Matthew Abate

Well, I weigh 172 pounds and started hitting the gym pretty hard recently. Also, the car can lose more than 30 lbs just by switching to a lithium battery, plus I'll get whatever the difference between a stock radiator and an aluminum one saves me. The one I have is leaking so I'm going high performance on that front. However, I'm sure the sound deadener I intend to instal will suck up some of that. Any other quick and easy weight savers out there? CF hood? Plastic gas tank? Nitrogen in the tires? As far as power is concerned, I saw somewhere on this forum that triple Mikunis supposedly bring an L24 up to 190HP and an L28 up to 200HP. it looked like manufacturer's documentation, so who knows how realistic that is, but if a carb change can do that, then I'm sure the other plans I have can get me over 200 without trouble. But the above target is a P:W of ~10:1; better than a Porsche 993 or a BMW E45 M3, not that this ratio is everything, but it's fun to think about.

Nothing to report other that I finished pulling the rivets out of the floor and the floors are in pretty much the same condition on both sides. I was thinking about where I want to go with the car and have figured out what my baseline goal is to try to beat the specs on a factory 1973 Porsche 911RS. A stock 1973 240Z supposedly makes 171 hp and its curb weight is 2301.6 lbs. A 1973 Porsche 911 RS weighs 2150 and makes 210 hp from a 2687 cc engine. So I need to find 150 lbs to lose and 39 HP to gain. And I need to think about torque and gear ratios. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It's not the same. Note the shape of the vents and that the license plate area is recessed. The one in the original post protrudes and the vents are wide and short. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Did some work on the right side floor board. Pulled the sheet metal (those rivers were a bitch and here were something like 20 of them), scraped up all the black goo (bed liner? tar? heroine?), and hit it with a wire wheel until my drill battery died. You can see the damage better now. Holes along the right side, which killed my fantasy of just welding up the holes, but not all the way up against the edge of the car, which is a relief. You can also see how banged up the floor is. I think they went off reading regularly. Time for a beer. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Try a Bose sound link mini with your phone. Then you can use the stock radio for FM AND have driving directions. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I just knocked out a quick photoshop concept of what I might do with my Z in the end. Note the orange-on-orange BRE style stripes. The original photo is by Dan M.

Thanks Grannyknot, These will be super helpful later, but I'm looking for the Inner Fender Weatherstrip, the long piece that seals the fender against the body along the hood line, the pads that go on the little pedestals under the top of the fender, and Front Fender Rubber Mud Flap, the triangular piece that has two screws holding it to the dog leg under the rubber tube that evacuates water from under the wiper grill. So far I've found these: Front Fender Rubber Mud Flap - http://www.thezstore.com/page/TZS/PROD/classic03a14/50-1129 Inner Fender Weatherstrip - http://www.thezstore.com/page/TZS/PROD/34-1221

Cbuczesk, I just emailed you. ——— Here are some slightly better pictures of the floors: I'm not 100% sure that the entire floor needs to be replaced, but the right side behind the front seat brace is pretty much rust held together by paint. I took a wire wheel to it and never got to anything shiny. I was in the process of pulling out the galvanized sheet metal that has been pop-riveted to the floors, but I broke too many drill bits and needed to go buy the correct tools to finish that process. Once I get that done I'll have a much better understanding of what is happening there. ——— As for the rails, I can't take pictures at the moment because the car is sitting on them. The 4x4s that make the top of the cradle I made are lined up with them and obscure them entirely. I'm not sure how they got so smashed up, but they are flattened almost up to the floor panel in a few places. It might be possible to fix them, as Patcon mentioned above, but I have a feeling it will be easier and faster to just replace the rails… unless there is a really strong argument for keeping the originals that I am missing. I'm also looking at this: http://www.nicoclub.com/archives/car-frame-rail-replacement.html ——— Another surprise I forgot to mention is that the gas tank is caved in in a couple of places, which might explain why I had a fuel leak in the rear of the car. It looks like it was either used as a jack point, or the previous owner backed over something and smashed it. Judging from the placement of the dents I am going to say it was from jacking up the car. ——— In other news, I pulled the front body work off: I'm super happy to report that there was nothing surprising under the fenders, other than a black widow spider, but that's nothing a leaf blower, hose, and some raid won't solve. I just need to pull the grill from in front of the windshield and all of the removable bodywork except the 3 doors will be off. I haven't looked for replacement weather stripping or rubber parts yet. I'm holding on to everything until I know just how hard to find all that stuff is. Hopefully I can just buy everything new and chuck all this old brittle crap.

