Before the 350z and G35 became incredibly popular import hot rods Rob built a very special sportscar with owner John N. back in 2005. They Vortech supercharged a G35 coupe to the tune of 500whp with nitrous intercooler-spray along with plenty of bolt-ons. The car was even featured in SportCompactCar magazine, here is what it looked like then:

From 2006-2007 John wanted to go all out in terms of performance and looks so ZCG proceeded to transform the G starting with a APS Extreme Twin-Turbo kit on a fully-built 4.1L stroker motor:

The interior got an extensive roll-cage that was both safe and allowed back seat access. Bride seats and a custom gauge pod stand out in otherwise factory-luxurious interior:

Footwork was immense, consisting of Stoptech 14″ brakes both front and rear(355mm), Tein-Flex coil-overs, and ludicrously wide custom HRE wheels with 345-width tires in back.

Although the tuning scene was very differnt 6 years ago, practically every aftermaket part available at the time was included in the build. The engine wasn’t fully tuned to experience all of its glory but the G was thoroughly enjoyed after it left the shop.
Fast forward to 2012 when current owner Mark L. called ZCG and described a certain widebody G35 for sale! Rob immediately knew the car, an appointment was made and work began where they left off to
complete that last 10% to make this widebody a street sweeper. Rob UPREV tuned with the factory ECU instead of Hydranemesis standalone originally on the car and made some incredible gains:

Before:   481hp/482tq

After:     556hp/566tq

Thanks for letting us finish an awesome car Mark, enjoy the ride!

It’s about  time we shared with you how our customers feel after coming to  ZCG for some performance upgrades. Here is owner Kevin R. with his experience:

“I bought my 73 240 in 1977 from the original owner with 42k miles when I was 18… drove it 2 weeks, decided to rebuild the motor for fun and added triple Webers and a DeLong cam. Four years ago, with 340k miles, Rob put in a high performance motor: 2.8 bottom end, E-30 ported head, and still the triple Webers and cam. Performance is incredible.. just added Rob’s custom exhaust system and hp at the rear end went from 162 to 182 and the power and torque is fantastic!  I am now at 386k miles and it runs stronger than ever…Thanks Rob”

Thad N brought his FX45 to ZCG last year for a BBK and suspension. While handling and braking were transformed and the new ride height pleasing to the eye the stock wheels just didn’t quite fill those massive wheel wells. Good thing Thaad has excellent taste and ZCG installedl these striking 22s with 275s up front and huge 305s in back.
The stance is just right. This FX is now both elegant and mean making it one incredibly cool canyon cruiser…

Last month we introduced you to Peter and his 1971 Skyline that he recently acquired through the well-known JDMLegends shop. After seeing ZCG’s upgrades to Gary’s C10 Peter wanted similar ignition mods and carb tuning. A 3.2L stroker motor is in the future but for now Peter wanted to get the car dialed-in to enjoying summer driving.

A Mallory Unilite setup with MSD6AL igntion box replace the stock coil.  A very trick ZCG touch hides the tach adaptor under the horn and the MSD unit is placed under the dash to keep the engine bay uncluttered. New factory Nissan plug wires are used because they are the best! Below you can also see the stock direct drive fan replaced with Zcar fan clutch:

The engine bay needed some love, especially the carbs which were corroded. New Nissan fuel lines supply the triple 40’s. 44s are on the horizon. Check out that engine bay now…

The fuel system was also corroded and the electric pump was replaced with a factory mechanical fuel pump.

Rob tuned the carbs for better driveability and a few more horses. The dyno shows significant gains in hp/tq and much smoother delivery.

Peter’s Skyline is ready to rock for the summertime. We know we will find him on a twisty mountain road with a smile on his face as the Skyline’s tach sweeps towards redline 🙂

Every so often, a new challenge materializes at Z Car Garage.

Nissan has been quietly developing its continuously variable transmission (CVT), which began with the Murano in 2003 and is now available across many of its models. With the kinks worked out in the early Muranos, the CVT roars at red-line as you punch the throttle and does not let up. And when an opportunity appears to tune a Nissan Altima 3.5 SE CVT Coupe, how can one resist?

At first glance, the Altima Coupe looks like the offspring of the Altima sedan and the G35 coupe. The front bears resemblance of the sedan, and has the rear of an Infiniti. Unlike the Altima sedan, the coupe has a shorter wheelbase and shaves off a few pounds. And the Altima Coupe, like its sedan parent, comes in two flavors: the 2.5 (QR25DE engine) and the 3.5 (VQ35DE), the latter of which develops 270hp.

One weakness of the CVT are its belts, which were known for some time to be intolerant of high temperatures and high torque. Fortunately, Nissan developed a much stronger belt system in the 3.5 model and it has proved its durability time and time again.

When Alex of Santa Clara brought up the idea of tuning his CVT Coupe, we knew that we were about to venture into uncharted waters. The VQ35 with a CVT posed an ominous challenge to tune, let alone dyno accurately.

Before we began, we had to prove that we could consistently dyno the car. Although the transmission has a manual mode, the gear ratios still varied within each gear. Across the web, the word was that a CVT cannot be dynoed. It seemed almost like an accepted fact. But we can now confidently say yes – it can be dynoed, although there is peculiar behavior, which cannot be ignored. This includes the transmission’s attempted to down-shift at full throttle and upshift just short of red-line. Despite this, with a little patience and great finesse, Rob and Josh found a technique to get consistent runs in 4th gear. Once we knew that it could be dynoed consistently, there was no looking back.

The Coupe entered the shop with one performance mod: an axle-back Borla exhaust. Our baseline for the tune was 212.24 hp at the wheels and 214.31 ft/lb of torque.
Here is a video clip of a dyno run:

Before we began the tune, we started by installing a K&N intake. The K&N air filter provides more surface area and better air-flow over the stock intake. Although no longer enclosed, the heatshield still mates with the stock air duct to deliver cold air from the outside. The overall gains from the intake were minimal at first. On its own, the intake actually caused a loss in performance in the low-end of the power-band, with some gains between 4,800 and 6,000 RPM.

The next step was to install Racingline’s Y-Pipe. The after-market y-pipe is far less restrictive that the stock y-pipe. Imagine taking a deep breath when you are winded, and then trying to whistle the air back out. It’s not a very effective way of delivering oxygen to your body; you’ll be left with a lot of CO2 in your lungs as you try to get new oxygen.

We knew that we might not see significant benefits from the intake until we freed up the exhaust. After the y-pipe install and a dyno run, we found a gain of approximately 6.5hp and 6.5 ft/lb of torque throughout the entire band.

Acceleration in the lower range was important, and the power was still lagging. Now it was time to bring everything together with UpRev. With a keen eye, Rob manipulated the cam timing and the air-fuel ratios to bring the entire power-band up, especially the low-end torque. The tune itself gave us an extra 2hp and 2ft/lb of torque.

The engine made 200+ ft/lb of torque at 2,400RPM and beyond. At the end of the day, we were left with 221.22 hp at the wheels and 223.78 ft/lb of torque (SAE 5).

The gains were modest for a first attempt, but we made it out in one piece. How awesome it was.