\na “race car”, but that’s not what they really<\/em> want.
\nReal race cars are cramped, noisy, and hot. A real race car doesn’t
\nhave any sound proofing, or any rubber in the suspension, or air conditioning.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I’m sure that when Infiniti designed the G35 Coupe, they made decisions to
\ncater to dreamers like me who thought that they wanted a race car, at least on paper.\u00a0<\/p>\n
To get the Brembo brakes you needed to order the G35 Coupe with the Sport Package
\nthat included, among other things, upgraded 18″ rims. On the 18″ rims
\nwere mounted Michelin Pilot Sport tires with a sidewall aspect ratio of 45.
\nThe aspect ratio is so low that on many occasions other people have tried to
\nwarn me that “your tires are flat”. The Michelin Pilot Sport is a pure
\nsummer-only tire, and is close to being rated an R-compound racing tire.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/a> The problem, of course, is that 99% of my driving takes place on the highway, Below is a photo of a Michelin Pilot Sport tire that I removed from the front wheel of my Below is another view of the same tire. You can see that the far edge of the tire The first symptom of this uneven wear is NOISE. I mean LOTS OF NOISE. As I drive there Herculean braking and corning ability are quickly forgotten when you’re behind Exacerbating the problem is the fact that the front tires are a different size It is possible to dismount the tires from the rims and then re-mount the rubber A slightly over-inflated tire is much safer than a slightly under-inflated tire. It might be my imagination, but after lowering the tire pressure to between 31 The cruel irony is that, if I didn’t baby the car and drove more aggressively The end result is that, at 116,000 km of use, I’m already on my third set of <\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n The Michelin Pilot Sports are pure summer-only tires and are not to be driven Normally, when you purchase snow tires and new rims, you’ll go down one rim size. That same first winter I had the car I inquired how much it would cost to After 4 years the engine in the winter car spun a bearing, but I decided that You can guess what happened next. I didn’t mange to finish everything This year (2008) the province of Quebec passed a law making it mandatory After the first snowfall, I visited my local tire shop and found a line-up Once it was my turn I explained that I would be willing to take all season tires The HX MXM4 tires are marketed as All-Season Grand Touring tires, which I’m sure They are expensive.\u00a0<\/p>\n The rear tires on the G35C are 20mm wider than the front tires. You’d think this Below is a photo I took of the new HX MXM4 tires just after I had mounted the How are the stock rims so clean despite over 116,000 km of use? Manual labour, \u00a0<\/p>\n I now have 40,000 km (25,000 miles) of use on the Michelin Pilot HX MXM4 tires. Do they have as much peak cornering and braking grip as the OEM Michelin Pilot Sport tires? No.\u00a0<\/p>\n Are they fantastic snow and ice tires? No.\u00a0<\/p>\n But for my needs – commuting to work year round on highways that are cleared of snow – they are <\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n I was out at lunch one day with some co-workers when I noticed that there was a G35 Coupe parked A friend snapped the photo below with his iPhone.\u00a0<\/p>\n After some investigation, I discovered that these are BSA 264 17″ rims<\/a>, which were reportedly sold at many Canadian Infiniti dealers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I remember the day I went to my local Infiniti dealer to test drive the brand new 2003 G35 Coupe. The dealer’s demo car was a bright-red 6-speed manual coupe with the Brembo brakes. The salesman was a young guy, … Continue reading
\nIf you drive behind a G35 Coupe in traffic, it’s easy to see that the
\ntires – particularly the rear tires – do not sit flat on the ground.
\nThey have a small camber angle to them, resulting in a duck-like stance.
\nWhen the car goes around a corner, it rolls to the outside of the turn.
\nIncorporating a few degrees of camber in the suspension design allows the
\ntire to sit flat in the middle of a corner, giving it better cornering grip.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"The](\"http:\/\/images.karjama.com\/automotive\/Infiniti_G35_Coupe_Camber_on_rear_tires_small.jpg\" "\\"The")
<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nwhere I’m travelling in a straight line. This causes the tires to wear unevenly.
