Hardway

Good one Blue. I see what you did there.

That is obviously a well loved Z! The only flaw I can see in the interior is the split stitching on the driver seat which is completely understandable and fixable. Great to see how nice the dash is and the original radio still in place. Again, congrats! I look forward to more updates and pictures.

Congrats 5150will! I too am partial to lime green Z's as I had a '72 in the same color. Yours appears to be in stellar condition. I know we are all wanting to see more pics! Glad to see you are back in the game and we look forward to your updates.

Thank you Cliff! I truly appreciate your compliments. This was definitely a team effort as I was really disappointed after getting it back from powder coat and thinking I would have to strip it all off. As usual, other owners with much more experience showed me the way. The Z community is great and I am happy to be able to contribute to it.

The July 4th weekend was very productive for getting work done on the Z. I wrapped up the restoration and paint work on my series-1 air cleaner. The full write up can be seen here -> http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/topic/55771-series-1-air-cleaner-restoration-lots-of-pics/ With the air cleaner on and the old valve cover off I figured I would do a valve adjustment as I had noticed a little valve train noise the last time I drove the car. Sure enough, 4 valves were a bit on the loose side. All in all, a 20 minute job well done. The 2400 valve cover and new cork gasket went on followed by the decals for the air cleaner. The new paint and decals on the air cleaner really elevate the engine bay's level of cleanliness and accuracy. Overall I am very happy with the way it came out considering the condition it was in when I started. The crown jewel of the engine is the 2400 valve cover. I cleaned and polished it a little but I like the natural aged look of the aluminum. Given the state of the rest of the engine bay I think it looks right at home. The final detail to be added is the paint code decal. The car is an original 901 silver car. Since the engine bay has already been stripped and re-sprayed I wanted to add this final touch. All of the decals are very sharp and beautiful in their own way. Mike at Banzai Motorworks is the man! I know the community appreciates all of the work he does to make these small yet significant parts available. It has been very rewarding to add the last two key components that make the engine bay "more correct". Many of you already know these parts are not cheap and not easy to come by. However, with some patience and elbow grease the final result is nothing short of impressive. That is all for now!

RAL Pumpkin is the powder coat color. RAL is the powder manufacturer that the shop used. Looking at the back of the air cleaner box you can tell it is a shade more red than what I painted even though the custom paint mix was based on it. I have used Chevy engine block orange in the past on another air cleaner box and it is a very close match to the original but it has a little too much yellow in it, in my opinion. Of course, at $5/can vs. $23/can and most people not being able to tell the difference anyway, Chevy orange may still be the best way to go.

With the gaskets in place and decals from Mike, the finished product looks great. Not only is it correct for the car but it brings a stronger consistency to the engine bay since the old series - 2 air cleaner was wearing a fair amount of patina and wear. Glad to have it on the car and show once again that we are all capable of this kind of work. If you have any questions please post them up and I will do my best to answer them.

Satisfied with the primer coat I moved on to paint. The spray paint I used is a custom mix from a CarQuest store that mixes it on site for $23/can. After several light coats things were looking really good! I let the paint dry for over 24 hours before even attempting to touch it. The Texas heat definitely helped everything cure nicely. With everything dry I installed the outer lid gasket that I got from Mike at Banzai Motorworks along with some 3/8 foam weatherstrip from Home Depot.

Once all the primer was dry I did several more rounds of 600 grit wet sanding. Now the surface was looking and feeling really good, almost like polished marble. I also wet sanded the powder coat as a lot of it had a "orange peel" finish. Seeing that 80% of the air cleaner cannot be seen when installed I did not get too crazy on the lower half. Looking back on it, I slightly regret this as I was in the position to make this perfect and should have gone the extra miles to do so. Oh well, next time.

Once the primer dried I started wet sanding it with some 600 grit. This made the surface almost glass smooth but also revealed some trash and pits in the primer. The imperfections call for several more layers of primer, some more focused in specific areas.

After posting a thread and getting input from other owners on how to approach the repair I started by sanding down the powder coat with some 80 grit. I applied a generous amount of lightweight Bondo body filler, making sure I worked it in to all of the pitted areas. After several rounds of sanding the only remaining filler was what was needed. The whole surface felt really good at this point so I figured it was ready for some primer.

