DevonK
Well-Known Member
I really hope you are correct, and I agree there are reasons for confidence given who's involved and what they have said so far. They've got good bones to work with - lots of aluminum in the chassis, new clutch-type LSD, and those double wishbones up front and the multi-link rear. If a good portion of the development budget went to tuning we could be looking at a great-handling car. (Of course one could argue that Nissan should have done this tuning years ago on the 370Z to make it more competitive over the past several years.)I’m hopeful about the new Z addressing the 370z’s short comings. I recently had a chance to drive a friends Boss 302 mustang. Amazing car all around, but I came away feeling like the steering was numb / vague and the chassis was less communicative then my Z. At the limit it felt much more sure footed then my Z though.
That experience showed me that the Z generally has a good chassis but I think the suspension needs some real tuning to be competitive. Small things like a real LSD to put power down better, improve the clutch feel, improved damping, etc would go a long way. It seems like those are specifically addressed with the new Z. I’m hopeful that with “Mr GTR” being in charge on the new Z Nissan can turn it into a 10/10ths car.
I am a bit worried that the great steering feel I recall from my 370Z test drives will be lost as a result of switching to EPS, but the response given by one of the lead engineers when asked about that was reassuring, it is getting close attention.