Here we are on the roof of Riverside Nissan for the YouDrift meet. It was a great crowd of Nissan and RWD  cars so we had to bring out our 350z.

Here is a photo of our Project 350z taken by Jon Chase of DSTROYR.

The best looking car in the whole show was this old Datsun 510.

Big thanks to DSTROYR for shooting photos for us and making a blog post since we forgot our camera: http://dstroyr.wordpress.com/2010/01/26/on-the-roof/

Jon Chase is the owner of DSTROYR clothing and he has this great 1967 Chevy Nova next to our Project Nissan 350z. He made a post on the DSTROYR blog Saturday At DSTROYR HQ which features some photos of our Project 350z!He makes some great clothing you should definitely check out.

Just before the weekend we got a great gift in the mail from one of our new partners Status Racing. They are racing harnesses for Project 350z. We selected a 5 point black/black harness which will look great with our car. Most importantly the harness is FIA compliant making them a great race belt option.

I cannot really think of anything much more fun than this.

Photo snapped by Ricky Cervantes.

We rolled the Nissan 350z out for the first time at the UTI Open House in Rancho Cucamonga, California. The open house was hosted in conjunction with Monster Jam.

Although we are a tad behind on tech articles here is a shot of our wheels, tires and brakes that are coming soon with tech articles. All four wheels are running Performance Friction Brakes for excellent stopping power. The wheels are HRE 540R’s that are 20×10.5 in the front and 20×13 in the rear. We mounted 245/35/20’s on the front and 305/30/20 Falken FK452’s on the rear to complete the wheel/tire combo on the Project 350z.

Here are some students and teachers checking out and talking about our engine setup which includes Brian Crower cams, a Koyo radiator, and the Vortech supercharger.

Monster Jam is also in town this weekend so they brought out Grave Digger. I deemed our car was Mini Digger since we have a similar purple/green setup. Personally I am a fan of Maximum Destruction in Monster Jam who defeated Grave Digger taking home the double down in Atlanta last week.

Riley ,who is a local drifter in the Inland Empire, showed up for the Adams Motorsports Park booth and we were stoked to see he is still representing Wrecked Magazine on the tail light of his S13, nice work sir!

A hood swap is a very simple task that you can do in your home. The hood in the 350z is secured by four bolts which you can take off with some basic tools.

Here is what the bolt will look like that yo take off to dismount the hood. We suggest once the hood is removed you take these bolts and screw them back onto the hood so you don’t lose them like we did. The Seibon hood comes with it’s own hardware so you can leave the OEM pieces with the OEM hood.

The hood goes on with four bolts and fits with ease. We ended up removing our mesh grill since it was getting a little too close to our Vortech supercharger belt and we liked the open look to the hood.

Here is the final setup on our flat carbon fiber hood. The Origin body kit and wheels are about to come and really complete the exterior look to this great Nissan 350z. Thanks to the guys at Seibon Carbon for this great product.

The first step to install our racing seat is to remove the factory 350z seat from it’s current position. You can see the four bolt holes from where the old seat rails are located. If you cannot figure out how to get to this take (removing your front seat) you probably shouldn’t continue this installation on your own. Our Bride Low Max VIOS III came to us from YoParts.com which is the first true wholesale club for the automotive industry. Just imagine Costco online with more car parts than you could ever order from one website.

With a couple bolts you will have the adjustable Bride seat rail attached to your Low Max VIOS III seat. The new “Low Max” design is optimized for the lowest possible setting a seat and seat rail combination can currently offer and also have the steering wheel centered to the driver.

Here is a shot of the Bride seat and rail sitting just outside the car before installation. The low setting I touched on above in the 350z is key unless your a male under five feet nothing. Especially if you plan on needing a helmet the roof line will find your head very very fast.

Here is the Bride seat sitting inside the Nissan 350z now. The colors flow spot on with the interior and the fitment is better than I imagined. The side bolsters hold you snug and point your arms directly to the steering wheel.

Here is the OEM bolt that we placed back on the Bride seat rail to secure it to our 350z chassis.

We also retained the factory caps from Nissan to give the seat installation a very clean look.

Each seat rail includes a small allen wrench style lever that you pull up at the same time to adjust the seat position. All and all the seat feels great (especially if I went on a diet) and it still has some adjustable rails so I really have to say this is one of the better modifications we have made to date with the Nissan 350z. Thanks again to YoParts.com for the Bride seats!

A quick way to shed some weight to our Nissan 350z and have a reliable starting power was to pick up a XS Power battery. With it’s dry cell technology you can technically mount it anywhere in the car but we opted for the factory battery area for the XS Power installation.

We mounted the XS bracket onto our stock bracket we removed by drilling two holes.

Here is the final installation of the top piece of the battery bracket.

Here we are drilling the stock battery mount after we marked the drill points for the XS power battery.

