Vultures! :bowrofl:

Everything is listed if you click on the link in my sig :tup:

Someone buy the wheels and coils so he can have a sudden change of heart and build the motor! I think that's a brilliant idea.

this makes me cringe.. after seeing the rest of this thread I missed from a few weeks back until now, i think you should fix this beoch, sell the wheels/coils ... and continue on... a Z with 400 whp I'm sure shocks everyone, Ive realized going to a BMW that people look down on the Z... and it pisses me off to no end, because i know with my Z and the bolt ons I had, 90% of the cars in the price range they think out preform the Z, would not of been able to compete on any level really....

Going to 135i the speed is certainly the best aspect that i like over the Z (room is a close second) , and you have that with the Z plus the Z's uniqueness ... your ingredients to you Z have made it a masterpiece, just fix n keep it, i take back everything i said to you earlier...

refund lip and diffuser/sills money and sell the wheels and coils and your good to go!!!

Definitely don't just get rid of the car because you got into an accident. If it didn't ruin anything with your kit just keep it. Some random person would probably buy it, and run it into the ground. I'm sure that thing feels f'in nuts. Keep it man. I've contemplated selling the Z for something else, but nothing out there is like the Z. A Z06 is the only car out there worth replacing the Z with, and I don't have 70k lol. (My parents did so I drive theirs.:tup:)

Coils are sold. I may have something up my sleeve:happydance:
Chuck, you're the man!
Trust me... I wouldn't get rid of it just because a damaged bumper. The entire ordeal I've gone through with the turbo kit fabrication and r&d has been hell.

I have found an '06 Z06 with 21k miles on it for 42k locally... they have really grown on me lately, but I don't think I can deal with that horrible interior and the fact that I'd be driving a 6 year old car. The Viper was my dream car when I was younger...not so much anymore, but I found my favorite color (Steel Grey) with only 27k miles on it for $42k. Then again...it's a 12 year old car. Then I've thought about an NSX...right back to an even older car.

In the end, what will I be happy with? I love the interior of the Z. I love the looks of my Z. I loved the boost of my Z. What does that add up to? Only time will tell. I'll get my bumper fixed hopefully next week and get an appointment at Nissan.

NOooo!!! I'm sorry to hear about the unfortunate mishap. I feel the same as well... spent too much on this car. It's fun, but the clutch issue means I have to dump $530 in labor cost to get the disk replaced in hopes it'll remedy the gearbox issues. Gotta bust the OT hours to quickly pay off so I can continue saving up for the downpayment on a house!

Haha, I've been working OT since I started my new job 2 months ago. I love not being salary anymore! Today was payday, I sold my coils for $1000, and insurance told me they are sending me a $900 check today. Today was a GOOD day :tup: There is hope....

dude I just got caught up with this......don't sell it bro...who am I going to look up to now?

But I also don't recommend building the motor if it hasn't ran right. My 2 cents... as I've sunken an enormous amount of money on a Z before too. The only reason to build would be for more power, not to FIX an issue. If an issue cannot be fixed as is, then after you build the motor, you'll spend even more money on FIXING, because the root cause wasn't determined.

Trust me...there are tons more thrown rods / blown motors than this forum shows. A couple months ago I saw first hand of a GTM TT 370z installed and tuned by Sam, blow a hole in the block after 2 weeks of delivery to the customer.

If you can get a spare stock block, use that. Just detune a bit for your fuel for more flexibility to ambiant temp / fuel / elevation, etc. adjustments.

I'd hate to see this car go...but I'd also hate to see your wallet lighten with nothing to gain.

Just thought I'd give you my 2 cents. If you wanna talk or discuss, PM me bro. Good luck with whatever you choose.

Haha IF it ever comes down to letting go (hope not), I'm going to take a break from the car hobby for awhile to focus on the house and hopefully settle down (out the window at the moment :crying:).

Plans with your car? Avoiding Mustang, eh? Haha... my next car will probably be a 200x TSX.

boo.........I know the feeling. If I divide my salary by the number of hours I work, I get paid very close to my assistant.......:(

Grats on selling them coils bro! :tup:

Been reading this thread like a book for the past couple days and I just finished. Can't believe the ups and downs you've had and the fact that you've somehow managed to keep your cool through it all. I admire your resilience and wish you luck with whatever you decide to do going forward. (build the motor!)

