Huberty:
The best bang for the buck change will be a new set of sways. Get stiffer and adjustable ones. You will be amazed and happily so with the difference when combined with your spring/damper changes already made. You can also do way better with a light wheel. Sell the stocks and get the Enkei NT03+M and you should be neutral on cost. But six pounds a corner lighter. Put on a light tire, but BIGGER treadwidth.
Go for something like 275/35/18 all around (3mm spacer in front), and then put in a camber link for the rear to reduce that to say 1.5 to 2 degrees neg.

Stop with that and see what happens. I think you will find it turns a corner faster than a rat leaving the kitchen with a piece of cheese.

 

Another successful track event. I don't know if any of you have been to MAM (I would assume not, seeing as I don't see a ton of G's in the midwest). On the way back home on saturday night I was convoying with myself, a lotus elise, M coupe, saab 9-5 wagon, Audi A4 and an S2000 and the only car that one family in a mini van asked about was the G. They were quite baffled when I told them it was an Infiniti..."what's an Infiniti?"

Anyway, MAM is in the South West corner of Iowa (south of Council Bluffs). It's a 2.2 mile track with 14 turns and a couple of nice straights (able to hit 110 on the main straight and 95 - 100 on the other). It's a nice track if you want to really learn your lines. You end up doing a lot of work on this track (good track to get used to your car)...which brings me to my first gripe. Many of the cars that were down at the track were staying in 4th gear on the main straight and hitting 110 just fine. I on the other hand had to shift at 100 into 5th gear just before breaking or just bump up against the rev limiter. I tried both and found myself getting similar times...although that last shift really makes for a lot of work at the end of the straight. I have a 2004 coupe, which I beleive has different shift points, so I'd imagine that the 05 has less of a problem with this.

My setup worked great after we got through the morning session. There was actually some rain at the track and the morning was used for drying the track out and finding out just how far you can push your car in the rain before spinning. In the afternoon the Pilot Sports really started to grip, but nothing like my friends M coupe that had R compounds...I can see what you were talking about Eagle1 when you suggest R compounds...A must have for anyone wanting to get serious about this. This and a sway bar will be my next mods...oh and some camber adjustability.

The G actually handled itself well. There were some 350's there that put up good numbers, but they had some pretty sweet mods and experienced drivers. I have to say I held my own and with some r compounds and a little more expience I should be able to put up some better times.

On that note, anyone know where to get some lighter wheels for cheap (Eagle1 you were mentioning the Enkei wheels)?

 

Huberty:
Anything that you can get that is either one piece forged, or Enkei MAT technology rolled, and looks good for your tastes, and weighs in the region of 18 lbs. I like the NT03+M wheel...strong and light. A pain in the backside to clean...but very stable. I have run the wheel at 165+mph on the track and through the Roval at Cal Speedway at 140-150mph....so it has plenty of what you need. Enkei is one of the largest, if not THE largest, custom wheel companies in the world, so they have lots of dealers. If you run dry weather, I like the Nitto NT-01 tire. A bit noisy, but grips like heck.

 

This is some SOLID advice. I have been doing research on this for a few months (16 total) and have come to the same conclusion as Eagle1, although I haven't been able to test it myself. The 3mm spacer up front with same size tires all around is a setup which I believe Sport Compact Car is running on their 350Z autoX car.

What width NT03+M do you suggest? 8" all the way around or different widths 7.5 front to 8" back?

 

Can someone eaborate on this. Are we talking all of the bushings on the car, just certain ones or certain areas. I keep rereading this thread and answering most of my own questions but I would love some more input as to what this would do compared to stock. Sorry about the double post and triple edit. If this was scrabble I would have hit the big time on this one.

 

Bump to bring back a great older thread.

 

Thanks for the bump! I never would've read it otherwise. Lots of good info, I think it'll me take a few days to absorb all this. Just in time for the next event.

 

My recommendation would be to get an intro to tracking a car with you G, then pick up a relatively cheap and lighter track car when you get seriously into it. Much easier to modify a car when it's not your daily driver, and it's much easier to toss around a ~2500 lb car than it is a ~3500 lb car. Your consumable budget alone when going faster will be quite cheaper, to the point to where you'll have paid for your additional track car in tires and brake pads alone.

I have an S13 240SX that I've messed around with for about 5 years now. It's pretty fast at this point, and honestly, it's a little on the scary side when really turned up because for some reason I've just stuck with street tires all this time. It's somewhere just below 2500 lbs and can make up to about 370 rwhp(way too much for DEs honestly, I usually run it about 300 rwhp). The plus side is that if I ever stuff it into a wall - which is VERY possible, I can source a shell for not too much money and then just have to swap stuff over for a few weeks.

The other advantage is you can go with a stiffer suspension that suits the track better, plus get some safety gear that would ruin a nice G35. A rollbar and fixed back seats with harnesses make such a difference on the track when you get fast and aren't sitting there struggling to stay in your slick leather seat.

 

We always have a good turn out of Zs for our (www.MVPTrackTime.com) track events an I don't think I've ever seen a Z sent home on a trailer due to mechanical issues. As you already know, the Z is a GREAT track car, stock or otherwise.

Feff

 

My $0.02. I've been out on the track scores of times now.

The Coupe I have didn't turn out to be as good a track car as I had hoped. Awsome at autocross while stock but running the track is requiring some serious brake work. After some sock sized rotor upgrades and brake compounds worthy of endurance racing in a lighter car I had to go BBK. Now after the BBK I get some serious knockback which I'm solving this weekend by installing knockback springs (I hope).

I've had some odd combinations of tires on the car which have been producing oversteer mid and late corner, this is also probably an artifact of me sheding some pounds on the car. Even so I've impressed the instructors enough that they don't want to sit in with me any more. I'm running in a intermediate goupe now where several people have upgraded to racing slicks. I plan on running street tires for quite some time yet. If the RE-11's I have on order don't fix the oversteer I'll most likely put some bar in the front.

The car is stock, with the exception of some shedded weight. Everyone that had sat in the passenger seat feals the suspenstion is fine, at least those who've I asked.

After I get the new tires (and possibly roll bar) I'm going after racing seats. Two reasons a) my knees are rubbing/bumping up against the interior pretty hard b) I have to slouch in the car with my helmet on (also getting rid of 100lbs of electronics won't hurt the track times).

So far as I run street tires I suspect that nothing else will need to be upgraded. So for now I'm contempt with distroying street tires in only a couple thousand miles.