BTF/PTM

See if someone here on our forum is in your area, they may be willing to shop with you. I had a member go with me to look at a car, it really taught me a lot. Most of the time the carpets won't pull up becuz they'll be glued to the floors. - shine a flashlight underneath both sides of both seats to look at the seat supports. Rust on these parts has probably crept upward from the floors since they're welded to them. - pull the carpets back from around the seat belt retractors if the car has them. Rust in those buckets is important. - Look all the way along both frame rails and make sure all the metal is there. The rails may be a bit banged up, but as long as they're not torn or visibly folded they should be ok. Mine have a few dents in them but no rust. - do a forum search for all the other places, there are dozens. p.s. - it's not that a z car is a pain to fix if it's rusty, it's more correct to say it's a pain to the wallet to fix.

I recently posted about the differences between the 3-screw and the 4-screw SU carb sets that I have, and I have a new question. Someone recently pointed out that the 4-screw carbs are easier to adjust becuz the 3-screw carbs have part of a linkage bar that protrudes out over the float bowl covers thus making it difficult to remove those covers for cleaning or adjustment. My car is running on the 3-screw carbs, it runs well enough but the back carb is fouling all three plugs and the car smells like it's running very rich. I have no idea when the 4-screw carbs were last run, so they'd definitely need to be disassembled and cleaned before using them. My question is, should I install the set of 4-screw carbs that I have and learn to tune those instead of the 3-screw ones? Is it realistically any easier to tune and work on them? I have an offer of a forum member to help me tune the carbs, but I'm having a helluva time getting the car past all of its drivability issues in order to get the ball rolling which is why I pose the question. And for the record, I'm a total newbie to carb work of any sort, so any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

I bled mine on the car and even with all the hydraulic lines connected. Get everything connected normally, fill both reservoirs with fluid and bleed each reservoir one at a time with the tube feeding from the main cylinder bleed nipple (on the side of the cylinder) back into its reservoir like your picture shows. I did it with the car door open, I worked the pedal with my foot and was leaned out over the fender/cowl holding the tube over the reservoir. A bit cumbersome, but it worked just fine. Took many pedal pumps, slow and complete, before I stopped seeing bubbles in the tube. Once you get one done, make sure to tighten the bleed screw and put the cap on the reservoir before beginning the next one. May not be the best way to do it, but my brakes feel confident and predictable so I guess everything is free of air. p.s. - make absolutely sure you add the step of packing towels or blankets under and around the master cylinder so drips of brake fluid don't end up on painted surfaces.

I'd like to powdercoat the steel bumpers satin black. Any recommendations for a southern-california shop that does good work? I don't have any idea what kind of price range I'm looking at so there's a good chance this job will end up being put off well into the future in favor of other more important jobs being done first, but what sayeth the forum?

I have not done this swap, but I've done lots of reading over at hybridz.org and it seems like the first step to doing this swap is to save up about $8,000 to make sure you've got enough for frame modifications, engine/transmission mounts, rear end bolstering, chassis stiffening, suspension upgrades and other stuff. It's not nearly as simple as just dropping the powertrain into the car. You'll probably want to rebuild the engine before you install it, too, just for the insurance. These things are never as simple as they appear.

Thanks for the continued feedback, guys! I hadn't thought of the metal pieces with small clamps, that's a pretty good idea. I did learn right away that the oven trick is risky at best, it seems like making a custom jig is the only way to really have that done right becuz the flange needs to be flat all the way around. I opted to take HLS30.com up on his offer to ship me usable housings (see previous post in the thread) since my housings are missing a couple of the cap nuts as a result of them having pulled through the plastic. I think I'll use the old housings as test beds, I can learn some of these techniques on junk parts so I don't trash good ones while learning. Also, it sounds like getting by without those tiny plastic rods inside the lights and their associated tin retainers is very doable. I like the idea of using small screws or bolts. Guess it's time to invest in a power drill

Thanks, ajcm, that'll make the next times a bit smoother (hopefully). I scraped the weatherstrip channels clean with a screwdriver to bust off a lot of old stuff (which also took a lot of the new paint off becuz the prep work was wizz poor in that area) and wiped it down with alcohol. The next time I do it, it will be due to one of two things: either the existing seal still leaks and/or I didn't seal it in properly, or I'm having the car properly sanded and painted. In any case, I'll probably have used a flapper wheel to really clean out those channels.

