Captain Obvious

The reason the manuals don't match your car is that someone has already converted your car from the original flat top carbs to one of the earlier years with the round tops. You'll need to use the earlier manual for the carbs and the 73 for everything else. As for the round thing near the carb... Can you be a little more descriptive? What direction is "in front"?

I wouldn't worry about the height yet. No glass or seats or anything else in the interior for that matter. What about gas tank and differential? Spare tire? I'm thinking you're going to be adding hundreds of pounds before your done, so I wouldn't worry until you have it loaded and then see where you're at.

Did you verify that the bushings are completely down in the receiving grooves on the rack? When I did my poly, the bushings were not a very good fit and I had to shave down the inside corners on the bushings to get them to sit well against the rack. Here's the details if you haven't seen it already: http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/suspension-steering-s30/51640-steering-rack-disassembly-refurb.html Does the slit in the bushing close up before you clamp it? Remember, the bushings are supposed to be tight as that's what keeps the rack locked in place. There's not supposed to be any play and the poly should be compressed some upon assy, but if those bushings don't fit down in the slots right, there will be too much crush and the bushings will deform in directions you don't want.

I'm not so sure it's that easy. There were other changes made between 77 and 78 with respect to the fuel pump control and FI control relays. The 77 uses the dual relay above your left knee, while the 78 uses separate relays over on the bracket by the battery. The one that used to hold the voltage regulator. I'm not sure which harness those relays connect to... The main engine bay harness, or the engine bay harness.

Ewwwwwwww! Nasty! You ever figure out where the water was getting in?

The flow of suggestions and ideas is clearly bidirectional! No oops there! :laugh:

Edited... Just re-read your post and what I think is a typo threw me for a loop. You meant to say that the harness has no such connector nor (any?) cut wires, right? If that's the case, then I'm with the rest of the crowd. You got one from a 78, not a 77.

The "SAE 30R6" code number is also an indication. That 30R6 is not rated for FI. For the pressure side, you want "SAE 30R9". Here's some info from Goodyear Fuel Hose | Goodyear® Engineered Products :: The 30R6 and 30R7 are fine for the return side since they're under no significant pressure, but the pressure side needs to be rated for FI. BTW - Yikes! :paranoid:

Well you do know that some of this is your fault, right? I was just trying to get a spare in there that worked, but then you go and tell me about how you lowered your wood deck floor for more room. Now I have to do that too. I was happy with just a reliable spare before you went and did that!!

Lenny, Was just thinking about you today and wondering when you might start to find time in the shop again. So you say that Bob's AFM has an offset that would make his car run rich? Couple questions... First, you're talking about an offset in the "airflow to resistance curve" right? Bob's takes less air than normal to move the vane? (Mechanically speaking, he's got a spring loose?) Second, you've measured enough AFM's to be able to spot an outlier? If so, that's fantastic! That means you've got enough data to identify what "normal" looks like???

I have no doubt the final parts were chosen based on test results. In fact, I guarantee it. Look at the resistors below the burned diode. See those metal stands with the resistors soldered to them? Notice how most of them have two resistors soldered to each stand (putting the two resistors in parallel)? Notice how one of them is always a significantly higher value (order of magnitude) than the other? The reason for that is... You put the lower value in place and then tweak the value down a little more by soldering a higher value resistor in parallel with the first based on test results. The lower value is "standard" and is probably the same on all the ECUs of the same generation, but I bet the higher value resistors change from one ECU to the next as determined on a test fixture at the factory.

Thanks for the additional suggestions guys. One other thing my "plan" provides is reducing the overall width of my spare. The accordion spare is on a 5" wheel and pretty much bumps against the underside of the false wood floor. And believe it or not, but because of the significant offset difference, the space saver wheel (the one that fits the rear but not the front) bumps up against it as well. You would expect the space saver to be narrower, and the rubber portion is. But because of the offset built into the metal portion, the overall width is about the same. Moving that space saver rubber to a narrow Z wheel will allow me to drop the height of that false wood floor and gain some valuable space back there. Of course, a can of fix-a-flat is thinner yet, and a AAA card is thinnest of all!

Before I forget though... It's clear that the two ECU's are from a different run. On mine the feedthrough wire connections are labeled "U sub n" (U1, U2, U3...) You can see U9 and U15 on mine for example while sscanf's are not marked in any way. It's clear that the silkscreen markings of the two different boards changed along the way, and I can tell you from experience that nobody changes just the silkscreen. It's too expensive. I'm sure there are some copper changes somewhere between the two as well. Might not be extensive, but I'd bet good money that something changed.

What makes you think the resistors are any different? But before you answer... The fact that mine have a gold stripe on the end while the ones that sscanf posted have green and blue? Take a look at the other end of the resistors in sscanf's pic. Mine were just assembled the other direction. No difference, just mechanical 50/50 pseudo randomness. So if that's what caught your eye, don't worry about it. Direction on the resistors makes no functional change.

