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Stans Roadster


Stan

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So I picked up my 56-plate roadster a month ago yesterday, thought I'd start a modding thread (just so I can keep track of what I've done really!)

 

Here it is bog standard when I got her. It had everything I wanted which was facelift, low mileage, sat nav and the GT pack:

 

q6aof2M.jpg

 

 

The first thing I did was order a few things from Tarmac, specifically a popcharger (pics later), stubby aerial and a new Z badge for the front. However while I waited for those to arrive, I treated her to a bit of a machine polish and mini-detail. I am a bit of a hobby detailer as evident from my garage :p

 

fGbPx2Z.jpg

 

To be honest there wasn't much to do paintwise, but it was mainly the odd things like dressing all the plastics, plastic polishing the lights, degreasing the engine bay a bit and ensuring it had a good polish before a layer of glaze and couple of coats of wax. This should keep it ok until the weather is a lot better when I can strip it and start from scratch.

 

My Tarmac order arrived so I got them installed, pretty easy really, even the popcharger (although I did follow a guide :D )

 

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The next thing I did was to order a load of LED lighting to replace pretty much everything I could on the car. I tried to get LEDs with SMDs that were 5630 size as they are brighter than the 5050 size because they cover more area on the board.

 

 

These 2 are both 501 type, the top ones are shorter as they fit in the number plate lights and boot light. The longer ones fit the front sidelights:

 

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Installed sidelight:

 

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These are just the sidelights in my garage, pretty bright!

 

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The numberplate lights are pretty good too.

 

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And here is the boot one

 

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I also got a couple of 31mm festoons with the 5630 SMDs for the interior lights. They almost light it up as if it was daytime (pic was taken in complete darkness):

 

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And to finish it off, a couple of 29mm vanity lights. I could only get these with the 5050 SMDs though, but they are still pretty good:

 

2p7NiDC.jpg

 

yNkrFRU.jpg

Edited by Stan
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Next up was to tackle the more expensive bulbs to replace, the rear indicators/reverse and side indicators. Whilst I was changing these, I also ordered some smoked sidelights:

 

TxxA6VY.jpg

 

The side indicators are still 501 size but with 30x amber 5630 chips on them, so pretty bright. I tried to get a pic but it was so bright my camera just made it look arty!

 

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The rears are harder to find (and more expensive!), being a 7440 bulb there isn't a lot of choice if you want SMD LEDs on them, but I got a pair of 50w ambers and a single 50w white for the reverse

 

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No pics of them working but you can take my word they are pretty bright when they are. Quite easy to fit as well once you remove your rear lights, even for me with big hands!

 

I haven't tackled the front indicators yet due to how hard it is to get to them, so they are in the pipeline! :)

 

 

The next thing I ordered after a recommendation from someone I know on my old Supra forum was a D1 Spec Throttle Controller. I followed a very helpful guide on here on how to install and was up and running in about 1/2 hour. I also mounted it by my A pillar so I can alter it on the fly. Only had a couple of runs at SP7 and it was pretty impressive! I keep it on EC5 for general day to day driving and don't notice it altering my driving at all which is good.

 

pcYU0Wt.jpg

 

 

A few days after that my new gearknob arrived from the states, and I had a gaiter that I had ordered the week before, so I fitted those. Suffice to say despite following the guides on here, the old knob was a :rant::angry: to take off lol and I pretty much wrecked it with the mole grips, but at least the replacement bits were nice and easy to put back on:

 

N9zSn8k.jpg

 

 

The latest things that I put on last weekend were some carbon bonnet lifters that I got from Redline Styling, a generic oil catch can from eBay, and thanks to Moped Mark a core strut brace with the edges done in Azure blue B) . You can also see the popcharger installed.

 

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Again following a guide the catch can was a doddle to fit. The only change I made was to order some more reinforced tubing to go with the can, as the supplied tubing was (a) too large for the plenum attachments, and (B) seemed to collapse upon itself on tickover.

 

 

And not really a 'mod' as such, but I finally found an OBDII connector that works with the 350z after going through a couple of duds, so here is the Torque app running whilst the car is ticking over:

 

qsozfP7.jpg

 

There are more parameters you can monitor, but I have gone for MAF, coolant temp, intake temp, revs and throttle position. It's quite a handy tool for a small outlay (£20 for the connector and a few quid for the app).

 

 

Got a few more things on order (blue bolt kit for the engine bay, blue D1 spec wheel nuts and a cooling plate) so watch this space...

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Same color roadster as me. I do like your mods,I'm resisting spending any more on mine this year. But I have been considering the lamp change. Where did you get yours from.

 

Do you mean the bulbs? They are all from the good old eBay, but not the cheaper ones on there though, as the 5630 LEDs seem to cost more!

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Looking good dude. Where did you get the new gearknob from and gaiter. They look really nice. Might put them on my b-day list for someone to buy me. B)

 

Got them from eBay, quite cheap as well, £12 for the gaiter (item 301373916396) and £22 for the knob from USA (item 111896789680)

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Small (cheap) update today, got a slam panel plate from Rickdon, and a set of blue wheel nuts from Tarmac. I plan on putting vinyl on the slam plate eventually, but put it on today as a test.

