I have a stock 07 G35X (not an S) and I want to upgrade the suspension. I'm currently running stock 17" wheels with a decent Nokian all season. The car is currently stock with about 75,000 highway miles on it. This is a pleasure ride to be driven as a second car when the daily driver is already out and it's also an all season ride with some winter conditions.

I've searched this board for hours and have a pretty good sense of my options and the limitations related to the X AWD. And I've done suspension upgrades like this on a TSX so I have a pretty good idea of what it involved.

I have three upgrades I'm looking at and would like some feedback on which upgrades would yield the most improvement.

1) 19 inch wheels with good summer rubber.
2) Sway bars - probably the Hotchkis front and rears.
3) Moderate 1" Lowering - given the limited options for the X, I'll probably go with springs (eibach) and my stock shocks until they fail and then replace. I don't think CO's make sense but I'm open to that option.

So how should I rank these upgrades in order of priority given the amount of performance each returns for the G35X?

Bryan

 

I would do the drop at the same time as/before the 19s else you will look like even more of a 4x4 in terms of ride height/wheel gap.

 

Sway bars should be 1st imo, big change in the handling of the car. The other two depend, if you go with a lightweight wheel and some max performance tires, then you should get a good change from the stock 17s with all season tires. If you're looking to get more performance out of a drop, you should really consider getting coilovers and not just springs. Looks only,springs are fine, but coilovers match the spring and strut combo, plus add adjustability to the stiffness.

 

Exactly. Moving from 17" to 19", you should be looking at dropping the car 2" or so to end up with a slight drop.

Sway bars are always a great mod (but not always). Not all coilovers properly match the spring and strut, a good majority need either stiffer springs or softer struts.

 

Its my understanding that the o.d. or circumference of the wheel/tires should remain the same regardless of which size wheel you use, so that would mean that a given drop would result in the same fender gap regardless of 17 or 19 inch wheels. Am I wrong?

 

Sways were one of my favourite mods, too, but IIRC on the X you can only change the rear.

 

Try it and see.

 

Yes, the OD will be the same, so the fender gap will be the same, but visually it can look bigger with 19's because the sidewall of the tires is smaller than the 17's. Kind of hard to explain, so check the aftermarket wheels sticky to see what our 2nd gens look like with 19's and no drop.

Hotchkis makes both front and rear bars for the X, stillen, whiteline, and eibach only make front and rear for RWD.

 

Can I rephrase my question? Good thing I didn't go for one of them goofy polling posts because I could really change it up.

If you had about $1500 which of the two of the three options would you go for first? Knowing you'd be looking at adding the third one later.

One combo that looks pretty good to me is the Hotchkis front and rear and the BC coilover. Do that first and a year later do the wheel and summer rubber upgrade.

Another combo would be $1400 on some reasonably light used 19" wheels with new summer rubbers and a Nissan Z rear sway bar from ebay for about $100 or some other appropriate rear bar. And a year later add in coilovers.

Those are two approaches that I came up with that make some sense and I suspect the first is what an experienced person would suggest but I'm not totally sure that's correct.

 

IMO - wheels and suspension go hand in hand - if you can't do it all - wait until you can - otherwise i say go with the sways to improve your handling for now - and get the wheels and coilovers together

 

Wheels do nothing for handling. Even if they are lightweight, larger wheels won't respond as well. If anything, the larger circumference will widen the turning radius, hindering performance just a little. And if you really want handling, find yourself a balanced suspension, not just some cheap coilovers.

 

I heard bigger wheels will improve handling, but worsen ride quality (in most cases but you might be able to negate that with the rubber you choose). Surprised to hear someone say handling actually worsens. I'll have to do some more research on that.

And won't the circumference of the wheel and tire remain the same even if the wheel is plus sized? So the turning radius should be the same, wouldn't it?

What does it mean to find yourself a balanced suspension instead of cheap coilovers? Are you referring to corner balancing a vehicle and making sure your CO's allow for the adjustments for doing that? Just curious.

 

like alot of peopel said..drop and rims at the same time..

 

Appreciate the advice. Think I'm going to do the Hotchkis to start with as suggested. And I don't see myself spending the coilover and rim cost all in one shot so I'll do them one at a time but together as advised. Probably do the rims and tires first. Then do the CO/lowering. I think that's the order to do it in from a pragmatic point of view so I can set the height at the end with the new wheels on. I realize it will look a bit offroad for a while but I'm seriously leaning towards 18's instead of 19's so it won't look any worse than an S.

 

Of those three, swaybars are the best bang for the buck.

I have done all three and highly recomend you do the same.

I have 19's on mine, but I kept the over all tire size the same as stock (thinner side wall) so my speedo would stay the same.

The last item would be a good set of after marked shocks.