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How Much Weight Can we Take Off The 350z?

47K views 45 replies 16 participants last post by  scathing  
#1 ·
Has anyone done any research on how much weight they can reduce from the car ..


wonder if i can take like 200kg off it LOL..


Match it up to a NSX weight lol


::Dreamz::
 
#5 ·
Match it up to a NSX weight lol

Yoiyu don't need to take any weight to match the NSX's weight ... NSX is about the same weight as the original 350Zs (ie. tad over 1400kg).

wonder if i can take like 200kg off it LOL..

You can strip even 400kg if you wanted. Just depends to what compromizes you're willing to make and also how much money you're going to put into it. Though, you can easily strip 200kg just by removing anything that does not help you go. ie. all the trim, seat, con-mods, insulation, sound deadaning and cover up plastic. That would not cost much ... just labour.
 
#7 ·
While we're on the subject, you might as well lose the wheels, all fluids, and the glass. That should help the diet. :lmfao:
 
#10 ·
In regards to this, what exactly composes the majority of the weight? Is it the engine? Tranny maybe?

Nothing in particualar, but everything in the car has some weight associated with it. The engine is not that heavy ie. ~200kg. Not sure about the tranny, but it's be (a loot) less than that. Each wheel/tyre combo is ~25kg. Then the each seat is about ~35kg. The rear door/hatch is about 30kg as well. Each disk/caliper will be about 10kg ... so it all adds up. And then (I'm guessing) the'll be at least 100kg oif sound deadening/insulation.
 
#13 ·
Its hard to believe those seats are so heavy.. you can almost take off 70 kg just from the seat..

Yeah, they are heavy ... though, considering that you'd think that you do want seats in the car, you can't take out the entire 70kg. Nice (adjustable) and lightweight seats should weight ~17kg (each) while a single-piece lightweight seat may weight as little as ~8kg.

So I'd say that 50kg is the most you can hope to remove here while realistically I'd say it'd be more like 30kg.
 
#17 ·
So whats the cheapest thing i can do to shave weight off my ride?

Gut it. ie. remove anything that's not goping to impede your perfomance. ie. start wuth the spare tyre and tool-kit (ie. ~20kg), and then remove all the trim, carpets, and plastic frills from the engine and boot. Then remove radio, speakers and air-con.

The above should not cost much and would save good amopunt of weight (ie. 100kg?). If that's not enough then replace seats with lightweight buckets ... this will save about 40 - 50kg, but will cost about $5k. And lso replace exhaust with a titanium one, which will save another 30kg or so, but will cost good $3k. Then you can replace wheels with lightweight ones ... you're looking to save 20kg at most, but will need to spend at least $6k (inlcuding tyres). So here's another 100kg or so, but at a cost of ~14k.
 
#18 ·
This is really going to depend on what you are willing to do without. How much noise are you willing to put up with? Are you willing to go without air conditioning (in Australia!!)? Are you willing to go without any sound system/radio/etc?

All of these things add a lot of weight. If you were to strip the car entirely of all things not required to make it run (radio, speakers, AC, sound insulation, etc, etc), changed out the seats to CF ones, replaced the glass with Lexan and removed all unnecessary wiring, you can drop about 200+ Kg from the car. From there, you can put on magnesium wheels, CF body panels, plastic/vinyl fuel cell, lighter engine parts (titanium valves, etc), exhaust, etc, for even more weight loss.

I think it's theoretically possible to get this car down under 1185 Kg if you had an unlimited budget.
 
#20 ·
for every.. lets say 50kg you drop off, whats the estimated gain in power at the wheels?
Well let's do some math! :eek:


Horsepower : 287 hp @ 6200 rpm(auto/'03-'05 manual),
300 hp @ 6200 rpm('05-'06 manual)
Torque : 274 lb-ft @ 4800 rpm
Redline : 7000 rpm('05-'06 manual), 6550 rpm(auto/'03-'05 manual)
Top speed : 155 mph(electronically limited)
0-60 mph : 5.4 sec.('03 manual)
0-ÂĽ mile : 14.1 sec @ 101.0 mph('03 manual)
60-0 braking distance : 119 ft
200 ft skidpad : 0.89 g
Curb Weight : 3188-3347 lbs(coupe), 3445-3479 lbs(convertible)
Overall length : 169.6 in.
Wheelbase : 104.3 in.
Overall Width : 71.5 in.
Height : 51.9 in.

Weight 3200 lbs / 290 hp = 11 lbs per horse
50 kgs = 110 lbs
110 lbs / 11 = 10 horse

There fore for evey 50 kgs you take off expect 10 hp (at the crack), very roughly as I rounded up the numbers to make things simple.

Not sure what that would be at the wheels, if I had to guess i'd say 7 or 8?
 
#21 ·
Not sure what that would be at the wheels, if I had to guess i'd say 7 or 8?

It'd be exactly ther same at the wheels. The drivetrain losses do not increase (or decrease) with increase in power. It takes finate amout of power to keep all the things in the Zed moving, and unless you start replacing things that the engione is moving (ie. diff, gearbox, wheels, chank, cams, etc) or increase the redline, then the drivetrain-loss will remain the same.

ie. Take a stock 350Z with 206kW. Let's say that 50kW of that is lost through the drivetrain. Now when you gain 30kW (let's say through exhaust, intake, and ECU), you will still have 'only' 50kW of drivetrain losses.

Why would it suddenly take more power to move all the parts/bits in there compared to what it took before?
 
#22 ·
So whats the cheapest thing i can do to shave weight off my ride? :)
Here's some tips from Sport Compact Car magazine on how they shaved about 2s off a Pulsar sedan's ET for free (well, if you already own the tools).

http://www.daleholley.com/nissan.htm
 
#23 ·
The Powerhouse Amuse FairladyZ is around 1300kg. They replaced most of the exterior panels with CF and gutted the interior though.


Why do you want to reduce weight on the Z? What's your ultimate goal? Weight reduction is expensive and/or compromises a car's streetability, and can actually be detrimental to performance if its not done properly.
 
#25 ·
I really don't think that striping out the zed is a good idea, especially by replacing the exteriors with dry carbon. With that kind of budget, one can simply buy a Lotus. The zed is designed to be performance/comfort compromised. Replacing seats, rims on the other hand is a good way of reducing weight as they wouldn't upset the weight distribution.