Thanks, I guess I am partial to the meaty look. It’s also functional given the net weight savings and increased grip from wider tires.

Sorry, yes - I installed LED bulbs. The T3 series from Lasfit has some circuitry that prevents hyper flash and it’s all onboard the bulb assembly. I think the tip has a resistor, which was getting warm when I tested them during install. They purport that this latest revision can handle 30+ minutes of continuous use before hyper flash may start to occur.

 

I'll share an update since I've had the Injen throttle controller on for a while now. I'm running it with the sport setting at 3 and I'm happy with it, the car feels a little more awake. I've tried setting 4 and felt the throttle mapping was just a bit too eager. While this has helped the car feel more awake, the initial on-throttle response is still not great; I find there is still that brief hesitation. I've tried cleaning the throttle bodies (didn't help) but haven't cleaned the MAF sensors, I may do this some time soon as its a cheap and easy effort. Something noteworthy about this is that when I'm shifting quickly and doing faster on-off-on throttle sequences, the hesitation is not as apparent. This makes spirited driving a little better but I'd rather not drive like an ******* all the time.

After having spent some time with the Tein springs, I'm thinking of going back to the previous setup with the 370z front springs and factory rears. The Tein spring rates are just a bit too low and make the car feel underdamped. I've thought of getting a set of Koni Yellow shocks but those only adjust rebound and I think I'd need more compression damping to mitigate the pitch caused by the springs. It's a bit of a pity because I've enjoyed how the car looks at this height. This will also help dial the negative camber back to a more reasonable level; since installing the Tein springs the front have been at about -2 degrees and the rears at around -3 degrees. I can't justify getting adjustable arms given how I feel about the springs. If for some reason I can't stand to look at the car after switching back to the previous springs I'll pony up and swing for some FA500 coilovers or something...

 

Is that one of those devices at the pedal that reconfigures the throttle-by-wire signal, like the Sprint Booster?

 

Yeah. I just drove into LA/Hollywood area to pick up some fried chicken dinner and turned the setting up to 5, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself enjoying the more aggressive mapping. I’m really glad I got this controller, any interest I had in tuning has all but vanished. I can set it and forget it or turn it up if I’m feeling saucy.

On a separate note, this drive has actually made me appreciate the Tein springs a little more with the crappy roads around LA. If swapping the front springs wasn’t such a hassle I probably wouldn’t second guess too much and just do it… I think it’d be the fifth or sixth time in one year that I go to AutoZone to borrow spring compressors. 😑

 

Alright, I just got done swapping the 370z front + original rear springs back on and went for a quick jaunt around town. The ride feels more balanced and shifting gears feels more crisp due to less pitch from load transfer.

I took a quick shot after the drive, it’s not terrible but I still feel a 0.5” drop would go a long way. Perhaps even more so with these wheels.




Edit: forgot to mention I cleaned the MAF sensors. I’m not sure there is a noticeable improvement but it almost seemed like MPG was better. My test drive was only like 3 miles though so I’ll evaluate after some more miles.

 

Ride height adjustments are frustrating, but it looks fine to me in both pics, before & after. Maybe what you need is a set of coilovers just for the rear, and dial in the height to match the front.



But like I said, it still looks good either way.

And look at that tag! Nice. The only one in California. With that custom plate you could do away with your trunk badge.

 

Indeed, I think my ideal height is about an 1/8” higher in the front and about 1/3” higher in the rear relative to where it was with the Tein springs. This side shot gives a good perspective of how the rear sat a little lower than the front.



also… I asked the wife if I could get some $800 coil overs and she approved. I bought a set of Tein Flex Z.

Time to list the H.tech springs for sale. I actually don’t think they’re bad springs, I’d be happy with them if I had a 7AT.

 

In other news, a couple of days ago I had 20% tint installed. I was a little worried this would be too dark but it’s actually just fine, the other option being 35%. I sometimes take the wife and kid on day trips in my G, on a sunny day it would get to be a little much for my son to be comfortable in his carseat.

 

I received the Tein Flex Z yesterday and got through installing the front coilovers before calling it a night. I couldn’t help myself and went for a test drive, immediately shifting felt more crisp and the pitch was nearly completely gone. This was with the dampers set 12 clicks from full stiff.

I just wrapped up with installing the rear but didn’t properly set the height adjustment initially so it was slammed instead of being at its highest setting. I looked at the reference settings in the instructions and just matched that, which incidentally has left me with a ride height almost exactly identical to what I had with the Tein H.tech springs: about 26.6” ground to fender up front and about 26.3” in the rear. Then I set the rear dampers to the same 12 clicks from full stiff and went for a test drive. It felt great, it was a “should have done this sooner” kind of thing.

One thing that confused me was that both front and rear dampers have a 31 clicks adjustment range despite all I’ve read about the Flex Z supposedly having 16 clicks. I’ve messaged Tein support to see what the deal is.

Edit: they said 16 clicks from full stiff is the softest setting and the remaining clicks do nothing to change the damping. Apparently setting it outside of this range (despite it continuing to click as normal) and driving like this can damage the dampers. It seems like a very poor decision not to use adjusters with the proper range. I’m glad I didn’t decide to go for a drive with the dampers set to the counter-clockwise most position…

I’m pretty wiped out from the install but I’ll likely continue adjusting the ride height until satisfied. For the next adjustment I’ll probably try and get everything as close as I can to 26.75” ground to fender. I think this will be a good middle ground with respect to fitment and ground clearance.

 

Meant to update last night. I went back and raised the rear another 10 mm, nearly as high as it can go. After a quick drive I measured all fenders at right around 26.5”-26.6” off the ground.





I took the wife and kid to pick up some dinner just now and decided to try 10 clicks from full stiff up front (from 12) and found it noticeably more firm. On the way back I changed it back to 12 clicks and confirmed this was significantly more comfortable while remaining very composed. I really appreciate being able to change it so easily.