 

No slam panel:

 

MopQkR6.jpg

 

Slam panel:

 

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Old nuts and locking key:

 

WfHEDrH.jpg

 

New blue nuts (kinda hard to see though!)

 

fl871XE.jpg

Edited by Stan
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  • 4 weeks later...

Put some wheel spacers on at the weekend (20mm back, 15mm front - didn't fancy the usual 25/20 as I think it looks too far out), and I noticed that my midpipe had sheared off my backbox :lol: for those that saw me at the Yarmo meet, that was why it was so loud for a OEM system! I just thought that was how it was meant to be!! So I ordered a Japspeed K4 Monday, got it delivered Wednesday, and got it fitted today... yes I know the rep Japspeed has on the forum, but I don't have a grand+ to spend on an exhaust like the Ark Grip, so went a bit cheaper :D

 

Apart from a minor problem of it touching the ARB on the right hand side, which got sorted by a bit of heat and bending a tiny bit, the rest fitted lovely. I am very impressed with the V6 rumble now, and it doesn't deafen you when driving anymore!

 

At the garage (having the pipe heated and bent)

 

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The finished product

 

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I plan on adjusting the tips so they aren't that far out, and then I'll do the bumper tuck to show them off.

Edited by Stan
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Had a few hours to work on the car today, so did a few things.

 

First was the bumper tuck to show of the exhausts a bit more. Followed the guide on here and it was easy as anything, took about 20 mins total. Used the existing bolt holes along with some M8 bolts to raise the brackets on the bumper

 

Pre-tuck:

 

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Post-tuck :evil:

 

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I had also ordered some brushed aluminium effect vinyl to trim a couple of bits. I knew I was going to do the cooling plate, but also thought I'd tidy up the door panel controls as they were quite scratched up.

 

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For the door switches I rubbed them down first just to help the vinyl stick, but also in case I decide to spray them in future so it's prepped up

 

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I may have another go at doing the vinyl as the dip for the window switches aren't perfect, but you can't really notice but for the time being I'm happy :p

Edited by Stan
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  • 4 weeks later...

I always wanted DRLs and finally saw a nice pair on ebay that were also switchback (so they flash orange when indicating). Equally I hate the look of DRLs that shine to the side and wanted ones that shone forward. Therefore I had to have these :D

 

For those interested the ebay link is here (these are facelift only though)

 

Yes they are expensive for what they are, but they are of a high build quality, have all the looms pre-wired and cable wrapped, and fit perfectly.

 

So I began by removing the bumper. 10 bolts underneath (although the 2 at each end tore through the plastic as they were so rusted, but it doesn't affect the fitment), 3 bolts each behind the wheel liners (turn your wheel left/right to get to these) and 6 trim clips on top of the bumper, and then the whole thing pulls off:

 

7luEX0b.jpg

 

The reflectors simply undo with 2 screws on each and then pull out. The new DRLs come with new screws so don't try and use the old screws.

 

For the wiring look I ran it through the metal bar behind the foam padding, and then hooked the lights up each side. You can tuck the relay boxes in here as well and secure them with cable ties.

 

The wiring is quite easy, you need to connect the red wire to an ignition live. On the back of the upper plenum is a 2 wire connector, the pink wire is live with the ignition on. I stripped back some wire and hooked the red up to this, and hid the wire under the battery cover trim. The black wire is earth so I connected it to my JWT popcharger bracket which was screwed to the chassis. The white wire is to dim the lights at night so I hooked these up to the sidelight one side (green wire) - the loom doubles this to the other side so you don't have to do this twice, and each side there is a yellow wire for the indicators, so I hooked each side up to the indicator wiring (green wire). I did have to move my lights for this, there are 2 bolts underneath, 1 on the side on the wing, and one on top in the bay.

 

After testing it all worked, I put everything back together:

 

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Yay! Nice new DRLs :D

 

And here is the switchback function working:

 

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All in all I'm happy with them. Having never removed my bumper it took longer than I would have liked, but in the end it took 2h45 so not too bad!

Edited by Stan
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They look really good, shame they wont fit mine. They would look good with some new headlights when I eventually get them. Will have a look tomorrow if you still coming in the evening.

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They look really good, shame they wont fit mine. They would look good with some new headlights when I eventually get them. Will have a look tomorrow if you still coming in the evening.

 

Not too sure now about yarmo, depends on how the weather goes :lol: failing tonight then there is always next time.

 

Shame it is facelift only... maybe you can do a bumper swap at the same time you do a headlight swap ;)

Edited by Stan
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Small 20 min mod today - replacing the front indicator bulbs! I was hoping to have done this at the weekend when I had my bumper off to make it easier, but alas my bulbs didn't turn up in time. So I had to do this tonight via the top of the lights. There is a little wiggle room if you undo the top bolt, I ended up using needle nose plier to move the bulb holder out which worked perfectly.

 

Old fried egg bulb:

 

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New LED bulb next to the old (for info, £8 from ebay for a pair. Make sure you get ones that are about 45mm high as longer won't fit in if you have the plastic bit inside your lights)

 

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New look (kinda hard to see, which I guess is the point!)

 

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Definitely a quick cheap worthwhile mod!

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