One of the center nut rods was already broken, and the other broke as I was using a toothbrush to scrub away the grime which suggests it was already cracked and just waiting for that last tidbit of force to fail it. On that note, though, it seems like a good sealer like the aquarium type would hold plenty strong since my one headlight without that center rod was holding up. I opted not to fight with the rods holding the chrome strip to the lens, but I do have a question in that regard; has anyone tried doing away with those little rods altogether and using some sort of epoxy to hold the chrome piece onto the lens? I'm not worried about having to take them apart a second time, I figure by the time that situation arises, I'll be able to pony up the dough and get replacement light assemblies (or will have already done it). Center rods aside, the lenses pulled away from the housings without a fight after a soak in steaming hot water. Was a pain scrubbing and picking and shaving all the old adhesive off, but the lenses look worlds better after just a good scrub with dish soap. Amazing how grimy even the insides have become after the decades. I think I'll use the 3-step polish kit recommended in Escanlon's write-up since I've already got everything apart.

I can definitely relate to that one, Dizeazd. I don't think I'll be doing weather strip again. Just like all body work, it seems well worth it to pay someone who can do it right, and most importantly has the right tools to do the job. That said, my girlfriend came up with a fantastic way to make weather strip on the hatch easier. That's right, I said my girlfriend. I might have to marry her now, she's turning out to be a better car guy than me We used this method on the smaller weather strip on the hatch, and I wish to tarnation I'd thought of something similar yesterday when I was dealing with the main seal. After laying the bead of adhesive and putting the seal down, we put bic pens in the gap between the seal and body and then used plastic hangers to put force on the pens. This held the seal lip flat, since of course it wasn't anywhere near straight becuz, well, extruded rubber just can't be expected to hold a perfect shape. It worked incredibly well holding the seal down while the adhesive set. A bit tedious cuz we had to stand there with the hangers, but it worked well. Here's a picture: Absolute genius, that girl. I imagine something bigger like a drum stick or magic marker in combination with the hanger may work for holding the main hatch seal in place.

The Permatex stuff I used has plenty of stick, it clings fiercely to anything it contacts whether you want it to or not. It's the stuff on the MSA site, I figured it was worth a couple bucks of over pricing to have the stuff included with the seals. It even threatened to stick my fingers together when I tried to rub them together in order to ball some of it up and get it off my skin. I think I may try coating my tires with it, I could probably drive on the ceiling

Yikes... So basically I want to bake the housings (without colored lenses and wiring) such that the mounting surfaces flatten out? I guess it's worth a shot, not like I could make them seal any worse, eh? p.s - how does one go about getting the colored lenses out of the housings? Do we have a thread already?

So I guess I won't be adding weather strip adhesive application to the list of things Motorman7 may be willing to help me with Believe me, Walter, I'd be much less upset with leaks if I'd done it the way you did it than if it leaks after the job I did. I seriously went through half the tube of adhesive doing it the way the instructions said it and it cost a couple hours of cursing and fighting with half-stuck adhesive and pulling the strip into place over and over again.

So I cut my teeth on gluing weather strip in place today, I pulled off the main hatch seal (which was barely glued on at all and falling off in several places) to give reattaching it a shot. I used the Permatex black stuff, it's nasty shyte! It was the instructions on the tube that made life most difficult, so someone please correct me if I didn't need to do it this way. It said to put a thin film on "both surfaces" and let dry. I took this to meaning laying a thin film on the body of the car and on the mating seal surface. The body was no big deal, but man laying a bead down on the seal and fighting the damned seal sticking to itself every eight inches as I went was infuriating. I let the two dry so they weren't tacky anymore and laid the final bead on the body and put the seal on a few inches at a time. Absolute nightmare, the seal would cling to the body the instant it contacted it due to all the adhesive already there and half the time the seal had stuck itself shut so I couldn't slide it into place without pulling the adhesive all over the place. I did eventually get it into place, but it's painfully obvious that a rookie did it, and I'm not even certain I got the thing to seal fully. I very well may have left gaps in the bead that could leak fumes between the seal and the body, but pulling it apart this time would likely destroy the seal. Did I really need to do all those steps to put that seal on? Could I just have laid a nice fat bead onto the body and put the weather strip in place? What an adventure!

Good news is, the tail light gaskets on my 72 are in very good shape, they look just as good as the brand new ones I ended up leaving in their wrapping. Bad news is, the lights aren't as fortunate. Anyone dealt with this before? Any advice would be good, be it replacing the lights, using some sort of filler between the flange and gasket or just about anything else. The metal overlay trim that fits over the lights is in great shape so I'm not sure how they got so bad, but speculation won't get me anywhere. Thanks, everyone.