This thread is classic. :tup:

Thanks for your insight, Alex! Coming from you...that means a lot. I just got back from picking up an OEM oil pan and OEM front bumper. Project Kill Z is tomorrow...turbo kit, injectors, exhaust, and manifold are coming off and all the OEM pieces are going back on. Then I'll have my fingers crossed with Nissan. If all goes well, I'll probably reinstall everything and get it tuned this time. I'm so back and forth on the situation, I seem bipolar:icon14:
See, I try to imagine myself getting out of the car hobby...I don't think it will ever happen. NO mustang! Haha. I'd love to have a TSX as a daily.
Between my M-F job and overtime, my side valet job, and rent from my roommate... I still manage to wonder where all my money goes. :icon17: Have you gotten a VIN for the bull yet? I saw my first one at the Tampa International Auto Show yesterday. I'm in love:yum:
Thanks, bud! That definitely helped the mood :)
Thank you very much! It's nice hearing people reading through this thread and enjoying my car's life story. I hope this will not be the end. I like my Z too much because I know all the problems I've had are rooted to Lutz Performance, not the Z in general.

Nissan better hook it up damnitt! Good luck man!

Ughhhh... Lutz is starting to post and advertise on Nissan forums. I've written 2 long replies explaining my story and by the time I hit the "post" button, the threads have already been deleted. It's because they are too damn cheap to pay for any kind of sponsorship. ****, I hate Lutz!

My half-assed reply to what I was going to post before the thread was deleted.



I dropped the car off at Lutz Performance at the end of April and picked it up the night I left for ZDayz on May 19th...Yes, that was a quick turnaround time, but my car was the only car that was having any fabricating done. So I do not think 3+ weeks is too far fetched. In the end though, if that was too soon of a time frame, Lutz should have said so. At the time, Lutz seemed great...well, really just their fabricator (Shawn). He was texting me making sure I made it up safely and asking for updates while I was up there.

I drove the car to ZDayz and enjoyed it, other than the overheating issues. On the way home, about 30 minutes after leaving Fontana Village, I burnt through one of the power steering hoses because the uppipe was fabricated laying against the hose. I made it to GA where the car went into limp mode due to the passenger side wiring harness left dangling on top of the passenger manifold. I spent $250 having the car towed to Z1. My repair bill was $2k. This does not include the 4 days (local Nissans didn't stock a power steering pump) of work I missed out on and I had to pay for a hotel. They had to rewire the entire passenger side wiring harness and I needed a new power steering pump because the pump had seized and the pulley snapped off. The 140-amp fuse on the battery also failed because the wiring harness was burnt through.

I make it home and the car goes back to Lutz so they can redo my intake piping. That was clearly an issue from the beginning regarding driveability and tuning. Since the intake piping was different diameters, one bank would see much more air than the other bank, netting in extremely rich cruising AFRs (10/12 mpg city/highway) and not allowing me to get into boost because the AFRs would get too lean. Lutz said they would redo it at no cost to me. My car sits there for 2 weeks with nothing done. They preferred to bridge my MAF wiring instead. My car was in the shop for 1 month to have a 30 minute wiring job done. When I went to pick up my car (Friday) for a professional photoshoot I had booked, one of my tires were flat because it had 2 nails in it. No photoshoot. I go to pick up the car again the following Wednesday (FYI Lutz Performance is a 45 minute drive from my house), and the tire was still flat...nothing was done. So I finally go pick up the car the following Monday with the tire patched and the MAF wiring bridged, even though I asked and they said they would redo the intake piping...but they suggested bridging the MAF wiring and they are the experts. The car still ran like crap, granted I never had it retuned to see if it bridging the MAFs would fix the issue.

I take my car to another friend and we redid the intake piping and intercooler setup to dual 3" equal-length intake piping and a 2-1 intercooler...the way it should have been done from the beginning. We also replaced the POS band clamp that Lutz installed and bowed the edge of the clamp to make the piping fit inside (causing a bad exhaust leak), which Lutz replaced once already to try to solve the issue. Since we redid the piping, I had to unbridge the MAF wiring. I called Lutz to see how to unbridge it and I was told and I quote "just cut the bridge wires". So I do so because the experts told me to do so. The car is in limp mode. A few hours of brainstorming and I decide to finally peel back the wire sheating and found this

http://i52.tinypic.com/1z7z3p.jpg

That was my last dealing with Lutz. Out of allll the troubles I had, they only compensated me by taking 2 hrs of labor of my total bill ($210).



