Evolving at 1500 miles
Mar 22, 2003, 07:02 PM
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Evolving at 1500 miles
A load of random thoughts on Evolution ownership...
Just rolled over 1500 miles in my evolution.
I picked up my Lightning Yellow Evolution on 3.13.03, a week and two days ago. On Sunday, I drove the car up to Chicago. ~500 miles from door to door, a great way to get through those break in miles.
Driving to Chicago was a lot of fun. The car is much much better on the highway than I expected. This is a fantastic car to be driving in for several hours. The seats are wonderfully comfortable. Even concentrating on keeping the car below half throttle and under 5000 RPM, the car is a blast to drive on the highway. Acceration is smooth and easy in fifth gear, and the car is an absolute rocket at ~70 mph in forth gear.
Hit Chicago with ~750 miles on the clock. First opportunity I got (coming off a toll station) I put the pedal to the floor and ran through the gears to redline. Couldn't get the grin off my face... even barely broken in, the car was everything I was hoping in the acceleration department.
I have the passenger dash rattle that some other people are speaking of. Its only noticable around 20mph - 40mph. Beyond 40mph you can't even hear it. One of these days I'm going to dig in to the area and see if I can't find (and document) a fix, but its not slowing my enjoyment of the car at all.
Acceleration and braking are exactly what I was hoping. The car pulls very strong to redline, and the engine sounds wonderful. No need for a shift light in this car... if you can't hear the 4G63 screaming above 7000 RPM then you've got a real problem.
Brake feel is very very impressive. The pedal is rock solid at only a half inch of travel. The braking is well balanced, and the stiff springs keep the Evo to minimal diving under braking (which I'm sure will keep the car much better balanced for turn-in at the track).
The handling on this car is still constantly exceeding my expectations. I've whipped the car around a few 90-degree right-hand turns under power, and the car just moves. The grip is amazing, and the car just scoots and slides through the turns with the perfect amount of drift. I've had the opportunity to drive a handful of great back roads both here and outside of Chicago, and the car is everything I hoped it would be and more. The car is well balanced and hugs the curves even better than my e36 M3 (considered the best handling car on the planet in its heyday).
As I reported before, the car's responsiveness is unparalleled in any car less than $120,000. Driving down the road, a quick jink of the steering wheel and the car just responds and moves. I've been able to avoid potholes and road debris better than any car I've ever driven, the car just juking left and right on command, well balanced and totally in control. As I reported before, I can totally understand how someone unfamiliar with this car and its awesome steering response could easily roll the car in a panic situation - a half-rotation of the steering wheel (as would normally be the proper amount of correction in the event of a spin) is like a 90-degree turn of the wheels and could easily cause an inexperienced driver to way overcorrect and get in real trouble.
The steering is just wonderful - driving on the highway, passing a line-up of cars is a simple extra inch on the throttle, spooling up the turbo and shooting the car up an extra 10-20mph in a heartbeat, a quick flick of the wrists to shift in to the next lane, a few heartbeats to zoom through traffic, and a quick flick of the wrists to pull back in. 95% of turns (even on the twistiest of back roads) can be achieved with a quarter turn or less of steering input. The tightest turns of all (such as navigating my parking garage at work) can be made with little more than a half turn of the wheel - never removing your hands from the 9-and-3 positions.
One thing I've noticed, the aerodynimics on this car are very impressive. Drive in a little bit of dirt or dust and you'll see what I mean. You get road dust along the aerodynamics - arcing along the rear quarter panel, along the side skirts, around the wheel flares, and all around the spoiler. It's truly amazing to realize the aerodynimic engineering that's gone in to this car - you can see where the wind flows around the rear quarter panel to hit the corners of the rear spoiler. You can see where the wind comes off the roof and hits the blade of the spoiler. You can see where the wind wraps around the bottom sides of the rounded rear bumper. All in all, very impressive - this car doesn't just look the part, the aerodyamics are for real.
Yellow is a color that gets you noticed. it also shows dirt and road grime like crazy. It's really easy to clean, as its so easy to spot the difference between clean yellow and grimey yellow.
Lots of attention on the road. So far only a tiny portion of people have known the car for what it is - three diferent guys, all under the age of 25. Most people just compliment the car or the color.... One guy rolled down his window on the highway back from Chicago to pay me a compliment and ask a few questions about the car, while zooming along at 85mph.
