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You all must be a bunch of youngsters, our family ride was a 61 Bel Air wagon, 283 with 3 on the tree. Got my license in this baby in 1967. When I started dating the folks sold it and got a 1967 MG Midget that they let me take on dates. They must have known the old adage of "accidents in the back seat cause kids"!

If I ever find a 240Z in a barn I'm going to just have the dirt it's sitting on carved out and placed on a trailer with the car on top and whatever happens to be on the car itself. Cleanup will be whatever hay/dust/dirt/droppings are blown off on the way to its new home prior to taking 300 pictures and posting on BAT.

I recently received a pair of front frame rails from ZeddFindings. They measured slightly narrower than the originals by 2mm. The ZF rails are 61mm wide and originals on my 7/70 240Z measured 63mm and 58mm wide at the narrow part in the rad area. My rad measured 640mm wide at the bottom, in the area my frame rails measured 647mm inside. With ZF rails that would be 641mm., or only 1mm clearance for the rad. But in reality it will be tighter as there also formed clips on the lower rad support that may interfere. Here is a sketch and picture to help explain.

When I have a winter project planned in the garage my poor Z has to spend the winter in the storage tent, I don't like doing in because of all the dust and mice. So this year I bought a big roll of the white shrink wrap that they use for winterizing boats and now she's all snug for the winter. I could have worked all the wrinkles out but I didn't see any reason.

In twenty years I'll post about how the 280s were used like a sex swing in my teens. Open hatch with legs hanging out.

Before proceeding to valve guides, I need you to test the #4 plug (use a new plug) against a ground by turning the engine over with the starter. That will ELIMINATE a possible electrical cause of the fouled #4, then we can move on to oil fouling. But while I'm thinking about it, how much oil does the engine use in around 1000 miles or 1600 kilometers?

The first family car I remember for our family with four kids was a 1956 Dodge wagon. Later my mom got a 1963 Ford Galaxie wagon with the 390.... But her long time car was a 1950 Studebaker Champion Convertible. It was stored after about 1965. It looked like this one...

Bezel is done and installed! S seal on the safety glass. I love how much visibility I have.

I noticed that too. Here's the Green Monster, 21,000 miles. You can see the blue paint that Blue246 was talking about also. Dogpile!!

I'm know E31 aficionado but mine has spent some time at a machine shop. Bigger valves were put in and the bottom was skimmed for true flatness. Mine... The "31k" cars...

Thank you Jan! I wanted to add that it looks like EAutoSmart traders is gone and replaced by ECarsBroker Depot. Similar site registered by an individual (Russian). Also same exact process which I walked through quite far (just short of an electronic transfer to their bank account, where I called it quits). The reply I received is word for word the one you received when you emailed the seller: "Yes, it's still available. the vehicle is in good condition, it has no technical damages at all, no scratches or dents, no hidden defects. The interior is in virtually spotless condition. The seats are clean and not torn. The exterior is in excellent condition, tires are in god shape, brakes work well. This vehicle has never been involved in any accident.. etc." The verbiage of not paying until you receive and inspect the car (and have 10 days to do so) is what they say, but not what they actually demand. They want you to electronically send money to their "escrow account" which is just a personal account. They will not ship you the car until you have completed the full escrow payment, which is explained in the next email from them.. This fraud/scammer has been doing this for awhile and has quite a few sites of his own where he has posted questions and then positive reviews from various other accounts. Once the site takes too much heat its closed and they open up another with a new name. Currently they advertise very heavily on "HotMuscleCars.com". Easy to determine now that I got so close to being scammed myself. Same car (sometimes different angles) listed in many other big cities. They will not send you a VIN number or a location to inspect it personally. They promise no payment until they ship it to you (for free..) and they say you have 10 days to do so, BUT as you go further down the rabbit hole, will require you to deposit the full amount into their personal account (which they call an escrow). There is no contact numbers, no address to visit or mail and all correspondence is done by clicking "contact us" on their site at which point you might receive a single reply to your email that is often just more photos or a cut and paste response. They do not reply to your reply of that email, so their is no chain of information, you have to click "contact us" again for a follow up question.. If you ask them to do anything that further protects your financial safety (ie Escrow.com vice their version) you just don't get a response or maybe more photos.. I should also add that the Better Business Bureau has zero listings of any company even remotely close to this name, meaning their history is non existent and you have no recourse to file a federal complaint against them (because they don't officially exist). I created an account just to help keep others safe from fraud like this. After doing some reading on this site though, I feel like I might want to get a vintage Z 😃 Best Regards to all!