Here is what the battery looks like with the battery trey mounted back into the vehicle. The placement and mount of the battery is so clean you can hardly tell that it isn’t a stock piece. It is overall a great investment and the easiest installation we have done on the car to date.

I was really excited to get the KW Variant 3 coilovers on the 350z. We decided with the guys at KW  Suspension that it would be cool to take the car down the street to the Rancho Cucamonga UTI campus. The guys at the school were a great help and got right to work on the car.

The Variant 3 suspension offers independent rebound and compression adjustability. I had heard from tons of European guys running the coilovers that they ride like stock and I was dieing to find out if it was true. A true testament to the product is their product is approved by the German Technical Control Board (TÜV) which is a prestige given to very few aftermarket companies in Germany.

The students at UTI got to work on the rear suspension. This is the easier side to tackle so we took apart the rear pieces holding in the suspension and removed the factory pieces.

Within no time we were setting in the rear suspension and bolting the car back together.

Once the rear of the car was put back together I snapped a photo of the KW Suspension V3’s sitting in the rear of the 350z. We dropped and aligned the Z to tuck the factory 18’s preparing us for a super aggressive look once our 20’s get installed.

You can see the old rear suspension sitting on this table. The wheels are going back on the rear suspension of the car to complete the installation.

Ripping out the front suspension we also have to remove the front strut tower bar to get the new front suspension inside.

The students quickly got to work with dismantling the front suspension.

Some of the guys finished up tearing apart the front suspension while some other students removed the hats.

You need to retain the factory suspension hats and the UTI campus has a machine that the students were able to use to take the front factory hats off and place them on the KW suspension.

After we had the factory hat one of the professors showed how to install the factory hat onto the KW suspension.

The whole front suspension has to be put back together including the front strut tower bar we disconnected earlier for access to the front coils.

Finally everything was put back together and putting the front wheels back on was all we had left to complete the suspension install. Once the car was ready to go we put it on the alighnment rack, made some last minute adjustments to the compression/rebound/height on the car and drove off back to the Wrecked Magazine office.

We’ve had the suspension on for a few weeks now and it does in fact ride like a stock setup so mad props to KW Suspension for building such a great piece of suspension that has great ride quality and performance at the same time.

With the help of LS Auto we tackled the Nissan 350z Vortech Supercharger install. Now I know your manly instincts will get the best of you when you get a hold of this kit but don’t throw away the 20 page manual just right away. It has quite useful information for your installation.

Tools/Supply Requirements:
2.5″ Hole Saw
1/8″, 11/64″, 3/16″ Drill Bits
Drill Motor
Stepless Clamp Crimping Pliers
Seal Cutter
Gasket Scraper
Silicone RTV
Factory 350z Manual
3/8″ and 1/2″ Socket & Driver Set
Open End Wrenches
Center Punch
Springlock 5/16″ Fuel Fitting Disconnect Tool
5 Quarts of Oil for Fresh Change
New Oil Filter/Wrench
Flat Head #2 screwdriver
Phillips Head #2 screwdriver
Heavy Grease
Silicone Sealer
Hex Key Wrench Set
Wire Strippers/Crimpers
Utility Knife

We have the supercharger mounting plate sitting in place in front of the throttle body ducting which we just started placing to ensure it wouldn’t get in the way of our supercharger plate.

Here is the same plate for another view. We are securing the air filter in the super tight location behind the drivers side headlight. The two items you see on the supercharger mounting plate here are the grooved idler and smooth idler. Once together they will run a belt connecting the supercharger jackshaft pulley to your motor accessory pulleys.

The Vortech kit comes with a complete fuel management kit to keep your VQ35 in healthy shape.The photo above shows you the mounting locations for the fuel management unit (FMU) and the fuel pump. Once they are securely mounted you will attach a ton of hoses and be on your way.

Here is how the charge cooler is mounted in front of the Nissan 350z. This is also part of the complete Vortech supercharger kit and has an easy installation process in the manual we told you not to throw away! The charge cooler has an aggressive look behind the OEM front bumper and we have an aftermarket one sitting in the garage which will make it look like a much better setup once installed.

This photo is of the Vortech Supercharger bypass valve which is LOUD and we love it. I’ve had my spin around great Vortech kits before and I think they put some extra noise behind the 350z kit for the tuners and anyone who buys it would love it. It’s not overbearing but it’s just loud enough to really enjoy under some aggressive driving.

The Unichip piggyback is seen in the top photograph and fits right next to the factory ECU. You can see both sitting together in the second photo with a wiring harness. These two items we added also come with the Vortech kit for an ease of installation. The factory panel fits snug over the two systems so nobody even knows it’s sitting there and you retain a factory interior.

It was a good chance to flush and put all new fluids in the car and then we cranked her up! The car whistled right off the bat and ran fine. With no tune we took her to the dyno after a few days of enjoyment at UTI so our untuned horsepower numbers will be posted Monday!