SteveK

OK -- all clear now, I'll go back to sleep

240ZMan In your first post you said that the compression was low on all cylinders and then on your last post you give figures between 170 (max) and 155 (min) Why do you consider these reading low ? I have only recently put a rebuilt engine in my car - run it in and am getting 160 -165 across all pots, which I am perfectly happy with.

240ZMan What you have described sounds like "spark erosion" and has been used successfully to get many an engineer of of the poo, many moons ago (1980's) I worked for the British National Coal board, where very heavy engineering was the norm, a colleague of mine broke a 1 inch tap off in a cast iron casting which weighed half a ton and cost in excess of £10,000 - then -- boy was he glad of spark erosion. st0878 Its a very good point and something to be conscious of, personal preference is to use the copper type grease's as they will stay in the threads and don’t "pool" so readily Phred I did like your method M8 -- never occured to me :stupid:

I too have swapped out the original 240Z dizzy (European units are supposed to have a better curve but hey) for a second hand 280zx unit and module, the main reason was eliminate the possibility of inconsistent spark at high rpm Replaced old ballast coil for a Bosh blue sports 12 volt unit, bypassed the ballast, whole thing took 30 minutes tops As was posted previously, very smooth, well past 7K and the tacho still works perfectly Previous to the swap I dyno'd the car and noticed ignition scatter around 3.5 K + and a small misfire at around 5.5-6K probably due to points, general wear and a 30 year old coil Re dyno'd the car - hey presto no scatter no misfire Total cost approx £100 (about $170 for you ex colonials :classic: ) Regarding plug wires I would replace mine every 3 or 4 years irrespective of how good they look - I used to work in a lab working on UV camera analysis of HT arcs and coronal discharge-- Faraday cage heaven -- its amazing what the human eye cannot see.

Each to their own I say I see nothing wrong with spending a few hundred $ on a potential improvement Bit like Triples Electric fuel pumps Injection Electric fans Stereos Vented discs Turbo's Headers Cams Rolling roads Hey if we didn’t try stuff, we would all be comparing which air fresheners and running on crossply tyres BTW thanks for the compliment on the Z, there aren’t that many 240Z's in the UK (last know 152 registered) -- keeps all the "ricers" that haunt the high street guessing as to what it is which is funny in itself.

Hls30 you wrote "1) I have never seen a electric water pump that came with anything more than an on or off temperature controlled relay " Go to http://www.daviescraig.com.au/newproduct.html and become enlightened "2) What happens when a part goes out on the electric water pump, it sure isn't like you can run down to your local part house and be back on the street the same day for less than $25 (unless you revert to an original pump)." OK have a 30 year old water pump shaft or bearings fail and go through your rad and your in a world of pain that your local parts store dont gonna fix. BTW at V high engines speeds pumps can consume as much as 15% of power produced and become inefficient due to cavitation

One advantage of an electric pump is that even with the engine off, some flow can be provided. For example you have been for a long hard run in the Z, park up, turn the engine off you run the risk of cooking the engine. With an electric pump you could set it to run for say a couple of minutes after turn off thus allowing the engine to ramp down Yes the device must still be powered and you don’t get something for nothing as Mr Einstein would say, but you are removing the dynamic load of the water pump in favour of a "buffered" load via the alternator thus you would free up "some" (probably not measurable) HP Another advantage is the ability to vary the flow independent of the engine speed, this is particularly useful when putting adverse loads (engine working harder, burning more fuel thus getting hotter with less air flow)on the engine, e.g. hill climbs etc when it would be desirable to have in increased flow independent of engine speed Another is, with a conventional system, bust a belt and you have lost both the alternator and the pump. However I do agree with the points that A, The electrical system needs to be in good condition (should be regardless) B. The alternator should be upgraded (not a bad idea regardless)

Sorry to go off topic for a moment but what on earth are "ricers" I have seen the term used several times and cannot for the life of me think what it refers too.

I currently have 2 stalk switches in for refurb, for the headlight switch there is a 2 pole rocker contact arrangement which is operates by a cam, this switch rocker (copper) is actuated by a small plastic "tit" for want of a better word (there are 2 of them one for side lights one for main and they act like pivot points on the copper rocker) make sure this is not worn down -- if is, build it up with JB, its a temporary fix but it has been holding one of mine up for 6 months of constant use -- be careful they have a small spring inside that loves to pop out when you are disassembling the switch. I'll try and take some piccies when I am doing the two units I have

No this one is from Eastern Europe :stupid:

Good point beandip I would certainly like to know what people are running and what they find best for their applications. On triples etc most suppliers (Webcon, Pierce etc) recommend cap off the vacuum and advance timing a little to compensate. Maybe time for a pole

Appreciate the replies but the problem I have with those set-ups Frank is two fold Firstly Getting them into the UK Shipping Customs charges Value added tax All of which can easily add another $300+ onto the price Secondly Those are pretty damn near race set-ups and on British roads with a speed camera around every corner my licence wouldn’t stand the temptation :classic: By going to the slotted/grooved route at $100 they were cheap enough to try a set and see if they improved some of the drawbacks of the stock system without having to do any heavy modifications to struts and suspension and worry about sourcing new minilite replicas (only just had them) hey if they didn’t work I would happily cut my losses and put it down to experience

I was interested in these as in the UK availability of anything but the stock stuff it difficult to say the least, I sent 6 emails (with drawings) over a period of 3 days to them asking them to confirm that the 240 discs (rotors) were of the 40 mm offset not the later 260 ones and I got no replies at all? Then about a week later I got a confusing barely legible email that basically said cannot help you as they have all gone on holiday. Excellent, obviously the holiday student cover hadn’t been taught how to use a ruler or to reply to an email properly.

