Thought that might make you pay attention ! Actually, the end is only nigh for my time with it. I've been driving the other half's new 350 since Sunday (she only got it delivered last Friday afternoon) and it has been fun, but unfortunately she'll be back this Friday night and is expecting me to return it :(

 

It's feels quite a lot different to my Z, it's shorter, taller and definitely doesn't have the mid-range whoomph that the turbo's deliver, but no question about it, it's a pretty quick car. It rev's well and although I've had to pretty much stick to the 4000rpm running in limit, that hasn't been a problem. The most challenging part has been getting used to the gears & clutch. The gears are physically very close together and it's pretty easy to end up in a different gear, especially going down the box from say 5th-4th. My normal trick of going from 4th-2nd under braking takes a lot of practice. That said I now get the right gear about 98% of the time. 6th gear is great for motorway work and on my 70-90mph blast back down from Preston on Sunday night I got a fraction under 30mpg, which is about 5mpg more than my Z32 does. Also, going to work and back this week has yielded about 28.5mpg, when mine normally does about 21mpg. The clutch is also quite aggressive and for me it bites just a little bit too high, which means my heel is actually off the floor, making it tricky to judge. That with a short first gear followed by a sometimes lumpy change into 2nd can make for a less than smooth take-off. Starting is 2nd is almost as good, but would obviously be a little slower. I'm sure many of these niggles will improve as it gets run-in - it's done less than 500 miles at the moment.

 

The handling is quite different, it's a rather twitchy car which takes a bit of getting used to on motorways and on the bends it feels like it wants to turn in well, compared with the slower steering Z32. For me I think that the steering characteristics of a Z32 vary more when you're on or off the power, the 350 seems more neutral than that. Also, sitting higher up gives a different 'seat of the pants' feel and it took me a while before I felt the same confidence in chucking it round corners - however, I've noticed that my cornering speeds are now the same or faster, so it can't be all bad. :)

 

The lights are good, dip beam is a big improvement on the Z32, but it seems to spray a load of peripheral light out around the place, which for me is pretty unimportant, still I guess there is a limit to what you can do with dipped beams. The main beams seem to lack the deep penetrating throw that my Z32 has, but that could be because once again there is more peripheral light which detracts from the long distance effect. The blue main beam indicator light is far too bright and must light up the whole cabin - reckon the car must appear like some alien space ship with a blue glow emanating from the inside !

 

The brakes - yeah, they work. Well enough to make you slide over the leather seats (which I don't like - far too slippery - you don't see rally cars with leather seats!), full harness required I think ....

 

Inside the stereo seems pretty damn good for standard fitment, it's got a big sub mounted behind the drivers seat which makes your lungs vibrate if you crank it up. Not really my thing, I'm just happy if I can hear the radio about the noise of the exhaust, which in this case is pretty easy when compared to my Mongoose ! The general finish is good and there's not really any evidence of the poor quality that Tiff complained about on the pre-production model.

 

The computer display thing has loads of functions, all pretty useful and my only criticism is that you can't display enough of them at once. So if you want to see the clock and anything else at the same time, then you're out of luck.

 

What I like:

Engine

Fuel economy

The colour (blue)

 

What I don't:

Door handles - what were they thinking ?

Clutch

Leather seats

Main beam

 

 

Would I buy one ? Well, if I genuinely had £26K to spare, maybe. But there again you could complete a fantastic Z32 for that money.

Wow, what a good test write up! Detailed on the important things. If more car mags had useful write-ups like that, then maybe I'd buy some of them. Andy, you missed your calling as a car journalist!

 

Thanks for letting us know all that info :)

Yeah, I wasn't going to buy one anyway, but that was a really interesting read - Now we know how to road kill one eh!

Nice, will give me something to think about when they release a turbo version stright from the factory :) (well about 10 years after they do and its at a reasonable price)