With spring upon us I hastily dropped it off with a local powder coating shop. The end result reflects my lack of real inspection and to be honest, I did not remember the pitting being as bad as it was. Plus, it was on the side that would be facing up once installed so this was not going to work. Looking back on it I should have just invested in a sand blasting cabinet and blasted it myself as the PC job cost me $160. Oh well, lesson learned. On a positive note, the areas that did not have any pitting or damage looked stellar and the color match was spot on, RAL Pumpkin. Of course before it could be dropped off I had to remove all of the old gasket material.

Many months ago I purchased this series - 1 air cleaner for my 240z. Since the car was built in August of 1970 it should have one. The original had the snorkel cut off to make room for the dealer installed air conditioning. When I purchased the car it had a common "flapper" series - 2 air cleaner. These air cleaners are out there but they are hard to find and prices have been rising over the past several years. Additionally, finding one with the snorkel in good shape is even harder as the metal is very thin and once damaged it would take a very skilled person to fix. When this one popped up on Ebay I bought it for $150 shipped. When it arrived the condition was a little rougher than I expected but it was complete and the snorkel was in good shape. It stayed in the box for many months up until the spring of this year.

I made the most of the 3-day 4th of July weekend and got the air cleaner project wrapped up. I plan on doing an more extensive write up on the restoration but wanted to let you guys know I took your advice and the end result exceeded my expectations. For the filler, I bought a small tub (cat food can size) of lightweight Bondo filler as the local supply store only carries Evercoat in one gallon cans. As I said before, this is my first real effort at paint and body work and given that fact I think I did pretty good.

Mike's concern about his paint possibly being damaged by brake fluid is completely warranted as the paint job on his car is absolutely stunning. I will add my experience to this conversation. I only drive my car to shows, get togethers, and to work on occasion. The brake system on my '71 240z is 100% stock with pretty much all new components at the time of the rebuild by the previous owner. He filled the system with DOT 5 and when I took delivery of the car the pedal was a big spongy and the parking brake did not grab until it was fully pulled in to the Up position. Once I home I adjusted the rear shoes as they were out of spec, tightened the brake cable adjustment, and went through two rounds of bleeding with help from my wife. The end result is a brake pedal that stops the car confidently every time but it does have a little more travel than I would like before they really bite. This might be remedied with another round of bleeding and I might need to look at adjusting the pedal a little as well. All in all, given the benefits DOT 5 provides I don't think you can go wrong with it as long as you understand its limitations.

Kudos Madkaw for helping out a fellow Z owner! There have been plenty of examples as of late of owners wanting to get their Z's up to scratch just so they can reliably enjoy them but they just don't have the time, skills, space, etc. Classic Z's are just like every other car that got cheap to buy, people bought them and just neglected them figuring they were and always will be a cheap car. Glad to see this one is making its way back on to the road again. Keep up the good work!

A small celebratory post is in order. Yesterday marked the 2 year anniversary of owning #8011. It has been a long time since I posted up anything about the car but rest assured I still have it and she still runs. With the warmer weather in full swing and lots of house projects taking up my time, I have not driven it very much. I did make it out to the Austin Cars & Coffee on the 12th. This past weekend I got to meet a fellow 240z owner that lives just a few minutes from me. Over the past 6 months the To-Do list has been growing and it has reached a point I need to take the car off the road for a while and sort everything out. The biggest item of attention is the rear suspension. The car has had a noticeable sag in the rear for quite awhile but the drive out to C&C revealed a kind of rubbing/clunking noise when the suspension is pushed down. So this will get addressed along with getting the heater control cables unstuck, cleaning and greasing the window tracks, and possibly tidying up the radio wiring. One of highlights of last year was getting to meet the original owner of the car. It was great to hear his stories and see that he still kind of cared about the car. I made a separate post which can be seen here -> http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/topic/52547-a-meeting-with-the-original-owner-of-8011/ Another small project I have been working on is the restoration of the series-1 air cleaner I bought. It is still a work in progress but I am getting there. Once complete I will do a full write up on it. Be safe out there everyone and stay cool!