The wheels get dirty, quickly. As with any high performance braking system, these pads dust like crazy. Not nearly as bad as my race brakes, but well worse than any of the stock BMW brakes as an example. There are several spots in the wheels that collect dirt and brake dust - there are two lips inside the wheels, each about an inch in from each side. Dirt and dust collects there. Here's a suggestion, a tip from the BMW world. Plan on pulling your wheels off the first opportunity you get. Use a good wheel cleaner - I prefer the BBS brand wheel cleaner from Griots Garage - and use a good wheel brush. I also use a toothbrush to get in to the tight places. Scrub the hell out of your wheels, and then put a good coat of wax on them . Both sides - inside, outside, etc. This will make it pretty easy to clean in the future. After a hanful of washes, plan on pulling the wheels off the car and repeating. Well worth the effort. Oh, and plan on cleaning your calipers too (which you can do pretty effectively with a toothbrush through the wheel spokes) - the red calipers seem to collect brake dust and it really shows (the calipers seem to dull and go flat when dirty - you don't notice the dirt but you notice the lack of shine).
Water collects in the ridge below (in front of) the hood vents. Water also collects in the ridges in the roof of the car. Plan on towling these areas pretty carefully if you are hand washing.
Also plan on opening the doors and trunk every time you wash your car, to clean the edges. Dirt gets under the doors and inside the trunk but hand washing can't get it. If people don't take care of these areas, its giong to be really easy to tell after a few tens of thousands of miles.
Two cool things happened re: the car while I was in Chicago.
First, I had my first street race. Tooling around the suburbs (showing off the car to one of my brothers-in-law) I ended up at a stoplight next to a black 350Z outfitted with the "track" package (easy to tell by the brakes). Driving the car was a younger (25-30 by my estimate) woman. We checked out each others cars, and she actually rev'd at me. I smiled at her, rev'd back. I assumed she was just playing... but as the light turned green we were off. She pulled at least a full car length, as I wasn't really expecting her to run. But through every gear, the Evo just pulled on the 350Z, gaining ground foot by foot. By the time we hit approximately 80mph, I had pulled to almost a full car length lead. We both hit the brakes and "staged" at a second stoplight. This time, we were both ready. I wasn't ready to drop the clutch on this car with less than 1000 miles on the clock, so I feathered the clutch in to a full throttle launch from about 2000 RPM. The 350Z again jumped out to a little lead (about half a car, I'm pretty positive she wasn't dropping her clutch at all, just putting the pedal down and letting the clutch out as I was doing). And again, the Evo pulled to a full car length lead around 80mph. By no means can this be considered an exhaustive test of the Evo versus the 350Z, but i was happy to get the opportunity to run against one. I have confidence that given equal drivers and given a clutch-drop launch in both cars, the (stock) Evo will be able to pull on the (stock) 350Z.
The other great thing that happened: through the forum, I hooked up with the guys from AutoMotorSports. I took a tour of their facilities, checked out their silver Evolution, and talked about tuning options. They really impressed me - I'm sure in short order they'll have a great combo of products for our cars, and I plan on going to them for all my Evo tuning needs.. I took a handful of pix from their shop, and I'm going to post a write-up and the pix in the . AMS vendor forum. They showed me their Evo dyno data, and talked me through the modifications they'd already done to the car and were happy to talk to me about future options for our cars. All in all, I was very impressed with AMS's profesionalism and attention to detail. Look for a full write-up shortly.
All in all, I couldn't be happier with this car. Its everything I wanted in the acceration and braking department. Drastically exceeding expectations in handling and especially responsiveness.
I still plan on modifying the car... I can't wait for someone to release a harness for a turbo timer, that will be my first install. I'll probably go with an intake, turbo-back exhaust, fuel controller, boost controller, and possibly hoses and blow-off valve. Looking for a reliable 350 HP at the crank, and will probably throw a 50-75 shot Nitrous setup on for the few times that I need to show up a 911 Turbo or etc at the track.
Oh, and I plan on tinting the windows next week. Driving to Chicago, it got pretty hot through the side windows with all that glass.
Just rolled over 1500 miles in my evolution.
I picked up my Lightning Yellow Evolution on 3.13.03, a week and two days ago. On Sunday, I drove the car up to Chicago. ~500 miles from door to door, a great way to get through those break in miles.
