George K. is the lucky owner of this Nismo Z34. The Z came in for upgraded rear brake pads and some lowering springs. The springs are made by SWIFT with slightly higher springs rates over OEM, while maintaining OEM-like quality. Out with the old, in with the new!
Front:

Rear:

The Z now sits a little more hunkered down, before(left) and after(right):

Check the gallery for more pictures
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David Swig of MotoringJStyle teamed up with the Z Owners of Northern California (ZONC) to bring us “Turn Z” during the Historic Races held at Infineon Raceway last Sunday. It was a fantastic day with incredible weather and a very impressive showing of classic Datsuns and Nissans.

ZCarGarage once again was the meeting place for the morning caravan up to Sonoma. I highly recommend joining us when we caravan to an event because it is a fun experience. Motoring up the freeways with a group of fellow car nuts is not to be missed. This group included a nice mix of old/new: two 240z cars, a ’67 roadster, a twin-turbo 370z and 350z, a twin-turbo G35 coupe, and 2 more z33s.
Here we are enjoying an on-ramp to highway 80 going to Sonoma:

Morning fog burned off and gave way to a sunny sky with light breeze when we arrived at Infineon Raceway…I love the sound of engines blaring and the smell of race fuel in the air.

As we drove through the ticket gate I was joined by 3 other Datsun roadsters and we were escorted Nascar-style by an Infineon ring taxi to Turn 7, appropriately designated “Turn Z” where the Datsun/Nissan car corral was being held. To my surprise this corral was completely paved, and had a stunning view of the track. In fact, we were so close to the Turn 7 run-off that we had to re-park a few cars for safety!
Big thanks to ZONC and David Swig for giving us a great corral, it was much better than the corral we have at Laguna Seca which leaves your freshly detailed ride covered in a nice thick layer of dust with bits of hay in the interior.

There were plenty of cool old-school Japanese rides in the corral mixed with modern ones too.  At the peak there were close to 50 cars! Some notables:

Super clean period-restored 240z cars:

Datsun 510 with a turbocharged KA24DE drivetrain:

A ZG-flared SR20DET-powered 240z with a very JDM paint color:

A Toyota S800!

More Old-School Toyotas:

Lou’s RHD FairladyZ(Yes, those badges came from the factory!) with some killer 17″ Panasports(custom offset) and 255mm wide tires:

 

This fully restored 1967.5 Datsun 2000 roadster was just plain pretty:

After looking at cars in Turn Z we toured the paddock area to check out vintage race cars from all eras. Lots of high-dollar, exotic and American muscle cars that left us all drooling and dreaming. Attention to detail, craftsmanship and cleanliness were at ever corner, in addition to some serious and frantic wrenching by race crews.
We found 1 Datsun that was actually competing in the races, this 240z complete with light beer livery and  some interesting flares:

The garage area had some impressive IMSA/Can-AM cars, below is just a sample of what the paddock had to offer:

Once the paddock area was thoroughly inspected  it was time to watch some racing! Datsun/Nissan racing legend John Morton was driving in 2 races so we had to watch our hero! John was driving a Scarab and Sunbeam Tiger. Things got more interesting when we noticed that David Swig was in the same races as Morton, piloting the Monsterati and Shelby Mustang.

After watching a few races the end of the day was capped off with a parade lap around Infineon Raceway, where participants in the Turn Z corral could take their own cars out on the track! This was 3-4 laps of pure bliss for folks, and I am still hearing good things about it. What a great way to also show off our Japanese rides to the crowd too!

I really hope that this event reaches yearly status, and with more advance notice I’m positive turnout will be even greater. Thanks again to David Swig and ZONC. Turn Z was a success, here’s to the 40th Anniversary of the Z!

Click below for more pictures!
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Monday the 1^st of February was an amazing day for a couple of reasons.  For one, Fred of the ZCG crew turned 40.  And secondly, Fred gave me the day off to play with the shop 370Z.  The day started off at ZCG in the early morning hours where I met the other two cars in the pack, Scott with his Z33 and Gia with his Nismo edition Z34.  We drove down to Laguna Seca to start our track adventures for the day.  Once we arrived at Laguna Seca we prepped our Z’s with numbers and a double check of our wheel torques.  After a brief driver’s meeting, we were off to drive our first session.  It’s been a while since I have been able to go to the track and hone my skill set.  Years ago, before ZCG, going to the track was a regular event in my life.  Driving on the track with Scott really made me appreciate the value of seat time.  Scott’s many track days and autocrosses have paid off and he and his Z33 looked great out there.  A few days prior to the event, we fitted Gia’s Nismo edition Z34 with a test ZCG oil cooler and some upgraded front brake pads.  The oil temps were in range for moving forward with our next round of testing.  The brakes, on the other hand, weren’t able to keep up with Gia’s driving style.  I have shared my data with Stoptech and they say help is on the way in the form of a pad that should help us on the street and allow us to push the limits at the track.  Once Gia’s Z34 brakes were unable to continue, we double teamed the ZCG Z34 with back to back sessions.  During these sessions, we were able to keep our oil temperature under control with the help of the ZCG oil cooler.  The highest oil temps were in the 250F range.  For those of you just tuning in, this is the 3^rd test version of our oil cooler.  We feel after the next set of tests that we will be able to serve the Z community with a product that will allow you to keep your Z’s oil temps within reason and out of the famous limp mode.  We will be returning to Laguna Seca on February 25^th to complete the shake-down on our latest mods.  The track organization we are running with is NCRC, nice guys with great organization which leads to lots of track time.

Turn in,

Rawb

I have quite a few posts in the works that should be done in the next day or two. Coming up will be a full track report from last Monday’s sessions at Laguna Seca, a nice write up on a G35 build and lots more.

Thanks to those of you who are patiently waiting.

Long live the Z

Rawb

One of ZCG’s oldest customers is back with a bang. This Nismo 370Z comes to us with 400 miles on the clock. During the next few days we will continue to finish the break-in miles. We are chomping at the bit to start modding this bad boy. The next few weeks will include installs of upgraded brake pads with fluid and version 2 of the ZCG oil cooler kit. We have a track day set up for February the 1st at Laguna Seca.We will see how the Nismo stacks up against the ZCG 370Z.  Stay tuned…

• Find more specs on the Nismo 370Z here