---------------Agility--------------

Front End Assembly After a long winter of fab and collecting parts she finally goes together.

Z33 Stoptech Rotors/Z32 Calipers At 2000lbs this car doesn't need a super high dollar brake kit. At first I wanted an AP kit and then a Wilwood kit but then I decided that would be way to far overkill. At nearly 13" and beefy thick these should do the trick.

Front End Fab I'm all about stiff a chassis. Its makes the car so much more crisp. I cut off the front ~10 inches of the frame rails and went to town. I wrapped the OEM frame rails with 1/8" steel all the way around. This gives an awesome smooth appearance and beefs up their strength significantly. I'll let the pics tell the rest of the story.

Largus Sway Bars Fairly straight forward. Largus swaybars are hollow to save weight but maintain stiffness.

SPL Front Lower Control Arms Pictures speak louder than words. No more rubber bushings to allow deflections and full adjustability to go along with it.

Rear suspension going back together.

SPL Rear Lower Control Arms My quest for a fully solid rear suspension lead me yet again to the SPL guys. They make some really high quality stuff. I spoke with them through several emails and phone conversations and decided that their RLCA's would be perfect. They really are works of are. Heavy duty spherical rod ends and balljoints.

SPL Rear Upright Bushings The purpose of these is simple. Eliminate flexible and pliable bushings at all costs. These should do the trick.

Nismo Rear Upright Toe Bushings I had to deviate from my plan to eliminate all the pliable bushings from the rear suspension. SPL doesn't carry the toe bushings in the spherical form that they do for the traction rod and RUCA. Hopefully Nismo did a good job in choosing the durometer of these bushings. I don't want them to be the weak link in the suspension.

Custom RSTB I decided to take the plunge on 20' of 1 5/8" DOM (.134" Wall) Steel Tubing. Eventually I plan on doing an extensive roll cage at some point. This is just the basis of what I hope to be a very rigid and safe roll cage.

Z32 5 Lug Hubs These are the rears only for now. I plan on doing the front conversion with GTO hubs next winter. What can I say about these? Um... You can't do a 5 Lug conversion without the hubs. These are just used hubs of a 300ZX. I was suprised at how clean they were. The bearings have no play in them. A good snag for $150.

Seam Welding Chassis This is and will be a continuous project until the entire car is fully seam welded. I takes time doing it but the benifits of the stiffened chassis should be huge. I use a heat gun to get any body sealer out of the seam and then use a knot end brush to clean the metal.

Z32 Brembo Blanks These are just the rears for now. I opted to go for the blanks because I've always been annoyed with any disturbance in the pedal under braking. I've heard that slotted rotors can cause modulation and drilled can crack. I wanted a nice clean rotor for the pad to do its thing. Plus they were a bit cheaper. I was astonished by how big and thick these are. Damn near 12" and vented. I guess it just shows you how heavy the z32's are.

Technafit Teflon Braided Brakelines I guess these teflon lines are the newest thing. They still maintain the good pedal feel of the SS lines but they resist wear better. These are just the rears for now.

Speed Bleeders There is nothing more annoying than having to drag a buddy over to do your brake job. These will eliminate that and hopefully make bleeding at the track a simple process. Just a simple mod to the Z32 rear calipers.

Rear Subframe Project Everyone has heard the stories of how the rear subframe of a 240 ripped itself to shreds on a hard launch on slicks. Even though I don't plan on focusing on 1/4 mile racing I decided I'd eliminate the possibility of failure and reduce flexing. I used 1/8"x3" steel on the RUCA brackets and 1/8" angle iron on the rear diff mounts. I also removed all the unused brackets on the subframe to reduce weight. I then sand blasted the whole thing and painted it with a very durable epoxy paint in gloss black.

SPL RUCA's Do it right the first time philosophy continues. The Rear Upper Control Arms allow adjustment of the camber of the rear wheels. If you getting adjustment out of the deal you might as well have a precision heim joint to eliminate the OEM rubber bushing. My baby holding the part. Not quite sure what she's doing with it.

SPL Toe Rods In order to make this thing handle like I want adjustable rear toe is required. I plan on running moderate negative toe that doesn't kill tires but helps with turn in.

SPL Traction Rods I got these in my effort to eliminate as much of the pliable bushing in the rear suspension. I'm not sure if I'm going to leave these at the stock length yet.

Z32 Rear Brakes Since I had a nice set of 5x114 rims I decided to do the 5 lug swap so I could utilize them. We all know stock is for pussies. So I decided to do a full 5 lug/Z32 brake swap beginning with the rear.

Hawk HP Plus Rear Brake Pads I had Porterfield R4-S' on the Maxima but I wasn't very happy with them at all. They faded nearly as bad as stock. I'm hoping the 100-800 degree operating range on the HP Plus will do the trick. I don't plan on doing a lot of track days but I would like to do some so I wanted a pad that would hold up but be suitable on a cold start. I was very impressed at how much pad material there is on these. Maybe this is typical for the Z32 pads; nonetheless I'm impressed.

SPL Aluminum Subframe Bushings Being as this car was over 17 years old when I bought it all of the rubber components in the suspension were totally destroyed. So over a winter I decided to drop out the entire suspension begining with the rear. I decided to go with the fully solid rear subframe bushings in hopes to force all the wheel movement to be controled by the other intended pieces. To do this the rear subframe has to be dropped and all components removed from it. While I was at it I decided to clean everything up and seam weld and strengthen both the unibody and subframe.

Megan Racing Coilovers After the suspension experience with my Maxima I knew I wanted a coilover right off the bat. As I lightened the Max the wheel gap went from nice to horrible. I wished all the time that I would've saved up a bit more for coilovers. I know this aren't the best out there but they'll do for me. I put them on just as they came out of the box and the car was already slammed; even stripped. When the rest of the car is nearing completion I will upgrade to a nicer set of coils with lower spring rates.

J30 VLSD Diff I picked this up for just over $200 from a yard. Its got a lot of miles but the wheels still spin the same way. This is just to tide me over until I get a nicer unit as the car aproaches completion.(Probably a Qualfie.)

SSR Competitions These are the same rims I had on my Maxima. The offset is +38 and the dimensions are 17x8. They weigh in a 14.5lbs. The weight was the main reason I decided to keep these rims rather than sell them and get an average weighted 17x8F/9R combo. I'm going to start by doing the 5 lug rear swap. Eventually I'll step up to a wider setup. I'm thinking a nice 3 piece 17x11 or 17x12 in the rear with a 17x10 up front.