Driving to Chicago was a lot of fun. The car is much much better on the highway than I expected. This is a fantastic car to be driving in for several hours. The seats are wonderfully comfortable. Even concentrating on keeping the car below half throttle and under 5000 RPM, the car is a blast to drive on the highway. Acceration is smooth and easy in fifth gear, and the car is an absolute rocket at ~70 mph in forth gear.
Hit Chicago with ~750 miles on the clock. First opportunity I got (coming off a toll station) I put the pedal to the floor and ran through the gears to redline. Couldn't get the grin off my face... even barely broken in, the car was everything I was hoping in the acceleration department.
I have the passenger dash rattle that some other people are speaking of. Its only noticable around 20mph - 40mph. Beyond 40mph you can't even hear it. One of these days I'm going to dig in to the area and see if I can't find (and document) a fix, but its not slowing my enjoyment of the car at all.
Acceleration and braking are exactly what I was hoping. The car pulls very strong to redline, and the engine sounds wonderful. No need for a shift light in this car... if you can't hear the 4G63 screaming above 7000 RPM then you've got a real problem.
Brake feel is very very impressive. The pedal is rock solid at only a half inch of travel. The braking is well balanced, and the stiff springs keep the Evo to minimal diving under braking (which I'm sure will keep the car much better balanced for turn-in at the track).
The handling on this car is still constantly exceeding my expectations. I've whipped the car around a few 90-degree right-hand turns under power, and the car just moves. The grip is amazing, and the car just scoots and slides through the turns with the perfect amount of drift. I've had the opportunity to drive a handful of great back roads both here and outside of Chicago, and the car is everything I hoped it would be and more. The car is well balanced and hugs the curves even better than my e36 M3 (considered the best handling car on the planet in its heyday).
As I reported before, the car's responsiveness is unparalleled in any car less than $120,000. Driving down the road, a quick jink of the steering wheel and the car just responds and moves. I've been able to avoid potholes and road debris better than any car I've ever driven, the car just juking left and right on command, well balanced and totally in control. As I reported before, I can totally understand how someone unfamiliar with this car and its awesome steering response could easily roll the car in a panic situation - a half-rotation of the steering wheel (as would normally be the proper amount of correction in the event of a spin) is like a 90-degree turn of the wheels and could easily cause an inexperienced driver to way overcorrect and get in real trouble.
The steering is just wonderful - driving on the highway, passing a line-up of cars is a simple extra inch on the throttle, spooling up the turbo and shooting the car up an extra 10-20mph in a heartbeat, a quick flick of the wrists to shift in to the next lane, a few heartbeats to zoom through traffic, and a quick flick of the wrists to pull back in. 95% of turns (even on the twistiest of back roads) can be achieved with a quarter turn or less of steering input. The tightest turns of all (such as navigating my parking garage at work) can be made with little more than a half turn of the wheel - never removing your hands from the 9-and-3 positions.
One thing I've noticed, the aerodynimics on this car are very impressive. Drive in a little bit of dirt or dust and you'll see what I mean. You get road dust along the aerodynamics - arcing along the rear quarter panel, along the side skirts, around the wheel flares, and all around the spoiler. It's truly amazing to realize the aerodynimic engineering that's gone in to this car - you can see where the wind flows around the rear quarter panel to hit the corners of the rear spoiler. You can see where the wind comes off the roof and hits the blade of the spoiler. You can see where the wind wraps around the bottom sides of the rounded rear bumper. All in all, very impressive - this car doesn't just look the part, the aerodyamics are for real.
Yellow is a color that gets you noticed. it also shows dirt and road grime like crazy. It's really easy to clean, as its so easy to spot the difference between clean yellow and grimey yellow.
Lots of attention on the road. So far only a tiny portion of people have known the car for what it is - three diferent guys, all under the age of 25. Most people just compliment the car or the color.... One guy rolled down his window on the highway back from Chicago to pay me a compliment and ask a few questions about the car, while zooming along at 85mph.
