Mine's Power, Reducing Tailgate Weight, New Front Spoiler

So it's already mid March, and while it has been a relatively issue free 3 months for the Elgrand, it doesn't mean I haven't been having some fun with it.

So yeah, I like to park away from others, just in case...

I did have my friend Matt in town from the UK, so of course I decided to take him down in style to visit Mine's as he had some shopping to do. So while he was getting a small tour and busy picking out some goodies, I was getting bored complaining about the lack of Mine's parts for the Elgrand.  That's when Niikura-san took pity on me and invited me to test drive their latest demo car! Their new VX-ROM for the the VRDDTT engined Z is absolutely amazing. The pickup is much improved, and there is more torque everywhere! Super fast car, dangerous to drive on cold tires, even on a sunny day!

This beast, with prototype VX-Rom. Amazing!

Niikura-san himself signing autographs!

It was about this time when engine builder takumi Nakayama-san thought it would be fun to annoint my Elgrand with a Mine's sticker. You know, for added power and flair.

Here he is, complaining actually that the graphene ceramic coating I used on the bumper (I have been experimenting) was making it tough for the sticker to stick!

But, he got it done!

Definitely adds something to this car. Not sure if it makes any sense but oh well. 

Next, I had been bothered that the tailgate, either due to tired motors or excessive sound insulation, was no longer opening up as much as it should, becoming a hazard to my head (and me needing to always manually push it up to the top). So, I decided some weight reduction was needed.

Here is the back of the rear panel.

Once I removed the OEM foam, I was confronted with this. This is all glued to the plastic.  The material has foam for sound deadening, on top of aluminum sheet and then below rubber butyl that I found stuck directly to the plastic. The StP stuff that Akiba-san at Dupree Factory had done for me.

I found this stuff even behind the small access panel for the lock.

At first, I was using heat to loosen the adhesive, but then in the end I just scraped it all off.

Total weight - over one kilogram! I did leave some, but only in places where I thought the butyl could absorb vibration. In place of the sound deadening foam, I used some left-over super light 3M Thinsulate I had left over from my earlier project. 

I think the liftgate now works much better, but not perfect so I suspect that the motors also need to be replaced soon.

Next, some bodywork - the Nismo Front Spoiler.   Now everyone who has ever had this part installed, or driven an Elgrand with this body kit, knows how low this front bumper is. Basically, this is worse than driving my GT-R, especially given how much I actually drive this car. What I mean by this is, this spoiler simply invites scrapes. Also, if your front wheels hit a pothole, the impact can shatter the spoiler.

BAM! It sounded just as bad as it looks!

The metal stay got bent as well with that impact. You can also see the leading edge tends to get scraped up as well!

So I had the Elgrand at the dealer for the last few weeks, getting a new Nismo bumper painted and installed. So of course, I started thinking about how to protect it going forward.

First, taping up to allow for some spraying

Clear Plasti-Dip as one option? Theory being, rubber could absorb some vibration upon impact?

It came out ok, but it's not shiny anymore. A matte finish, and probably not as thick as it needs for anti-vibration purposes.

In my next post, a few more projects as I show you how I decided to protect the underside of the lip spoiler, as well as my DIY for an issue the dealer could not fix in time!