-fitting the lights once dry. Also gave the area a good wipe down and clean as it was pretty mucky.

Car is now back all present and correct :D .....pesky caravans :lol:

 

You can almost see the spot of surface rust to the lower left of pic, just above the plastic trim.

 

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Edited by mattross1313
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  • 3 weeks later...

Pretty special treat this weekend. Attended the air show and got to take some pics afterwards with the C-17 Globemaster that flew over from the US for the show. This thing was unbelievable!! The sheer size of it!! Got to have a walk through the plane during the day which was great and chat/beer with the crew. Any way, some cracking pictures :D

 

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Grabbed this one too whilst we pretty much had the runway to ourselves!! Don't think I've ever been so tempted to launch the car! :D

 

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  • 1 month later...

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