The wheels get dirty, quickly. As with any high performance braking system, these pads dust like crazy. Not nearly as bad as my race brakes, but well worse than any of the stock BMW brakes as an example. There are several spots in the wheels that collect dirt and brake dust - there are two lips inside the wheels, each about an inch in from each side. Dirt and dust collects there. Here's a suggestion, a tip from the BMW world. Plan on pulling your wheels off the first opportunity you get. Use a good wheel cleaner - I prefer the BBS brand wheel cleaner from Griots Garage - and use a good wheel brush. I also use a toothbrush to get in to the tight places. Scrub the hell out of your wheels, and then put a good coat of wax on them . Both sides - inside, outside, etc. This will make it pretty easy to clean in the future. After a hanful of washes, plan on pulling the wheels off the car and repeating. Well worth the effort. Oh, and plan on cleaning your calipers too (which you can do pretty effectively with a toothbrush through the wheel spokes) - the red calipers seem to collect brake dust and it really shows (the calipers seem to dull and go flat when dirty - you don't notice the dirt but you notice the lack of shine).
Water collects in the ridge below (in front of) the hood vents. Water also collects in the ridges in the roof of the car. Plan on towling these areas pretty carefully if you are hand washing.
Also plan on opening the doors and trunk every time you wash your car, to clean the edges. Dirt gets under the doors and inside the trunk but hand washing can't get it. If people don't take care of these areas, its giong to be really easy to tell after a few tens of thousands of miles.
Two cool things happened re: the car while I was in Chicago.
First, I had my first street race. Tooling around the suburbs (showing off the car to one of my brothers-in-law) I ended up at a stoplight next to a black 350Z outfitted with the "track" package (easy to tell by the brakes). Driving the car was a younger (25-30 by my estimate) woman. We checked out each others cars, and she actually rev'd at me. I smiled at her, rev'd back. I assumed she was just playing... but as the light turned green we were off. She pulled at least a full car length, as I wasn't really expecting her to run. But through every gear, the Evo just pulled on the 350Z, gaining ground foot by foot. By the time we hit approximately 80mph, I had pulled to almost a full car length lead. We both hit the brakes and "staged" at a second stoplight. This time, we were both ready. I wasn't ready to drop the clutch on this car with less than 1000 miles on the clock, so I feathered the clutch in to a full throttle launch from about 2000 RPM. The 350Z again jumped out to a little lead (about half a car, I'm pretty positive she wasn't dropping her clutch at all, just putting the pedal down and letting the clutch out as I was doing). And again, the Evo pulled to a full car length lead around 80mph. By no means can this be considered an exhaustive test of the Evo versus the 350Z, but i was happy to get the opportunity to run against one. I have confidence that given equal drivers and given a clutch-drop launch in both cars, the (stock) Evo will be able to pull on the (stock) 350Z.
The other great thing that happened: through the forum, I hooked up with the guys from AutoMotorSports. I took a tour of their facilities, checked out their silver Evolution, and talked about tuning options. They really impressed me - I'm sure in short order they'll have a great combo of products for our cars, and I plan on going to them for all my Evo tuning needs.
. I took a handful of pix from their shop, and I'm going to post a write-up and the pix in the . AMS vendor forum. They showed me their Evo dyno data, and talked me through the modifications they'd already done to the car and were happy to talk to me about future options for our cars. All in all, I was very impressed with AMS's profesionalism and attention to detail. Look for a full write-up shortly.All in all, I couldn't be happier with this car. Its everything I wanted in the acceration and braking department. Drastically exceeding expectations in handling and especially responsiveness.
I still plan on modifying the car... I can't wait for someone to release a harness for a turbo timer, that will be my first install. I'll probably go with an intake, turbo-back exhaust, fuel controller, boost controller, and possibly hoses and blow-off valve. Looking for a reliable 350 HP at the crank, and will probably throw a 50-75 shot Nitrous setup on for the few times that I need to show up a 911 Turbo or etc at the track.
Oh, and I plan on tinting the windows next week. Driving to Chicago, it got pretty hot through the side windows with all that glass.
Last edited by jedinite; Mar 22, 2003 at 07:08 PM.
Mar 22, 2003, 07:15 PM
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Great review jedi!!!
The 350Z Track vs the Evo was perfect. That's the two cars i'm trying to decide between sometimes. So far I haven't heard anyone unhappy with the Evo, which is a very good thing!! It means I will be happy too!
The 350Z Track vs the Evo was perfect. That's the two cars i'm trying to decide between sometimes. So far I haven't heard anyone unhappy with the Evo, which is a very good thing!! It means I will be happy too!
Mar 22, 2003, 07:45 PM
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Re: Evolving at 1500 miles
nice report except for this part.... $120k?
