Your car, do what makes you happy.

Another little update by way of pictures. I believe I have everything in place to begin re-assembly. Everything removed has been degreased at a minimum, and in some cases more than that. One of those "while I have it off the car it sure makes sense to refurbish it" situations. Anyways, I'm happy I did it. Again, balancing time with results. She'll never be a show car, but with minimal time and effort, I can make it look 80% better at basically zero cost🙂 Here we go...

Here's the fuel rail before, exactly as I removed it from the car. Crusty and oxidized...

Mounted it in a vice, cranked up some tunes, and scrubbed away with some degreaser and a scotch brite pad. A perfect afternoon task...

I had 1 can of 2K matte clear left over from refinishing the wheels and opted to use it on the fuel rail and coolant lines. They came out great, and the 2K should keep them that way. Again, while I have em off the car, why not spruce them up a bit. I know it's a slippery slope, but trust me, there's a limit to how far I'll go...😉

Shiny😎

I did the same thing to the injector hardware because I had more paint than i knew what to do with😅...

Speaking of injectors, here they are. Assembled and ready to be installed. New seals, hoses, and pintle caps. All serviced and confirmed good by Jim at injectorrepair.com. I also polished up the aluminum injector holders because why not...

Here are the injector filter screens that were replaced, plenty of debris and varnish it looks like...

I also replaced the bottom rubber pieces on the inner fender splash shields. Ready for install...

More to come. Stay tuned.

Also an interesting fun fact, I've been following Leno's law 2.0 here in CA. It's looking promising (which is shocking), and if it does pass, this 78 would be smog exempt. I won't hold my breath, but who knows. I'll prolly end up getting it smogged anyways before the law takes effect next year, which will at least allow me to know it's running right.

Thanks for following along this far👍

About time they moved that cut off date!There can't be enough vehicles of that vintage on the roads to make a difference

Question on my injectors…

I’m not sure what OEM hose size they used (some say 7.5mm), but the only hose I could find is 5/16” fuel injection rated hose. This seems to be what everyone uses.

I saw one forum post saying you should ADD another FI clamp to the barb fitting side of the injector. This would mean you end up with 2 clamps per injector, one at the injector barb/hose connection and one at the hose/fuel rail connection. OEM setup only had a clamp at the hose/fuel rail connection.

For those who have replaced their injector hoses, what did you do?

8 mm is the original size (maybe). That works out to 5.04/16". 5/16" is actually tighter than factory.

The barbs on the injector do the work to hold the pressure. The sharp edges create a tight seal. I just jammed mine on and had no problems over many many miles. The procedure in the FSM works fine.

Edited September 11Sep 11 by Zed Head

It's not obvious. I had to think about it some when I was doing mine.

https://www.beswick.com/resources/what-they-didnt-teach-you-about-fittings-in-engineering-school/

". The sharp barb digs into the inside diameter of the tubing making a high pressure contact and providing a leaktight seal. Properly designed barbed fittings allow the tubing to be easily pushed onto the fitting but make it difficult to pull off."

Thanks Zed, I'll carry on sans additional clamps. The connection feels very secure anyway👍

I had second thoughts on my 8 mm comment above. I searched around and do see the 7.5 mm number on several forums. But I've seen in the past that sometimes a single post somewhere on the internet will propogate, especially if there is no valid source to refer to. All I've found so far is people like me above saying XX is the proper number.

Anyway, 5/16" fuel injection hose has worked for many, including myself. 7.5 mm is an odd number for an engineer to choose. 8 makes sense, 7.5 doesn't.

Another puzzle to work on.

Edited September 11Sep 11 by Zed Head
can't speel

Zed, if you used 5/16” and didn’t have any leaks, that’s good enough for me! 😆

I grew up in Minnesota. I would store my car from just before/after Halloween. No battery tenders around back then, but every spring, I’d go to that warehouse slap jumper cables on it and it would crank for 30 seconds or so, then fire right up. That L-Jet was remarkable. Mine back then was a ‘75 280Z but same-same.

Not loving the patina idea but it’s yours.

You’d be surprised how quick the automatic cars are. They run out of gear in an autocross with long straights in first.but they are very quick!

The cowl pinhole is concerning, I’ve seen Z’s with considerable rust, under that cowl panel. They rust from the inside so…

Good luck and have fun!

We're making progress...

I've begun putting everything back together in the engine compartment. It's looking good.

As I was putting the AAR valve back on, I figured I should test it to verify operation. Glad I did, because it wasn't working right. Even after putting it in the freezer for an hour, the shutter stayed closed. Hit it with brake cleaner, still nothing. Everything I ready online indicated that's there really isn't a good way to disassemble and repair these things, so I was getting ready to purchase another used on on ebay. But then, I wiggled the heater plug and it slid right out. I think the problem was that the heater was not "clocked" correctly. The bimetal switch was moving down and to the right, instead of up and to right as it should be. Anyway, it's working properly now.

Bench testing...

Bench testing the internal heater. Kinda interesting how these things work. It moves about half an inch either direction depending on temperature. This acts as the "lever" that opens and closes the AAR valve. Primative, but it works.

I added a couple targeted drops of marvel mystery oil and the shutter action was moving very smoothly. A little bit of RTV to glue the heater back into place...

Note the slight "up and to the right" angle of the heater. That matters. It also matters which side is up versus down because of the movement of the bimetal strip. As you can see here, it was about 80 degrees in my garage, so the valve should be open as you can see. As the temp increases, the valve becomes fully closed. Cold = open, Hot = closed, Mild = somewhere in the middle. Anyways, it works now, back on the engine it goes!

Engine is pretty much back together, looking much more tidy and cleaned up. New rubber AFM elbow, all new vacuum and emissions hoses, new radiator hoses, correct spec coil installed, all electrical connections cleaned up. She should be ready to go.

Correct fusible links installed...

New fuel lines (yes, fuel injection rated) and a bosch filter...

But alas, apparently the STOP is as important as the GO. Brakes. The front rubber lines had been replaced at some point. They looked OK, but the rears, yikes. I decided to just replace them all.

Front brake pads have very little meat left on them. I kinda wonder if they're original. They have this green paint circle. Anyone know?

Rear rubber brake lines were original. 12/77. Almost 50 years. Not bad.

Prolly could've got a few more miles out of these...😜

Next thing on the list is to bleed the brakes, and get these bad boys mounted on the wheels, white letters facing out of course, for the added horsepower!

Edited September 22Sep 22 by kcpope

Don't lose those shims. I could not get my brakes to not squeal until I found an old crusty set of factory shims like those. None of the tricks/fixes worked.