Walter Moore

Not to rub salt in your wounds, but I frequently drive to Detroit on business, and I agree, Michigan has to have some of the worst road conditions in the Midwest. The Michigan DOT always blames it on the weather, but I don't understand how the weather can change that radically at the state line. You don't suppose that it has something to do with the lack of overall weight restrictions on trucks in Michigan do you? Entering Michigan from either Ohio, or Indiana, if you are riding in a car reading or working on a notebook computer, you can actually feel the change without having to look up from what you are doing. And I94 (the Ditch as the locals call it) is horrible. It is like a badly maintained county road. I don't know how people who have to drive on that road every day keep their cars operational. I feel your pain, usually at least three or four times a year. So to bring us back on subject...:nervous: consider the local terrain before deciding to switch to poly bushings. If you drive mostly on poorly maintained roads you might not want to go that direction.

Now this looks like an interesting electric car... http://www.opb.org/programs/ofg/videos/view/56-Electric-Drag-Racing

Can you quantify that "zap" experience for us? Was it an "Oh my! That really hurt!" zap or a "Somebody call 911, I think I just lost a finger!" zap? Sorry. No insult intended. My naturally smart-allecky nature wouldn't let me keep quiet... :stupid:

I will testify that his statement is accurate, at least in my case. But I finally understand how they operate, which had been a mystery to me for decades.

Man, that is really nice looking!

I put an Optima battery in mine, but only because I was told that they are sealed and do not leak. Every other battery that I have ever owned always weeps just a little acid out of the top while it is charging, and my poor old Z just doesn't need any more corrosion. One thing that I will warn you about the Optima batteries, is that when you let them run down they draw an enormous amount of current when you go to recharge them. It always pegs my 10A battery charger.

Oh, I get it "vert" is short for convertible... I kept looking for a green car, and couldn't find one...

I can see a "ram air" system increasing the airflow into the carbs, but why would that change the mixture? Isn't the point of the mixture setting on any carb to set the ratio of air to fuel? If the air flow increased wouldn't the fuel flow pretty much increase at the same rate because of the velocity of the air passing through the venturi? I really do not know the answer to that question. I am asking because I want someone who does understand to explain the process better.

This Laurel looks mildy interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nissan_Laurel_C130_001.JPG

I think that a rear hatch like that would make me (more) claustrophobic.

Several years ago I bought a set of "DAD" brand racing seats on Ebay and they came with harnesses. On this particular set, the upper belts mount to the shoulder belt mounting bolt in the back. On a 240Z the shoulder belt mounting bolt is back by the hatch. My harness has a single webbed main strap that connects to two separate shoulder straps that then go through openings in the seat. There are a several issues with using a racing harness in a street car. 1. Without the racing seats the belts would have to wrap around the sides of the stock seats, which would tend to cause them to slip off of your shoulders. A standard shoulder belt avoids this because it crosses across your entire body to the latch on the other side. 2. I have been told (on this site in fact...) that without a roll cage in the car they could actually increase the danger to the occupants because they will hold you upright in a roll-over while the roof collapses on you. (I am somewhat dubious of the concern since if the roof crushes that far you would be in serious trouble in any event, but thought I should pass it along.) 3. They are a royal pain to deal with if more than one person intendeds to drive or ride in the car. It takes several minutes to adjust them when someone different uses the seat. I suspect that this is the underlying reason that governments never required four point harnesses in the first place. They really are more comfortable than a three point seat belt when properly adjusted, but it is a time consuming process to get them setup. To be honest, I am strongly considering replacing them with the three point seat belt that Motorsport Auto is selling, just because I am tired of having to adjust the passenger side harness every time that certain family members ride with me in the car. Apparently in my immediate family only males are capable of adjusting belts..... (No offense intended to any female who is not related to me!)

Oh, so that is why my fuse block looks more or less like the earlier picture, except that instead of the fuse clip being cleanly punched out like our friend's here, it MELTED its way out of the box without any outside assistance... I doubt if the missing fuse is the cause of the current ammeter problem, but it may have contributed to it at some time in the past. It looks to me like the meter is just broken.