Just curious, I've seen a few posts about upgrading to CV half shafts but haven't found any pictures. My car came with an R200 and the 4-bolt-flange U-joint shafts - are CV units something else?

Slide the seat all the way back and stretch out before you start. Bend yourself backward and upside down to twist yourself under the dashboard looking up. You'll see said 7mm nut at the top of the pedal. Crack it loose. Now gently pop the knuckle loose in the engine bay and you can thread that first linkage rod out. I used a small screwdriver to pop the last of the grommet in place through the hole from inside the car, it can be a bit stubborn and try to fold up. Don't forget to re-tighten that 7mm nut.

I just put a set of Sumitomo HTR 200 tires on my 72, they're 205-60R14's and they look great on the slotted mags. They're a summer tire, treadwear rating of 380 with temperature rating of A. Tirerack.com has them for pretty cheap, and a lot of tire stores in town will match their prices.

^ thanks for the links, MikeB! I'm gonna keep a list of these links as they come up. p.s. - why does the part number change through the years? How does one go about keeping track of these changes?

I'd contend that the strut does in fact exert a force on the hatch while it's closed, it couldn't open the hatch to begin with without a certain amount of outward oomph to begin its arc of travel. If you compress the strut while it's not attached to the car, it springs back out as soon as you let it go. It's doing the same thing to the hatch when it's closed. Probably not a lot of force if the angles of the hatch closed against the body were thought through properly, but a small amount nonetheless that isn't countered by an equal force on the opposite side. Combine that with gravity pulling the other side of the hatch downward while it's open, the fact that people almost always close the hatch at its middle instead of over the one strut which creates a twisting force of its own and decades of those gradual forces, and you have the makings of the mild twist that apparently many of us see. I've seen much newer hatchback vehicles with single-strut hatches that had the same problem. I could be completely wrong, but it seems logical to me. In any case, beating a seal into submission sounds like a terrible idea to counter such a problem!

My car is missing most of the seals for the entire tail end, the main hatch seal is there but it's falling off due to having been very poorly attached by the PO (and it looks like pretty cheap material) and I'm pretty sure the tail light seals are in the samecondition, and all the others aren't even there. That's why I ask, becuz I'll be gluing all fresh hatch seals in place and replacing the insertable grommets as well. The body has a decent enough paint job to be well preserved until I can afford to have it done right, but I can see the job in the next few years so if I can reuse the fresh seals by peeling them off and re-gluing that would be good.

Ok, this is good news. I just ordered a set of all the tail and hatch gaskets, including the much more expensive factory Nissan main hatch seal, through MSA and I wanted to make sure I could reuse them in the event of eventually changing the car's color or repairing invading rust or something of that nature that would require pulling the seals off.

My existing strut works quite well, my curiosity comes from the fact that, with just the one strut (and with many many other vehicles other than our z's), having just one strut on the hatch means that it's got a slight twist to it after many years of just having that one strut. Two struts would lift it evenly. The problem of having the two brackets welded out of parallel causing buckling and leaks makes a lot of sense, though, I dunno if it's worth the trouble given the amount of precision required.

If a body seal is still good, can it be peeled off its adhesive and reused? I'm asking generically, like in the instance of having a shell repainted or something of that nature.

Not sure if any 240-series cars had hatches fitted with strut mounting holes on both sides, but mine has this feature. If not, it's had its hatch replaced at some point in its life. Of course, there's no mount for the strut bracket on the passenger-side body of the car. I picked up a working passenger-side strut and brackets from a local parts yard off a 280z just in case it would fit (while out looking for other stuff). Has anyone mounted a passenger-side bracket on their 240z to use both struts? Seems like it would be a nice perk to have two struts there.

Courtesy Nissan is quite a bit cheaper than MSA, looks like they win. Wish I'd thought enough to go through them when I replaced my door handles (again the seals were dead). I apologize for beating the dead horse, but with the graphic below, am I correct in guessing that the metal ring/grommet midway down the tube is what bolts to the trunk floor from the outside to seal the gap between the tube and trunk floor? I guess the top of the tube is sealed in place by the flat metal flange at the top under the gas door? Thanks for the help, everyone. http://www.courtesyparts.com/fuel-filler-hose-1970-1974-240z-260z-p-568994.html?cPath=7724_7759&