Nice find and looks to be a good foundation to start with. I can tell you are very appreciative to find the car and carry it forward to the next level. The Libre's look good on it! We look forward to your updates.

Hi Patcon. The hardener is labeled catalyst so once mixed in I would say yes, it is catalyzed unless you are meaning something else. The spot putty is very light (or its supposed to be) so 36 or 80 grit would be too harsh but I know where you are coming from since it seems like the surface needs to be rougher to get the filler something to grip to. I read up on the Evercoat products and you are right, they seem to be favored over the Bondo brand of stuff. There is a auto paint supply shop not too hard from my office. I plan to pay them a visit this week to see what they have.

Well I finally got some time to work on this and so far the results have not been good. I picked up some Bondo 907 Glazing and Spot putty. You can see it using the link below. I used some 120 grit sand paper to knock down the powder coat some and used my fingers to get in to the pitted portions of the metal. I mixed up some of the putty on my mixing board and applied to the areas that needed it. At first seemed to be adhering well and I let it dry for 20-25 minutes as the instructions indicated. Once it dried I went back and started sanding with 220 per the instructions and the filler pretty much just lifted off the surface. It also pulled out of the pitted areas. I cleaned it all off and tried again, giving it more time to dry and had the same result. http://www.amazon.com/Bondo-907-Glazing-Spot-Putty/dp/B0002JM8PY At this point I am thinking I need to either get some courser sand paper or possible wire wheel all the powder coat down on the top panel area and use some real panel putty. That way I can sand it all down flat and hopefully the putty would adhere to the metal. What do you guys think?

When I had my lime green '72 240z I bought a pair of chrome rectangular Chevelle/Camaro door mirrors. Think I paid $50 shipped for the pair. A NOS unit was not in the budget for that car but I never put them on. In fact, I still have them in the garage. A member on here or another Z car site had them on his Z and they looked good. Another option would be GM round chrome mirrors. Again, they run about $50 - $60/pair on Ebay and other sites. For the look, cost, and functionality I think they are hard to beat.

Thank you Zup and S30Driver. This is good to know! I bought a 2400 valve cover from Will off of Ebay. The coin was in the box and I just never paid attention to it as it was wrapped up.

I received this coin with some parts I bought, I honestly did not know I had it until months later as it had been wrapped up. I figured it was washers or something but just recently unwrapped it. I can see it was for an event in July 2011. Can anyone on here tell me me the story behind this? I can see it is numbered, how many were made? Is it truly gold plated or something else? I am not a coin guy but it is definitely cool and now has a spot in my office along with my other Z stuff.

Congrats on the sale of your Z! $19K+ is good number, especially since Z's seem to be coming out of the wood work now. I can add in another option here if the deposit and escrow do not work out for you. A few years ago I sold a Karmann Ghia convertible to a buyer in Germany. He was working with an international shipping company that basically took care of everything from paying for the car, picking it up, getting it to port, and getting it on the boat. The buyer was actually a dealer so that may have helped but basically the shipping company guy showed up with a truck and trailer along with an envelope of cash. He did not do Paypal either and felt the shipper could make it to my house fast enough and did not want the hassle of two payments to me for the deposit and the balance. I had no problem with this as I was not under any time commitment to sell and did not have #2 buyer waiting. The shipper guy was knowledgeable of VW's and based on the info the seller provided him about the car he felt it looked good and handed me the cash. After a quick counting I signed the title and handed over the keys. Find out from the guy in Denmark who he plans to use. I am in agreement with the others, the winning bidder has not met the terms of the auction. Now that 48 hours has passed, time to move to the buyer in Denmark. If he is willing to pay the deposit I believe he is the true buyer of your Z. Good luck with it and keep us posted.

Thanks for all the info guys! Glad I posted this up before I sent any money. Since I already have a nice set of 14x5.5 slots on my 240z, I don't see the need to pick up a set of 14x7's right now. If they were 15x7's I would be all over them as I have been looking for a set forever. If anyone is interested in these you can look up Chris Caiazzi on FB. These were posted on the DPAN FB page and the 240z 260z 280z Lovers page.