Let's be realistic... You are correct in saying there are no guarantees when adding forced induction to an NA motor.

I went to Bradenton and ran a 11.85 @ 119mph on my 3rd pass. Based on that mph (460-480whp), my car was well below the limits of the VQ37. The boost was turned up from 12.6psi to 13.1psi on the next run when the motor started ticking.

The turbo kit did fail.
I'm sorry, but I fail to see how $12k was a budget build.
Lutz did all the fabricating. S&R did the initial tune.

wow, reminds me of a shop here in town that is no longer is business. RAWR, gives me nightmares.

Ridiculous. Definitely staying away fom that place.

wow!

:/ wholy

All I can say is WOW! Gonna send you a PM dude............

Damn dude bet you wish you went with a gtm build now......... Sucks cause yours would've been so unique being top mount!

O well looks like TT is the answer for boosting our engines.

Not so sure that I can agree with that statement, however TT seems to be the method with the mosr R&D. It just looks to me like someone wanted to make money instead of doing what was necessary to make things work properly. Either that or just lazy and stubborn.

98:

Keep you head up dude. I'm pulling for you!

Got to read the whole thread, boosting is boosting, 98 got mistreated and screwed over. His system worked but the damage had already been done by the previous shop. Good luck bro, I had a similar story with my past car. Keep us posted!

lutz can suck it!

See man........we do agree! I was hoping that it could be salvaged even though the motor had/has some problems now. Still have my fingers crossed though!

I still prefer single... I just would have NEVER taken my car to Lutz had I known who/what I know now.
My head is heavy, but I'm trying! I appreciate it
Yup. And to think I was "this close" to having the car 100%. That's what makes me sick to my stomach.
:icon23: <---they can suck that
I still haven't put up my turbo kit for a reason... We shall see. I really want to get rid of it, but may have no choice but to rebuild it.

If you wouldn't have done this build my build would have been a massive headache and maybe even a fail. Stay positive, **** has to turn around! Hola if you need anything.

It will work out, just stick with it :tup:

98: Great thread. You've got the balls to try something new, and you're perseverent. Yes, you had a bad deal initially. And still needing work.

That said, when this car is rockin', it's ROCKIN'! That in car vid was testimony.

And that you're ready to test at the strip and get a great time is also cool.

Props to you. Keep us posted.

Coop

Well best of luck then. Hope it does work out for you. I know for myself I will be going with something more people already have, and have little to no issues. I'll probably go with one of the gtm kits

98:

Don't part out the kit man.......I have a feeling that you will regret it. I just can't stop thinking about how pumped I was after watching your vid with the ninja squirrels, lol. I should be back in the states next summer, so we can collaborate and make the Fairlady sing again if you want.

Side note: I plan on going to check out CJ Motorsports soon after I get back to the states. I planned on stockpiling some extra parts, but I am willing to contribute to your car's recovery (since you are one of three individuals that inspired me to make my move). I know it is depressing, but keep your head up big man. You pioneered some things for all of us whether you realize it of not..............

man i read this whole thing with excitement. i was cheering you on all the way. till the end. i feel your pain man. my car goes into limp mode for some unknown godly reason, and i cant figure it out. it dies out randomly. gtm keeps telling me that my car is mechanical failure, balbhlahblahbl. story kept changing for about 2 years. i took it into my own hands and fixed alot of problems i found on the installation they did. i'm the one car they ****** up on from many other cars. bad luck i guess. but props to you. like i said. this thread kept me on the edge as i was reading.

sorry to hear. next time its your time to shine man.

Have you guys seen S&R performance single turbo for the 350/370 HR/VHR?

Funny that you would mention that........I was running a search for a coworker who wants to SC his Altima 3.5 and that product was the first one that popped up............:stirthepot:

Yes, I have. They were the first shop to tune my car. They actually wanted to build me a custom kit, but I went with Lutz becaue I was friends with their fabricator. What a disaster that ended up being. I'm sure S&R saw the flaws in Lutz's design and have had the idea in the back of their heads for a long time.

I've seen their kit on a 350HR, exhaust manifold is is kool looking!

They are slow with putting out more about it, and they claim they aren't shipping the kit. Which sucks

You know this draws a big question to me and people will claim success but every tuner I talked to on the subject of tuning a car with dual maf sensors in a singal pipe can not really be done and will lead to issues. So is it really possible to do it.