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So here's how the judging works as I understand it. Most of this came from a fellow CZOT member who has judged and been judged at other ZCCA sponsored events. 1. There are two potential rounds of judging depending on the scores of the first round. 2. During the first round all cars are judged according to the class they are in (ie 240Z, 260Z etc) as well as the category (stock, street modified, etc). Three judges are used with each focused on a particular area, ie interior, exterior, and engine bay. There are a total of 100 points possible per area for a total perfect score of 300. 3. Cars that achieve a first round score of 280 or higher are eligible for a second round of judging. These scores are used to determine potential winners of the Gold and Medallion cups. I have been told that the second round judges that are used are the more experienced ones because at this point the car is vying for what is considered to be the pinnacle of achievement. 4. The first round scores are used for the class awards (ie 240Z, etc) as well as the "Best Of" awards. 5. Second round scores must achieve a minimum of 290 points to be considered for a Gold or Medallion cup award. 6. In the event of a tie, the award will go to the older car as that is considered to be more difficult to restore and maintain. At this last ZCON there were apparently no stock class vehicles that either met the first round minimum, or perhaps failed to achieve the second round minimum of 290 to score the Gold Medallion award. That is why we did not see an award for stock class cars. Jim's score of 298 in the first round was used for the class award as well as the "Best Of" awards. His second round score of 290 dropped 8 points from the first round for some reason and perhaps this was a result of the more experienced judges. In my case, my first round score was 290 (the judges disclosed this to me after they finished the first round) and my second round score went up 2 points for some reason. However, in the end, both Jim's car and mine scored 290 or higher in the second round and that resulted in Gold cup awards for both of us. I also understand that we will receive our judging sheets at some point in the near future so we can actually get an understanding of where and why the judges took points off. I will also say that this is the first show I have ever been to where the judges actually talked to you after they were finished. This was extremely helpful in understanding what they look for and how they score. As an example, I was told after the first round that I lost a point for my interior due to a cobweb being found. Ironically it was under the front of the passenger seat and it was not there the day before, so I determined that I had a spider somewhere in my car who caused me to lose a point due to the spider web that he made!! Just amazing the level of detail the judges were looking for. Hope that helps. I'm anxious to get my judging sheet at some point, but in the case of both Jim's car and mine, they are now retired from competing at ZCCA events, so getting this info will not be all that useful with respect to the cars we entered at this past ZCON. I'm already trying to figure out my next build so I suspect this information will be very useful in the future. Mike.

There is a "pay it forward" thread on here that allows folks to post up what they have to get rid of - usually for the cost of shipping. One man's trash is another's treasure...

Update: I thank everyone for their comments and wanted to update the post. It has been a long day, but the 71 Series 1 now lives in my garage!

A while back I cleaned my 280Z fuel pump and replaced the o-rings. Its running ok and I compared it to an old reserve pump. The reserve pump delivered about 75% of the flow compared to the one in the car. Since these pumps are getting harder to find in good condition I decided to take a closer look at the spare pump. The outside looked shocking, corroded and rusty so I cleaned and painted it to make it look respectable. After opening it up Im wondering it was worth the trouble cleaning and keep it as an emergency unit. The inside is showing a lot more signs of wear compared to the one in the car. There are possabilities to improve it. I was thinking of making a new center section (intermediate part) and maybe new rollers. The inner ring of this part has vertical lines which reduce performance some and make it noisy in operation. These parts are made from hardened steel, maybe steel type S890 (890MPa tear strength) would be suitable. Not sure what it would cost to make. The inlet end plate could be surfaced 0,1mm to remove most of the wear. That would increase the crush on the o-ring, but it should be ok. That should improve the output and reduce the noise a little. Opinions welcome. Here are some photos of the worn parts and a drawing of the part for possible replacement. PumpRing1_Rev0.pdf This post has been promoted to an article

I finally got the windshield installed, and the engine running nicely. Today was the first day my Z has been used like a car in a long time. But still so many things to finish. The before and after pics.

Grabbed a few from my camera: MikeW's Jewellery Box Don't know but I like Janet and Mr. K and his Yellow 2+2 Bill Coffey's Monster and its heart JFA's Winner and its go-go unit Bpilati's 240z Gnosez's Track Beast and its Deep Dish Delight

Curious what some of you guys do with the parts you pull off your car. I've got things like sway bars, bumpers, springs, etc. that I've removed from the car and don't imagine I'll be putting them back on. I could store them somewhere, but we're moving in a month or two, so I'm in a purging kind of mood. Tossing it all in the dumpster feels kinda...wrong, though. Based on the posts I've seen languish on Craigslist, I don't imagine that stuff has much value, so trying to sell them (or even give them away) may be more trouble than it's worth.

Hope you can make it in '16 Madkaw. It was nice to meet people in person...

I posted some of mine here: http://www.classiczcars.com/gallery/category/2264-zcon-2015/ Now Mike can be happy.

Some bits and pieces I've acquired over the last few months There's more but it's much the same. Will start work on the greasy bits soon.

Sandblasted Primed Donor frame ready

Mighty Purdy Don't Mess With Texas (Double Barrel Trouble) SteveJ's Golden 260z

House of Rising Sun E's Dino Asphalt Robotman

Obvious (the real thing) Cool Z31 Mike's 260z SteveJ's 260z suffering tornado damage This one has my heart Nashville Fred's Place (non-ZCON 280zx in front) Graceland Nashville Roller Janet on Elvis's drums (Meg White... watch out!)