(Stating the obvious) A structure won't deflect unless it's subjected to a load. If the centre and rear sections of the unibody are supported (axle stands under the pinch welds at the front), then everything from the firewall forward will 'droop' because of its weight (i.e. load = force of gravity). However, there's not much weight left up front after you remove the engine/transmission, the hood and fenders, the bumper, the front suspension/steering and the front crossmember. As a start-off guess, I'd say maybe 150 lbs, tops. In vertical bending, each side of the front part of the unibody gets its strength from a ~ vertical panel (the inner fender) that's reinforced by an upper and a lower boxed section. The upper box section is sometimes called the 'horn' and it's made from very thick (0.050" steel). The lower box section (aka the 'frame rail') is also made from 0.050" steel. The inner fender panel is the usual 0.032" (20 gauge). Both box sections are pretty deep vertically (which is what you want for vertical stiffness). The inner fender isn't really a 'vertical' panel, but it serves the purpose and it ties the upper and lower box sections together. The center part of the unibody is boxed by the firewall (which is, in turn, helped out by the transmission mount frame that helps to reinforce the open trans tunnel area). The front frame rails aren't needed to box the center section of the unibody (as I think you would intuitively expect), so cutting one out isn't going to cause the centre section of the unibody to twist. Ahead of the firewall, when you cut out the frame rail on one side you weaken that side of the front unibody structure somewhat, but the upper boxed section and the inner fender panel are still intact. I expect they're plenty strong (see next paragraph) to support their respective shares of the weight of the front section of the unibody (150 lb?) without any any droop, remembering too that the 'cantilever' effect of the structural weight steadily diminishes the closer you get to the firewall. The boxing of the front unibody structure at the front by the rad support frame will further serve to resist any differential droop (i.e. twist). Let's break it down... I have one of ZeddFinding's replacement frame rails in my shop. It's made from 0.062" steel and weighs 8 lb. Let's say the upper frame rail weighs 10 lb. Then let's say the inner fender panel adds another 10 lb. Add 2 lb for the T/C Rod bracket. Add 5 lb for the shock tower blister. Add another 5 lb for the upper ledge panel. We're up to 40 lb per side, 80 lb total. Let's add another 15 lb for the front rad support bulkhead. That's 95 lb. Add another 5 lb for miscellaneous. Hard to make the whole front structure as being much over 100 lb. That's just 50 lb per side. And it's distributed over a length of about 4 feet (from firewall to front of structure), so it's not like a 50-lb point load hanging off each front bumper bracket. When you cut out the lower frame rail on one side, the 50 lb on that side reduces by 10 lb. So 50 lb on the intact side, 40 lb on the cut side. 10 lb difference. Same as two 5-lb bags of sugar. Not much of a twisting load. If you're still worried, put an axle stand under the corner of the rad support bulkhead and shim it up to take out all the clearance. If you're still feeling uncertain, put a dial indicator on the underside of the rad support on the cut side before you cut out the rail and measure the droop after the rail comes out. If you don't like what you see, use the axle stand and shims to push things back up into a zero-droop state before you weld in the new rail. If you do this, I'll be curious to learn what you measure. My guess is 4 or 5 thousandths of an inch (but I'm ready to be shown wrong). Maybe someone else has already made this measurement? Everything I've said depends on your car having good structural integrity where the front unibody elements join the firewall (and, to a lesser extent, where the rad bulkhead joins the inner fenders). You may find the attached article, 'Analysis of Early Z Chassis' informative. Credit to the author, James Lux. It appeared in an old edition of a unknown club publication called 'NewZletter'. Analysis of Early Z Chassis - NewZletter - James Lux - 19xx.pdf

Thanks for posting the FSM description. Who knows why both springs. Most important part is as I paraphrase “weight with spring engages with long slot, no spring weight with short slot” so I put it back together again correctly.

Love the wagon! Also, I am living proof of that old adage you referenced. A 1960 Chevrolet Impala convertible from what I am told.

You say no one in Panama can work on the L motor. How/who put that Schneider cam in? As I recall it came from Ebay crook California Datsun with a "Far 311" cam. Please correct me if I'm confused. Very often occurence with me.

I don't know what all this means but... One says spring, one says set. And the 72 FSM shows the unbalanced slots. I alternated pictures and links, hope it makes it through. http://www.carpartsmanual.com/datsun/Z-1969-1978/electrical/distributor/240z/for-manual/to-aug-71/6 http://www.carpartsmanual.com/datsun/Z-1969-1978/electrical/distributor/240z/for-manual/from-sep-71/5

It's deep down inside the housing. You'll need a pick type something to get it out and I'm pretty sure I used a 10mm deep socket to get the new one down inside.

