So long, farewell, auf wiedersehn

A sad time recently as Mrs Tim and I decided to dispose of the 370Z.

Anyway, we had it almost 3 years and managed 20k miles.

Buying it in October wasn't the most ideal timing as we were into cold roads, often wet or damp and that's not the perfect set of criteria to get used to a slightly old-fashioned, short-wheelbase, powerful rwd coupe.

There were a couple of early scares which were probably down to the Jinhu banana skins that the Nissan dealer fitted to the car prior to us collecting it.

If I'd known I would've asked them to leave the part worn Bridgestones on the back at least.

The hill away from the roundabout at the South end of the Tay Bridge is clearly a slippery place as I'd noted a bit of gentle weaving from the earlier 530d and 320d under full throttle in a low gear in the wet. What I didn't expect was rampant wheelspin at part throttle in 4th in commuter traffic but it showed the traction control isn't over zealous.

It also showed the 370 is somewhat more twitchy than the similarly endowed (power to weight) E39 M5.

Otherwise I suppose the car is much as you'd expect from reading about it in the mags.

It's a bit of a throwback, there's plenty of road noise and it sounds like there's minimal sound deadening in the rear wheelarches so you hear lots of little stones getting kicked up and the hiss of water when its wet.

The suspension is hard and there's little feel of roll but, being honest here, it's barely any worse than an F30 3 Series on 19 inch runflats. Plus, of course its a sportscar so you wouldn't want it to be soft.

Perhaps the most often spoken about part of the 370 is the engine.

I've read plenty in the magazines about harshness, vibration, the general idea that you might lose fillings because its unrefined and that it got unwilling to rev above something like 5500rpm.

Well, I was always happy to take it to 7500rpm and never noticed any particular reduction in urge or smoothness at those high revs.

Sure, it wasn't quite as smooth as, say, the V8 in my M5 but it was nothing like as bad as the mags imply.

Perhaps the journos should spend a little less time in expensive supercars.

I expect that on a twisty road, especially if it wasn't perfectly dry, a modern superhatch would be quicker, probably significantly so if you were committed. I'm certainly not a 'hand' by any means and have always limited the TC off function to those times when I want to leave 2 straight(ish) black lines in memory of the imminent replacement of a set of tyres, those on the 370 smoked nicely under these circumstances.

I was probably always slightly wary of it and although I saw the TC light flash often I think the only times I used opposite lock were the aforementioned occasions on the commute home.

In the days while we were awaiting its replacement Mrs Tim mentioned several times that she finds it the most comfy car to sit in that we've ever owned. Stationary, obviously!

The only real problem we had with the car was that the door mirrors appear to have been taken from an SUV. If you lsit down and ook out the opposite side the mirror is equal to at least half the height of the window. This has been a recurring issue for Mrs Tim in particular as she's only 5 feet tall and consequently had to peer round it at junctions and roundabouts.

Otherwise we simply had an annual service (cheap), a set of rear tyres out of necessity rather than wear, some rear brake pads (£21, fitted by me, rather than £197 fitted by Nissan) and a bill to fix the squeak that appeared when chaging from 6th to 5th, more of an irritant than requirement.

The clutch slave cylinder failed at 20k miles but this was covered by warranty.

So, farewell then or perhaps Au Revoir as its our intention to get another one after we move house.

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