Thanks for the info on the space savers, but that's not the real problem here. Let me put the whole story out there... First, let me start off with: I did get my hands on a 4.5 inch wide Z rim, so if anyone is still looking for me, thanks for the help and I'm calling off the dogs. Now back to the story... I have a 77 280 with the collapsible accordion spare and the inflator bottle. I don't trust it. I don't know if the bottle has anything in it, and I'm not sure that accordion spare would be all too happy to be woken up from a 40 year long slumber. So, with all that in mind, I started looking into different options instead. Problem number one... I don't have enough room to use a full sized spare. The spare tub in 77 is too small of a diameter. A full sized tire won't fit down in the small tub. I don't know when exactly they made this change, but I know a 74 will accept a regular tire and wheel combo, and 77 will not. So in either 75 or 76 they reduced the size of the spare tire tub and made it necessary to use the smaller accordioned inflat-o-spare. So, I went to the junkyard and started looking for mini space saver spares. I found lots of them with the proper lug pattern (like your list above), but the diameter restriction is an issue even with the space saver spares. I took a tape measure with me and bought a 15" space saver with a diameter that should fit. When I got home I pulled on front and one rear wheel and checked fitment. Fit fine on both front and rear. Offset was wrong, but I didn't really care too much. Like you said, it's temporary only and emergency use. Offset isn't really a big deal. However, as I was test fitting the 15", I realized it had very little air in it and as I filled it properly, it grew in diameter and when done, it wouldn't fit in the tub anymore. Duh. So 15" doesn't work. Back to the junkyard and picked up a 14" space saver with the correct bolt pattern. It's a 115/70/14 and even when fully inflated, it fits in the 77 tub. But when test fitting to the vehicle it highlighted problem number two... It fits fine on the rear, but in the front, it won't clear the caliper because of the shape of the back side of the wheel. :tapemouth So, the bottom line is that I'm not sure there exists a space saver spare that will fit in the reduced diameter 77 tub while still having a large enough wheel insides to clear the front caliper. That brings us to now... I've got this 115/70/14 tire that would work just fine if I moved it to a wheel that would clear the front caliper. The space saver rim is 4" wide and with the very short sidewall on the space saver rubber, I doubt I could stretch it out to a 5" wide Z rim. But I DO think I could get it onto a 4.5 inch Z rim. My theory is that a 4.5" Z rim with a 115/70/14 space saver spare tire mounted on it will fit the 77 tub AND will be able to be mounted to all four corners. And if that 's not all!! A bonus would also be that the offset would be appropriate. And that's the whole Alice's Restaurant Massacre as to why I'm looking (was looking) for a 4.5" Z rim.

The cold start valve is completely independent from the ECU. It's driven solely by a couple relays and the thermotime switch. I'm betting your ECU is stone dead and you're running off the cold start spray for a couple seconds. And for testing purposes, you don't need a Schottky. Any diode capable of handing the current requirements would work just for a proof of concept test. If the 1N4005 (I'm assuming you meant 1N4005 and not 1N005?) didn't work, you've got problems more significant than just the diode. No surprise there.

There used to be a shop close to 95 in the Baltimore area (north of Baltimore?) that specialized in 300ZX stuff. I can't remember the name though, so I know that doesn't do you much good. :stupid: But as mentioned above, Bernie should be able to hook you up. I sold my 94 to buy my 77.

Woof. That's not good... That used to be diode D190 and based on where it's located in the circuit schematic, I'm guessing it's a Schottky. Supposed to look like this: It's the main power feed into the ECU and the input side is hot any time the fuel injection is operating. I'm thinking reverse polarity protection for the whole shebang because it's in right at the supply input and feeds just about everything. So... Yours passed way too much current and went up in smoke. Problem is though... What was it that was demanding so much current that the diode gave up? The diode probably isn't the underlying problem, it's probably just the result of the underlying problem.

Hahaha!! Oh, the confusion!!

The transistors are easy. They're your garden variety 2N and 2S stuff. Problem will be that the whole box was "tuned" on an ATE fixture at the factory with those piggyback resistors. Who knows what parameters of those transistors have been characterized in that way. Gain, leakage voltage drops... Who knows! And there's the three IC's. Custom parts with zero documentation made out of unobtanium. :-) Good luck. We're all counting on you. PS - Haha!!! Hope you don't mind if I steal that one!

Absolutely! And if there's anything I can do to help, I'd be happy to!

What are the big red things? Same as the small red things. Film caps, probably polyester. Just higher value or voltage, or both. Good luck with the poking around and let us know if you see anything suspicious! On edit, forgot to mention... I'm surprised as well about the lack of electrolytics. I fully expected to find at least a few in a power supply section or something, but I really don't think so. Credit to the designers! Also, video game repair? Cool! That's one of the things that got me through college. Classes during the day, game repair in the evenings. Always had to earn the next semesters tuition!!

http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/engine-drivetrain-s30/49675-weak-return-center-spring.html

Thanks for sway bar input. The end link bushings have to (by design) deal with significant misalignment in every direction other than vertically without loading the bar. Side to side, front to back, they just swivel on the bushings accordingly. Every direction other than vertically shouldn't load the bar. So I'll just count my lucky stars that my sway bars line up almost perfectly vertically. When I put mine back in I was able to tighten up the frame mounts and then just rotate the entire bar in it's mounts until the end link holes lined up. No muss, no fuss, not fight. And I've done it the other way as well... With the end links still attached, I am able to remove and reinstall the frame mounts without any fight. In other words, I didn't have to wrestle or force the frame mounts to get the four holes lined up. They just aligned naturally and the bolts slipped in and went finger tight all the way to "home" without fighting preload. It wasn't like I had to squeeze the second mount into place after tightening the first. They just lined up. Hanging or loaded, same results. I'll watch over my shoulder for Murphy to catch up with me as well? Sounds like maybe I owe him one?

Take a look at #6 as well. I don't like the way the head gasket has slipped off position and is out of round near the water jacket. Did you do a compression test before you pulled the head?