Your thoughts on the 370z and Follow the Z Tour?
 

Hey guys! My names Mike and I work for Marketingworks and we recently partnered up with Nissan for the Follow The Z rally!(Follow The Nissan Z Tour) I hope you all got a chance to catch an early glimpse of the 370z during the tour. We really appreciate loyal Nissan fans such as yourselves.
I was curious to get some feedback from those of you who are now behind the wheel of 370z. Did any of you attend the rally, and if so, what did you think of it? What do you guys like about the new Z? What stands out as its best new feature? Did you guys play the new Need for Speed:Undercover? (you can drive the 370z there when you're not in your real one ha ha!) How jealous did you make all your friends?

Hi Mike. A number of us are already behind the wheel of the new Z, and if you browse the General Discussion board, you will find that several of us have posted reviews/early impressions. Here is a link to mine.
http://www.the370z.com/nissan-370z-g...ownership.html

Awesome, thanks a lot semtex!

When I first saw the front(fangs), head lights and tail lights, I thought WTF! I didn't really like the design! But now I like it, I guess you have to get use to it ! I (we) will be getting one next year!

Great post Mike. Many of our members have attended the "Follow The Z Tour" and now that it's over, you can get great feedback from our members. It'll help you plan your next tour. I encourage our members to drop couple lines on how you like the tour, what you liked or disliked about the tour, etc. I'm going to move this to General Discussion Section so that you get more attention. I thought it was a great publicity idea. Nissan made the right decision doing a tour for the new Z and you guys did a good job. Thanks.

Sounds good to me AK, thanks!

I've had mine for about 5 days now. I used to have an 03 350z for a few years. Always regreted sellling it. I was ready to buy a new car and the 370z was just released so pulled the trigger. She has about 200+ miles on her now. I'm just starting to get used to it. It is a total different animal than my GTO I traded in. I do miss the low-end torque of the GTO, but I am noticing this car does have decent torque. I just have to put the gas peddle down farther and work the clutch different. I'm still going easy on her, break-in period and all that. The past couple days it has really starting to open up and it feels like it is becoming more responsive. Hoping this is just the start. This car is a go-cart compared to my GTO. Loving the suspension. I thought my old 350z cornered well; this new 370z corners even better IMO. I have to admit I was a little shy about buying a 2 seater again, now I'm very glad I did.

awesome MaximumPwr that's just the kind of feedback I like to hear!

I really wish the Z tour would have made a stop somewhere in New Mexico :(

I live in the NW and you guys didn't even come close to Portland or Seattle. It would have been cool to see it in person, but I bought a new one regardless. This is my first Nissan.

It's a great car, but there are definitely some things I don't like, mainly the lack of heated mirrors and a rear view camera due to the massive blind spots.

A couple of irritants that I neglected to mention in my review thread.

• There's no hatch release button on the key fob like there was for the 350. It's bad enough that there's no release button in the cockpit, but by taking it away from the fob as well, now there's only one way to release the hatch - you have to walk right up to it and press the switch above the license plate. My wife's Murano's fob has 4 buttons. There's no reason the Z's couldn't also have 4 buttons.
• The three center gauges (the small ones) - you can no longer configure the one closest to the instrument cluster to display things. In my 350 I used it to display my speed, and found it much more convenient to glance at it to ascertain my speed, vs. looking at the analog needle.
• Most of the other display items that you could cycle through have now been moved to the funky trip computer thingy on the left, which is fine, but I noticed that one can no longer display tire pressures. The vehicle has TPMS, but it's only good for warning you if your pressure is low. Well, I want the ability to see what my exact pressures are in each tire!

End of supplemental gripes, for now. :postwhore:

I attended the Glendale AZ visit you guys did, and have some feedback since you're asking:
1. You folks were out an outdoor mall, and I had a little trouble finding you. Some signs or something would have been handy. I was also confused as to whether I was supposed to park with everyone who had Zs and Gs, or if that was for some kind of VIP.
2. I was a little disappointed that there was not a handout. In fact, I seem to remember being fooled by that, because there was a table, opposite the DJ that had some stuff on it, but I believe it was just junk.
3. I would have liked for you guys to give it a quick drive by the crowd, so we could have heard what the exhaust sounded like, as well as the rev match blip.
4. I'm not sure how you could pull this off, but I was interested in getting some pictures, but found that to be too difficult because you couldn't get people away from either car for even a couple seconds.

That being said,
I liked the variety between the two cars.
It was nice to have music.
It was great how you pretty much let us do whatever we wanted to the cars (I pulled up the back carpet and took the woofer out of the spare tire to see how it worked).
The staff was more knowledgeable of the car than I was expecting out of some non-nissan employees.

As for my thoughts on the Z itself:
The interior is leaps and bounds above not only my 350, but my previous C6 and C5 vettes.
The handling it awesome. Although I have not had an a-- calibration, I would say it handles every bit as well as the vettes, and far better than my previous GTO, Trans Am, SSR and so on.
Although it is technically faster than my 02 trans am, it actually felt slower. That may have something to do with the torque, I'm not sure.
The trunk of the 70 is much easier to use than the 50. Moving the bar forward was a great idea.

So when is the Canadian tour?

:icon17:

^^^^ hey no making fun of the Canadians it is against form rules. lol :)

I am sorry. :o Yes, you guys def should have a tour. The 370Z was in NY for the longest time because the Miami vanue was in January 4th. They could have taken the Z to the Canadian cities close to Northern border of NY(i.e. Niagara falls area ). Oh well, may be next Z.

You'll need a set of rain tires though ;)

And block heaters.

Both Z tour cars are sitting at the Moroone dealership here in Miami, I saw them earlier.

I also put a deposit in for my Z :)

Block heaters can standard on all nissans/infiniti's that come to canada :p

Not sure about a website, but if Nissan sends me a new owner survey, I'll be sure to document my improvement suggestions.

Nissan Consumer Affairs
P.O. Box 685003
Franklin TN 37068-5003
(800) NISSAN-1 (or 800-647-7261)
8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.,
Eastern / Central Time / Pacific Time
Monday through Friday

hi mike i was the one who helped the HIN and hozman group guys organize the interim stop for the Z's in NC before they went to the big chantilly VA stop on the east coast

the tour was good seemed to be well organized and got the word out in a grassroots way. especially getting forums and clubs involved we got to spend a whole day with the cars.

overall i thought the guys did a good job.. but if i had set up the marketing end of it i would have made it maybe a little more interactive. i remember last year subaru did a traveling event where they set up a mini autocross and let participants do like a couple 20-30 second lap around cones in their demo WRX and STI with a subaru staff member... something like that would have been cool for the 370z since its targeting the same demographic. that way you could have shown people the rev matching and other features first hand


the Z rally must have been a success because i noticed that GM was trying to do the same thing by bringing the camaro around to a few dealers in a very similar fashion


as for the car ive driven both the auto and the manual my thoughts are here

http://mygtr.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1359

Thanks for all taking time out to respond. This kind of feedback helps immensely.