thetwood

Sorry. Is a pressure kit. Just hoping to get better pressure reading than the inline gauge. It runs okay. The exhaust on it makes it loud and it's not completely smooth, but does fine out on the road.

Also getting ready to order a fuel injection test kit to use. Be here in a couple of days.

First of all, I just want to say thank you to everyone. It's awesome getting all of this advice, even if it's somewhat overwhelming. So much we still have to learn. Here are a bunch of pictures. Hope is helps with a few of the questions. Just let me know what I'm missing of where to change angle and I'll go take more. The car is a 280z (they mistakenly put 280zx on the emissions). VIN is HLS30-432877. Engine block is stamped L28 652773. Not sure how to look that up to know where it came from, but I was told it was purchased to put into the frame by previous owner. Don't know much more about it than that... ECU appears to be OE (attached pic), though I didn't pull it out fully. AFM appears to be JEGS after market. I'm not sure how to check to see if cams are original, but will research. Spark plugs were changed when we redid all of the fuel and liquids. Probably 30 miles of driving and a decent amount more idling as we worked on different parts getting it running. They're pretty dirty (see picture). I'll get new ones to use for testing.

He was a high school kid. Why do they do anything? I know my high schooler doesn't always make the best of decisions... But wish it would have been left closer to stock.

So maybe the fuel pressure gauge is bad (was in the car when we got it), but at idle it's sitting around 15 psi without the vacuum hooked up. With the vacuum hooked up, it's at 4 psi. I can look at replacing the gauge to see if that's indeed the problem... In actual forward progress, I purchased and put on a new fuel cap, so at least I should pass that one. Returning to stock seems daunting. With a swapped engine, new fuel rail and other non-stock items added in, I'm not even totally sure where to start. The Service Manual shows where things should basically be, but I'll have to read through further to see if I can really understand how to rebuild all of the missing. Then would have to start finding all the parts as well.

Thanks. Heading to get vacuum hose and a new gas cap now. Once I hook up the FPR, should I be able to tell a difference listening to the engine at idle if it's working?

Where does the FPR vacuum line go to? Or know where in the service manual it goes over vacuum lines? I'm paging through but haven't found yet...

Thanks to everyone for all the quick responses. Really appreciate it. @SteveJ, thanks for the point to the right documentation. Have it now and have started reading. According the the previous owner, it had a cat and he took it off when he ditched everything else. Will look into that more. @EuroDat, I'm getting questions to the previous owner now. Did find out that he had swapped engines completely. It's an L28, but different number (doesn't match cars VIN). Will see what he says about the AFM and Cam. There is a BEGI fuel regulator, but it doesn't have a vacuum line hooked up to it so I'm assuming it's not doing much. I'll look through the boxes of stuff we got with the car to see if I can find the actual model number or documentation for it to look into this more too. Once my son is up to help, I'll start the car up and watch the fuel pressure and get notes back to you. @siteunseen, I've attached a better picture of the area you circled. I think it's just a spring back there.

Last year we bought a 1978 280z from a neighbor for our sons first car. It had been our neighbors sons car and had sat in her garage for the last 11 years. We've spent the last year getting it road worthy (new fuel lines, relined the tank, new suspension bushings, all new fluids and spark plugs, new tires/wheels, got the lights and blinkers working). Finally went to register and get emissions. And boy did we fail. HC at 977 (limit of 400) and CO at 7.28 (limit of 1.5). Also, the gas cap didn't seal. We knew it was likely to have problems, but seems pretty bad. The previous owner had lived where there were no emissions tests and was a high school kid, so he did a couple of things. He replaced the exhaust with an after market (not sure of make, but it's loud). Not sure if car originally had a catalytic converter, but it doesn't have one now. Just straight back to a small muffler. He also removed all of the Emission Control System. EGR is not hooked up. BPT and almost all hoses are gone. See picture for the little that is left. I'm hoping for some thoughts on where to start (other than the gas cap. I can figure that one out). I'm not a car guy. Just a dad trying to help his 15 year old learn (lots of reading and youtube videos). We'll tackle about anything, but where should we start working? Thanks for the help.