BRE Clone MikeW's Webers the Texas Trio Riverboat Card shark... beware the smile Shark Pool Beautiful counTRY Elvis shop Back to The Future TR6 Sun Studio hardware Not Elvis (but his mic)

Anything for you winners

So a little more detail on my ups and downs. As I said the motor sounded good at first, quiet and very strong even with reduced timing. It was very responsive and reminded me of the original motor, BUT, it had some quirks. I had a very scary metallic sound coming from up front, like pinging from detonation, but I had never heard this before, As stated earlier., no go past 4000 rpm. On my second drive around town before discovering my bad CAS, I started to develope loud valve noise as if something came loose. Limping it home I also noticed my trans didn't like third gear. It would not downshift into third unless rpms were nothing. This was the fnal straw for trying to make Zcon. So reluctantly accepting the failures I put the car up on jacks and preceded to pull the trans. Now just before this is when I dicovered my failed CAS mount. The sensor was damaged around the threads from what I thought was excessive movement from a failed mount. My mount is directly on the plate between the engine and trans, so fixing the trans would also allow me easy access to fix the CAS. As I pulled off the clutch slave, I noticed the boot had come loose. When I pulled the boot, pieces of metal fell out into my hand-this was not good. WTF. Not sure what these were but they were in my bell housing. Pulled the trans out and everything inside, flywheel,PP, clutch looked great. Called my trans guy and arranged to drop it off, along with the metal pieces. So now looking at the CAS, I realize those metal pieces were bullets hitting the sensor that was potruding into the bellhousing area. The mount couldn't hold up to this battering and I'm surprised the sensor held up. The only thing i could think is that the pieces were broke up pilot bushing from when i removed the old one. But how did they remain there. I vacuumed out the hole and installed a new bushing. The input shaft would have trapped anything missed. The plate between the engine and trans would have kept anything I missed on the back of the block from getting into the bell housing. A call from my trans guy just confirmed more mysteries. He couldn't find anything wrong with the trans and the pieces I found fit the pilot bushing radius perfect. He tells me that I might just have used the wrong gear lube. I used Redline synthetic-expensive stuff. He said he was going to check everything again and make some phone calls. I guess I could see that the synthetic is too slick for the synchros and not slowing them down enough? I've heard of this before, but never experienced it. I was running lucas 80/90 before. I will note that the past 2 weeks were hard on the old body and my herniated discs in my neck. Another reason that memphis just wasn't going to work. The good stuff! My high oil pressure I had with the previous block is gone. pressure readings are where they should be , not riding 70psi all the time. No more leak at the rear main!!! The engine sounded strong, quiet after the lash adjustment, and the cam looked like it was wearing in normal. All my guages read normal. And the car drove as good as I remember. After searching forever I found a steel nut that I can properly weld for my CAS. I have weded it in place and now I feel much better about the mount. Waiting anxiously on my trans so i can finish breaking this in!!

Yup, that about sums up what to expect. Great people, great beer, great coffee, great Z's. Great job OZCOA. Gonna be epic, eh? 50-50 chance of a blizzard or massive heat wave no matter what part of summer you do this in, so early August it is.

This all started because I was curious why it was making so much noise and performing so badly, but now I think I may have a real chance of improving it. I cleaned up the pump motor end and inlet part today. The first problem was I couldn't think of a way to work the motor end without getting a lot of fine material in the motor. Then I thought of trying grease to fill the holes and later flush it out by pouring fuel in from the outlet end through the motor. It seemed to work ok. Next I sent the drawing of the center ring and the rollers to a machine shop that does work for us. It will be interesting to hear what it will cost to make. In the mean time I will assemble the pump and do a free flow and pressure test to see what the rework has done to its performance. This pump barely making 3.3 (48psi) compared to the other pump making 3.7Barg (54psi). Here are some before and after photo's

like zed said - it all depends on what you want out of it. i'm firmly in the camp of "buy the best body you can afford and don't worry about the mechanicals" because i like working on engines, body work is expensive and not something i can do myself (or at least in such a way that i'd be happy with the results) and these cars disintegrate quickly once rust begins in the hidden cavities. but if the goal is a simple, fun DD and you're not bent on a full resto then it really comes down to if it's solid enough to drive around safely. there are some pretty moth-eaten cars on the road (not that this is what i recommend) with very happy drivers, and some spectacular restorations that the owner is afraid to drive and loses sleep over the thought of a door ding or rock chip. personally, i fall into the upper middle between those two camps - i like a car that looks good, drives great and i know is reliable and easy to keep up. i like fiddling with projects that are within my capabilities, and i love talking w/all the folks that stop me in the parking lot to chat about the car and how it brings back fun memories of their youth. my car isn't perfect by any stretch, which gives me the ability to modify as i choose without the concern for being period-correct. it also lets me drive it every day and park at the grocery store without thinking to hard about where to park. the other day my son was mowing the lawn and kicked up a rock that dinged my drivers side door. sucks, but i was able to give him a hug and let him know it's only a car. if it was a $30K example it might have taken me a little longer to get to that zen-like spot with him...

It's already fixed. You drove it. Without knowing your plans all you're getting are reflections of what the people out here would do with it. The restore guys see lots of work to make it look like it came off the factory floor. The daily driver guys see a car that's ready to buy and go. Pick a plan, and ask worth relative to the the plan.