Okay, I'm back. Sorry for the long hiatus, but I had a long list of stuff I needed to take care of this summer and the car sort of languished as a result. But now the vacations have been had, tuitions have been paid, the garage has been organized, and the motorcycle has been sold ( ), so I got back into it. The first order of business was collecting cardboard boxes. The car came with a lot of bits and pieces that have been sitting in old boxes outside in a Missouri field, so I wanted to make sure that I got any dirt, animal dung, mice, black widow spiders, etc. out of my garage. I also wanted to make a loose inventory of what I had so I had a sense of where I am with this thing. Next I cleaned up. Then removed the hood and I took pictures of the engine bay in better light that before. Let me know if you see anything peculiar. I don't know these engines very well yet and have no idea what's happening in there yet. Sorry the images are crappy. I didn't realize it until I started writing this and can't fix it right now. Then we made a cradle to get the car up off the ground so I could really get in there to check it out. It's 3/4" plywood, 2x4s and 4x4s, with 2x3s to lash the four parts together. The 4x4s have sockets for the heads of the jack stands to sit in and prevent sliding, and the jack stands themselves are secured to the bases with plywood. The casters can support up to 250 lbs. each, and there are 16 of them total, so we're good on the weight. I wanted 6" wheels to make it easier to roll, but Home Depot only had 5 of those, so we went with this mishmash of 4" wheels instead. The car is sitting about 30 inches off the ground now. I have discovered that my frame rails have been smashed from some jackass jacking the car up incorrectly, so they are going to have to go. Sorry, no pictures, but trust me, they are shot. This sort of solves a problem for me. I had been deliberating on whether or not to replace the rails with some for a 280z. Since I have to replace them no matter what I am leaning more heavily in the direction of doing a rest-mod rather than a straight restoration. The fact that it is not a numbers matching car is reinforcing that as well. I'm still not 100% decided but I'm seeing 280 drivetrains for fairly good prices so I might just bite the bullet and go there. Even if I don't hot rod the thing I will probably go with the 280 rails. Opinions on this are much appreciated. I'm having a rare case on not being able to decide for myself. ——— Next I removed the seats and center console, and stripped the sound deadener from the interior. Note the condition of the floors. I already knew they were going to have to be replaces. Now I know the extend of the damage. It is isolated to the floors themselves and does not come up into the transmission hump, thankfully. But, look at what some jackass decided was a good idea: I'm so pissed about this. I'm not sure if you can buy that sheet metal, but I have a feeling fixing that is going to be a gigantic pain. ——— And here are some shots of the luggage area and rear wiring area. Looks pretty good. ——— On the whole I feel like I've got a pretty nice base to work with here. She's not really a candidate for a concourse restoration given the engine block issue, but I think I can make a really nice sleeper with some tasteful exterior mods that will keep her mellow but also give her a little bit of style. The next order of business is finding someone who can do the sheet metal repairs for me. I'm going to remove the fenders this weekend and inspect the doglegs, but if they turn out to be alright I think I can get a welder in there as soon as the parts arrive. If anyone can recommend a place or person in northern New Jersey who I should talk to about this please let me know. I would love to find someone who could do the work in my garage, but if not I will need to also figure out how the move the car (anyone know a good flatbed company?). I know someone had recommended Auto Rust Doctors in another thread, but they have closed up shop. This is going to be for the rails, the floors, and the storage area wall that was cut for speakers ( ). Hopefully this can all get done is one shot.