Yesterday saw me head down to Kent to pick up my new Shortie! :D I got on the motorway to come back home about 4pm.

 

At 9pm, I was safely tucked away... on the hard shoulder of the A1(M) near York with a grand total of 1 wheelnut holding my rear passenger wheel on!!! The other 4 studs decided to shear off while I was in the outside lane - there was an almighty bang, the back-end of the car went completely loose so I had no choice but to dive for the shoulder! :(

 

The recovery truck arrived at 11pm and I slowly edged my new tripod onto the flatbed, before we headed off back to mine.

 

Spoke to Mr F this morning and he's ordered me 10 new rear studs, so my new car is currently undrivable. Seems it had cheap slot-on spacers on the back, no spigot rings and the end result was 4 wheelstuds missing.

 

Gotta love Zeds, eh...?!

Edited December 4, 201411 yr by Mondo

As promised, some cleaner pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Took the old wheels to their new owner this afternoon, popped in to see Lexx :) and then stopped of for a super-glamorous photoshoot! :lol:

 

She's a pretty little thing....

I have no idea where my lip came from, mate - it was on the car when it was imported.

 

I've never found a similar one through a Google search either!

 

Doesn't grey have the same one on his zed?

Those wheels look ****ing huge on your SWB!

Nice! Are they 18s or 19s?

Doesn't grey have the same one on his zed?

 

Gray has a stillen lip

Those wheels look ****ing huge on your SWB!

 

They do have a bit of a presence, don't they... :)

 

Nice! Are they 18s or 19s?

 

19s - same as the old set, mate :)

Gray has a stillen lip

 

My mistake. You sure it's a stillen one? Appears to have some extra vents that they don't have and the figment appears different.

They look great, I much prefer them over the old ones. They do look mahosive

They look great, I much prefer them over the old ones. They do look mahosive

 

I think there are two things that make them look so big in comparison to the old wheels: the design being totally different (these are concave whereas the TDs had a deep dish) and also the fact that, due to the rears being 0.5" wider than previously, there's a small amount of stretch on the tyres now.

 

Looking at your sig pic, I don't think mine look any larger than your Nismos, Pete :)

My mistake. You sure it's a stillen one? Appears to have some extra vents that they don't have and the figment appears different.

 

Gray definately has a stillen type III lip mate

Brake calipers going on tomorrow :biggrin: That should help to make a little more sense of my super red wheel emblems! :thumbup:

for a 19" wheel they look MASSIVE! lol, nice style of wheel though!, and suits the car really well!:drool:

Although they do look huge with the design of the spokes going all the way to the rim, I think the colour choice tones that down a bit. If they were a bright silver for example, I think they would be too overpowering.

 

Regardless of the colour of your calipers, I don't think several matching colour splashes is necessarily a good thing, I'm on the side of toned down wheel elblems but they're subtle enough to not matter [emoji106]

Well, people can now judge for themselves... the refurbed calipers are now on:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think they're incredibly subtle, despite being Candy red! I can also confirm that my braking is now very much improved as well, which makes a wonderful change!

 

I'm very happy with how it's all turned out after such a debacle with the original wheels :biggrin: FunkySi may not approve of some things, but I can live with that.... ;)

They look great - just how I'd like to get mine done when I have a chance to get them painted properly. Barely visible behind those wheels though!

They look great - just how I'd like to get mine done when I have a chance to get them painted properly. Barely visible behind those wheels though!

 

That was pretty much the effect I was looking for, to be honest :) Nice and subtle, but still there (if that makes sense?)...

They look tidy. it's great to see everything so clean and tidy, particualy with them on show now so much more. Glad the performance is better too.

 

as a future upgrade have you thought about some bigger discs?

They look tidy. it's great to see everything so clean and tidy, particualy with them on show now so much more. Glad the performance is better too.

 

as a future upgrade have you thought about some bigger discs?

 

The front discs are already 345mm...!

Hi Si, Just noticed how many views your thread has had......Views: 21,058...... nice..... lol

I do like the new wheels......:thumbup:

Hi Si, Just noticed how many views your thread has had......Views: 21,058...... nice..... lol

I do like the new wheels......:thumbup:

 

Thanks Russ :thumbup1:

 

I'm very happy with how she's starting to look now. I still need to get the replacement rear spats painted and fitted though. But yeah, I think she's looking well these days :biggrin:

Thanks Russ :thumbup1:

 

I'm very happy with how she's starting to look now. I still need to get the replacement rear spats painted and fitted though. But yeah, I think she's looking well these days :biggrin:

 

Silver or are you painting them black or something?

Silver or are you painting them black or something?

 

Exactly the same as the ones that are currently fitted, just the replacements are in slightly better condition :)

So, imminent plans!

 

Mid-April, we're off to LA Autos to drop Lee's retrimmed interior off with him (thread coming soon!) and also to have my Hicas arms and balljoints replaced. That should help to tighten the back end up properly and also get rid of an advisory on the last MOT. :)

 

Funds permitting, I'll be having a brand new starter motor fitted as well as I grow incredibly weary of the annoying and embarrassing grinding noise that the current one makes on occasion...

 

Late April will see me heading to Bristol. To Infinity Exhausts, to be specific, where they'll be fitting the new 3" expansion downpipes and fabricating a complete system from those downpipes back. :biggrin: I'll be happy to see the back of my current Powerflow catback, truth be told.

 

Now, as much as I'd love to have a pair of Speciality Z downpipes on my Zed, they're sadly too rich for my blood so I'm opting for a pair of AMS ones instead. Not ideal, true - but infinitely better than standard and I figure I should be able to get around any possible fitment issues by the fact that Infinity will be making everything after the downpipes from scratch. Let's hope I'm right!

 

While I'm in Bristol, I'll be dropping in on Jimmer and we'll be attacking the underside of my car and cleaning it, then sealing it. :)

 

Once all that's done, I'll be beyond skint so that'll be it for a while! :lol:

Shame you are not down there a bit later, I would love to see your car

 

I'm very interested interested how the exhaust turns out, us swb owners have rather limited options without importing. I'm coming up with a plan to replace my exhaust as well

I considered buying the whole system "off the shelf" but it was going to turn out more costly than getting one made, Pete.

 

This way, I at least get to decide how I want it all to look, so that's a plus for me :)