\nSince the inside portion of the tread is taking more of the weight of the car,
\nit tends to wear much faster than the outside portion.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\ncar after only 40,000 km (about 25,000 miles). You can clearly see that the inside
\ntread is more worn than the outside.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nis no longer a nice smooth circular space. Instead it looks like a bunch of straight
\nedges connected to form a circular-ish shape. Perhaps it has become
\na “tricontagon” (a 30 sided shape).\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nare certain resonant speeds (40 km, 100 km) where the worn tires emit an
\nannoying “VaVaVaVaVaVa” noise. Sometimes the noise is so strong that I
\nthink that my cell phone is vibrating in my pocket and I attempt to answer the call!\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nthe wheel of a car that is so loud that you can’t even think. Now imagine driving
\nfor hundreds of hours of year in these conditions.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nthan the rear, and Michelin Pilots are uni-directional tires; written on the sidewall
\nof the tire is an arrow pointing in the correct direction of rotation. This makes
\nit impossible to perform a standard tire rotation where you swap the rims from
\nfront-to-rear and from side-to-side.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\non the opposite side of the car, but obviously this requires special training and
\ntools and is more expensive than a standard rotation which an amateur mechanic
\ncan perform in his own driveway.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nI used to keep the Michelin Sports inflated between 35 and 40 PSI, which actually
\nallowed me to achieve just under 30 MPG. However, the inner part of the tire
\nwould wear quickly.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nand 33 PSI I believe that the rate of uneven wear decreased. An additional benefit
\nwas a softer, more comfortable ride. Be advised that driving on an under-inflated
\ntire is dangerous if you intend to drive at high speeds, or with a lot of weight
\nin the car, or on a rainy day.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\naround corners, the tires would wear more evenly and might even last longer.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nrear tires and I’m about to put new tires on the front of the car.
\nTo put this in perspective, on my last two vehicles I managed to get well
\nover 100,000 km out of the first set of tires.\u00a0<\/p>\nSnow Tires on a G35C<\/h1>\n
\nin the snow. The first year I had the car, I was at work one autumn day when
\nabout 2 centimeters of snow fell. On my ride home the highway was clear, but
\nwhen I turned onto my side street there was still a thin sprinkling of snow.
\nI needed to drive up a small hill to get home, but it was hopeless. I couldn’t
\nget the car moving in first gear, even with the traction control turned off.
\nI left the car on the side of the road and walked the rest of the way home.
\nBy the next day the weather had returned to above freezing temperatures
\nand everything was fine.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nUnfortunately, except for a few lightweight racing spec models, nobody
\nmakes a 17″ rim for the G35 Coupe that will provide sufficient clearance
\nfor the massive Brembo brake calipers. (Note: I have since
\nfound an affordable 17″ rim that will clear the Brembo brakes<\/a>)\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nget 18″ rims and proper snow tires. I don’t remember the exact price I was quoted,
\nbut I do remember being shocked that it was going to be many thousands of dollars.
\nIt was literally cheaper for me to purchase a winter beater car and park the Infiniti
\nin the garage.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nit would be fun to fix it myself. Not just fix it, but improve it… with ported
\nand polished intake ports, a mild camshaft upgrade, lightweight underdrive
\npulleys, and a limited slip differential.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nbefore the snow started falling, and now I’m forced to drive the
\nInfiniti for at least one winter.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nfor drivers to mount winter tires on their car. This, predictably, resulted
\nin a shortage of winter tires for the rest of the Canada.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nof people trying to get winter tires. An exasperated salesman was trying
\nto explain to some of the customers that he couldn’t get them the exact
\nmodel tire they needed at any cost, regardless of how long they were
\nwilling to wait.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\ninstead of pure winter tires, and that I was looking for something that would
\nbe soft, quiet, and comfortable. With little thought he recommended the
\nMichelin Pilot HX MXM4 tires, which was funny because I had just done some
\nquick online research and I had been looking at the exact same tires.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nis a fancy way of saying that they’re soft and quiet, despite having a short
\n45-series sidewall.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nwouldn’t make a big difference in the price, but you’d be wrong. The rear tires
\ncost $100 more than the fronts. In fact, in the salesman’s manual, the
\nP245\/45R18 was listed as an “Infiniti tire”, so I have to
\nassume that this is a special low-volume application.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nrims on the car. I’m hoping that these will be much quieter than the Pilot
\nSports they replace. I’ll give you a full report soon.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nmy friends: Lots of cleaning and scrubbing and applying wax. I probably spent
\n6 or 7 hours total to make them look like this. I should mention that the
\nprimary reason I wax the rims is to prevent the brake dust from sticking to
\nthem, and not to look like a playa’.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nJune 2010 Update<\/h1>\n
\nI haven’t rotated them yet, but they
\nare still smooth and quiet with no visible feathering.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nclearly superior to the original Michelin Pilot Sports. The Michelin Pilot HX MXM4 tires
\nfit my “mission profile” perfectly.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n17″ Rims That Clear Brembo Brakes<\/h1>\n
\non King street that had Brembo brakes and<\/em> 17″ rims with snow tires (this was
\nthe middle of the summer, so I’m not sure why the owner was driving around with snow tires!).\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n