Originally posted by jedinite
As I reported before, the car's responsiveness is unparalleled in any car less than $120,000.
As I reported before, the car's responsiveness is unparalleled in any car less than $120,000.
Mar 23, 2003, 12:29 AM
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hey man great job on explaing alot for the people who dont have the cars yet... i really really appreciate the time you must've took to write this..thanks alot... I live right by chicago, in the suburbs.. wheeling.. if u know where that is... It's pretty close to AMS..and they are a great shop..
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Mar 23, 2003, 03:59 AM
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Awesome review. Thanks for taking the time to write that!
Man, after looking at your yellow pic and the stories you had..makes me want to get a little louder color like red or yellow! I guess I should go with my instinct and stick with the silver, but color choice is by far the hardest thing.
Man, after looking at your yellow pic and the stories you had..makes me want to get a little louder color like red or yellow! I guess I should go with my instinct and stick with the silver, but color choice is by far the hardest thing.
Mar 24, 2003, 10:12 AM
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Re: Re: Evolving at 1500 miles
Originally posted by MEGABUSA
nice report except for this part.... $120k?
nice report except for this part.... $120k?
Mar 24, 2003, 01:01 PM
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i think you are totally right about the 120k jedi, the only cars that come close are the corvette ZO6 -55K+ and not controllable round turns in the city streets, and the porche carrera -85-95k... i have customers coming from both cars and saying they cant hang unless its a straight line. how crazy is that for an msrp of 
30k... and you all know you are going to spend under 2k in mods and out accelerate the 320hp porche (right now 0-60 is equal) easily and be right in there with the 405hp corvette.... thanks for puting your thoughts on paper jedi, keep up the fun
30k... and you all know you are going to spend under 2k in mods and out accelerate the 320hp porche (right now 0-60 is equal) easily and be right in there with the 405hp corvette.... thanks for puting your thoughts on paper jedi, keep up the fun
Mar 24, 2003, 02:47 PM
#15
Re: Evolving at 1500 miles
Originally posted by jedinite
<<<<snip>>>>>>
The wheels get dirty, quickly. As with any high performance braking system, these pads dust like crazy. Not nearly as bad as my race brakes, but well worse than any of the stock BMW brakes as an example. There are several spots in the wheels that collect dirt and brake dust - there are two lips inside the wheels, each about an inch in from each side. Dirt and dust collects there. Here's a suggestion, a tip from the BMW world. Plan on pulling your wheels off the first opportunity you get. Use a good wheel cleaner - I prefer the BBS brand wheel cleaner from Griots Garage - and use a good wheel brush. I also use a toothbrush to get in to the tight places. Scrub the hell out of your wheels, and then put a good coat of wax on them . Both sides - inside, outside, etc. This will make it pretty easy to clean in the future. After a hanful of washes, plan on pulling the wheels off the car and repeating. Well worth the effort. Oh, and plan on cleaning your calipers too (which you can do pretty effectively with a toothbrush through the wheel spokes) - the red calipers seem to collect brake dust and it really shows (the calipers seem to dull and go flat when dirty - you don't notice the dirt but you notice the lack of shine).
<<<<snip>>>
<<<<snip>>>>>>
The wheels get dirty, quickly. As with any high performance braking system, these pads dust like crazy. Not nearly as bad as my race brakes, but well worse than any of the stock BMW brakes as an example. There are several spots in the wheels that collect dirt and brake dust - there are two lips inside the wheels, each about an inch in from each side. Dirt and dust collects there. Here's a suggestion, a tip from the BMW world. Plan on pulling your wheels off the first opportunity you get. Use a good wheel cleaner - I prefer the BBS brand wheel cleaner from Griots Garage - and use a good wheel brush. I also use a toothbrush to get in to the tight places. Scrub the hell out of your wheels, and then put a good coat of wax on them . Both sides - inside, outside, etc. This will make it pretty easy to clean in the future. After a hanful of washes, plan on pulling the wheels off the car and repeating. Well worth the effort. Oh, and plan on cleaning your calipers too (which you can do pretty effectively with a toothbrush through the wheel spokes) - the red calipers seem to collect brake dust and it really shows (the calipers seem to dull and go flat when dirty - you don't notice the dirt but you notice the lack of shine).
<<<<snip>>>
Erik