It might make a good collector's item.:classic: Those are fairly rare aren't they?

Have you checked the infamous front differential mount? Those are the most common source of a clunk when shifting. Normally a bad universal joint will cause a vibration. (At least they always have in my experience.) Someone else needs to correct me please, but I think that after some point, which I thought was the 280Z, the universal joints became non-replaceable. Since 78 was the last year for the first generation Z, I assume that the original U-joints were not replaceable. That should in no way be assumed to mean that YOUR U-joints are still of the non-serviceable variety, since the car is 30 years old, and who knows what has been done to it in the interim.

I just saw a link to this on the Indy Z car club site: http://www.the370z.com/ For those who might be interested...

Zak, See this link: http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10076&highlight=cam+tower That is the thread that I referred to in the thread that I linked to earlier. So essentially, to re-install the cam towers you must have the rocker arms removed. Put the towers back with the bolts finger tight and the towers in the same order that they were when you took it apart. Slide the camshaft into the towers and make sure that it turns freely. Tighten the mounting bolts slowly to a maximum of 12 - 15 lb-ft of torque starting with the two in the middle and working your way out to the ends in a spiral pattern. (Just like torquing a cylinder head... middle tower, tower to the right, tower to the left etc.) Keep turning the cam shaft between tightening the bolts. If it begins to bind, loosen the last bolt tightened and try again. It seems like perhaps I had to tighten both bolts on a tower before it went free sometimes, but certainly if the cam is in a bind after tightening any two bolts on a tower you have a problem. Having the camshaft in a slight bind while tightening the other bolt on a cam tower will not hurt anything, but never just give up and put the engine back together and run it that way. After the final torque setting is achieved on all bolts, re-check that the camshaft rotates freely. If you are not comfortable risking the engine to your own skills, pay a trusted professional to reassemble the head for you. That is why they are in business.

Would the 1000 miles adjustment apply also to a rebuild engine?

Carl beat me to the punch, but you are fine. I had a similar experience. If you do it yourself, follow the directions I was given here: http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10257&highlight=cam+tower By the way, I now see that I mentioned an earlier thread, but back then I didn't know how to link to it. I do remember that I tightened the mounting bolts in three steps to 13 lb-ft of torque. I started with the center tower and then worked my way out to the ends, just like tightening head bolts. (I may have used the same order in fact.) The trick is to keep turning the cam by hand between tightening the bolts, and if it gets tight to back up and try again. When you are done it should spin free.

Wow...

Believe it or not, I have also encountered a vacuum leak that made a high pitched squeal, just like a bad bearing. You might want to check the tightness of all your manifold bolts if you can't find any other source. But the long screwdriver trick should help to track down the source of the sound.

Well said, and worth remembering while driving any S30...

It doesn't look like it was pulled from a lake to me. It looks like it was driven in Michigan or Indiana in the winter for about 15 years. Pretty amazing actually. I have never seen a Fiat that would run often enough to be a daily driver...

I had to put my Z away for the winter. (It snowed here for the first time this winter over the weekend.) Once the roads have been salted I am not taking back out until at least April.

The hinges have to stay bolted to the car, but I think you have to remove both the hood and the grille. At least is it a lot simpler that way. See the attached pictures for more detail of how it ends up. (The green slime is "dust" left over from wet sanding the car that I never got around to washing out...) The torsion bars have one end with a flat washer like end and two 90 degree angles, and the other end has only one 90 and then a long straight section. The straight section slides horizontally into the hood hinge base and then fits into the bottom of the torsion bar holder. On the other end you have to twist the bar around until you can get the keeper part through the hole in the pivoting plate on the side of the hinge about half way up. The bars have to be installed so that they are constantly pulling the hinges up, and toward the front of the car. It takes quite a bit of force as I recall.

Some WWII fighter aircraft (the P51 Mustang for instance) had the "hood" area as it were directly ahead of the cockpit painted flat black for that reason. It was particularly true on the planes that were painted bright silver. I always assumed that some of the mystique for black painted hoods was to emulate the fighter plane look. But if there was actually a reason as stated above, then that is even better.