@Tweeds 7tooZ, by 'felt in the channels', are you referring to the bit of weather-stripping at the base of the window frame(where the window emerges from the door), the top of the door, or both? all of the channels are lined with a felt like material. Just a thought to check before you put it all back. I have used white lithium lube but there are other products.

the market can decide on the future if politics don't get too involved. I see lots of issues with electric cars, besides how to make and distribute the power. batteries would need to be recycled to the extreme to avoid massive waste. Can the batteries be produced in volume (is there enough raw material). Sensible people know what works for them and can choose with their wallets. Mandating things assumes people are dumb and cant decide for themselves. Build a better mouse trap and it will sell. Personally I would not count on much in the way of investments, too hard to predict, try to be a diy person, if you can do more you need less. Even the old stand by of land is risky due to the politics of taxation. You cant get more stable than land (well unless you live on top of a volcano or fault line, like much of the west). Personally I would love to see electric cars powered by a APU adapted to burn any kind of fuel, that would be nice. A turbine sounding car that has great acceleration. for those that see personal transport as the cause of the destruction of the world, that's easy, drive less. the problem with predictions is the unknown changes can be completely out of left field. when I was young we never considered "social media" and a driving influence since it was not a part of our everyday lives and at best was maybe touch on in books that were only read by a few. we thought flying cars and travel to the moon would be in our personal daily lives, did not happen, not even close. I drive a 20 yr old chevy suburban, am I a polluter that should be banished for not being green? well given that I work from home (thankyou unforeseen in the past internet) I rarely drive any distance in it, and given that its old means no new cars and associated carbon emissions to make them) I would say I am greener than most that adhere to the religion of green. Its being sensical and what we used to call thrifty. Not everyone can work from home, but many can. Add to that a culture of diy and you can have huge planet saving reduction in carbon (given that is real) by people.

I would be surprised if any repaint was the same thickness as the factory paint even on bare metal. The first reason being is many people run base clear on their repaint. So you have at least one extra layer of paint. Painters also tend to stack layers of clear so there is room to cut and buff the car. Also most decent painters spend a pretty good amount of time trying to get the car straight and smooth. That means lots of buildable primer and filler which adds thickness really quickly. These cars never had paint stacked on them in the factory like that. It would be interesting to get some readings off of cars like mine (if I ever get it sprayed) or Wheee's or Grannyknot's if it was bare metal to see what our finished paint thickness is

Congrats on fixing the part you started out after - the mirrors. Unwind the gears off the teeth like it was when you pulled it out of the door and the spring fell off. Then with it as far as it will go in that direction put the spring on and then push it back up towards the teeth (against Spring pressure) Then used the window crank to start the teeth engagement again. There is a lot of pressure with the spring so extra hands help here to turn the crank while holding the spring pressure. Hope that makes more sense.

Oh well. I was just wondering if there were any conclusions to be drawn from the readings. Unfortunately, the readings don't really make much sense, so there's no conclusions to be had.

That's what 131,000 miles will do.😏

Just read this entire thread top to bottom. Firstly, I’m frankly in awe of you guys and your immense knowledge of these cars. I feel even more like an ameba swimming among Great Whites! Secondly, even to my untrained eyes and before reading down, paint readings aside that car didn’t add up to me. I’m very pleased that your comments had a superb positive effect and saved some poor sod from parting with silly money for something dressed up to be something it clearly isn’t. Thirdly, this thread just makes me so pleased that my car is very far from perfect! I just couldn’t own or drive a car that is completely immaculate - it’s a big burden. And I do get it, people buy these as investment and show pieces, but that’s never me. Horses have to stretch their legs and gallop otherwise you may as well stuff them. Thank you for the education on this thread - I have learned so much!

Not a paint expert but when you convert the white paint readings from metric to imperial you get 9.8 mil, 7.9 mil, 5.9 mil respectively. If the repaint had a heavy primer plus top coat over the original paint you might get those kind of readings.

Ex Dodge Polara owner myself. Seats 12 comfortably.....

and you either have an exceptionally large bladder or you peed outside a lot!!!

I salute you. Mental faculties intact under those conditions is exceedingly rare. Even basic survival is to be commended.

Is that because you can roll it back and forward without losing tension? Exactly . It’s hard to land right on the valve opening sometimes based on the valve spring tension- but if you miss , you just roll the engine back . Movement is instant thru the chain assembly . You can also turn the motor using the cam bolt - which also simplifies things

Getting close to starting again ! Love the Kameari tensioner set up . Makes life a lot easier to degree your cam

And the guy who made preparations A through G. They were complete failures.

Confirmed by the gentleman who made WD1 - WD39

No, I wish I had some though, I like that setup. I have the louvers that slide like a deadbolt and are screwed into the hatch. Good luck on your search.