Its looking good nurse, Got the rear ones replaced and guess what, on a UK 240Z the stock springs are shorter than the Haynes manual states (made a phone call or two) Haynes manual says 15 inch My old ones = 12 inches My new ones 11 inches Now I will admit that they could have weakened and compressed a little but not 3 inches and besides that would have made the ride height so ridiculously high Now for the fronts --- tally hoe

When I took my old shocks out I could see where the paint had peeled due to heat (constant re-compression sometimes many times a second) If there is no oil, the air gap forms a heat barrier preventing any heat generated "sinking" away, this could cook the seals and ruin the shock.

Thanks very much for the info guys Spent a little while measuring up and things look hopeful, whilst the spring length looks a little short they are measurably stiffer so won’t compress as much Rears are longer but the pitch of the coils greater than the fronts which are shorter. I think I will offer them up and see how the car sits first, as they were made by a very reputable manufacturer that has made them for a number of Z's in the UK and they have infinitely more experience than me. I am about to enter the operating theatre to commence surgery ---wish me luck --Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; and all that. If it’s all-ok I shall emerge and post triumphantly, if not I shall be conspicuous by my silence

Just about to do a spring change on a Stock 240Z (European car) in favour of new shortened, firmer springs and am checking the lengths, the ones I have been supplied are different lengths front to back, 11 inch long back, 9.5 inch long front but the Haynes manual says they should be pretty much the same length ??? Is the Haynes book up to its usual tricks again? Any one happen to have some dimensions as a guide line as I am just about to start dismantling and don’t want to get all the way there and find something is wrong.

That 2 inches (50mm) kinda corresponds with the spacer size I mentioned before I wonder:ermm:

How much play are we talking about When I did mine (5 months ago, front and rear) the fronts were a different length from the rears (this confused me for a while until I offered them up into the tubes and only on set would fit), one set had an extender attached to the bottom, I wonder if you have got them swapped or the wrong ones (extender was about 50-75mm long) other than that when I tightened the nut up onto the supplied washer it locked down quiet well, don’t tighten it down all the way a small amount of thread should be left showing I think its about an eighth of an inch gap from the nut to the top of the strut tube (may be wrong) As for Oil I put a couple of table spoons of normal 10:30 in as it should help dissipate the heat better (shocks can get pretty hot) opinion is mixed but, hey better to have it and its not needed that not to have it and get overheated shocks.

richard1 If you need to do it yourself its dead easy, I used a scrap unit from a clock that I had lying around or you can buy for a few $ a quartz movement that will fit inside the shell (most are of a standard size) with the correct spindle shaft size for the hands of your existing clock. I have done it with mine and it looks stock. For power I put in (still plenty of room) a small voltage regulator from 12v down to 1.5 v available from most electrical projects stores --radio shack etc then put the original tails on and hey presto. Alternatively just extend out the battery leads into your glove box so that if you do need to change that battery (once a year) its v easy.

Thats it frankensteinZ Give it some

And if you cant get a "Big" pipewrench -- get the next size up No seriously sometimes that nut can be an absolute swine to shift

Hey I now need sunglasses every time I read this thread :cross-eye Its a good job you guys aren’t firemen -- all that polishing and all those helmets LOL LOL

zeiss150 Expect to loose about 25% + through various HP sapping things like gearbox, diff, tyres etc -- rolling resistance. A few months ago I put a fresh L24 into my Z with stock ignition and SM needles (gives a more linear fuel delivery I found) the head had been reworked i.e. flattened, ported and polished and had new stainless valves and hard seats, new stock cam, springs, followers etc, 6 into 1 header and K&N's All in all giving a compression reading of 170 bang on across all 6, plugs out, dry. We got in excess of 120+ at the wheels equating to 150+ or so at the flywheel --- (lightening of which does not increase HP of the engine it just means less is wasted) I have read several items on the web regarding the stock L24 one guy took a number of tests on various stock L24's and averaged them out and this came to about 110 BHP at the wheels stock. So to sum up, headers, mild headwork, K&N's got me 10 or so BHP, Pretty poo really for £700, but good foundation work when I do get the head skimmed and a new stage 2 cam. On other vehicles (RS2000's MG, Mini Cooper, Triumphs etc) the same amount of work has netted me 20 or 30 BHP, indicating that the stock engine needs more significant work than just a bolt on jobbie. Its all about getting the engine to "breathe better" and as it goes, for a single OHC the L series do quiet well, in order to get significant gains you need more drastic surgery Head skim (you can get away easily with 30 thou before shimming the towers) Decent head gasket Cam, followers, lash pads etc And lots of tweaking Ignition systems wont necessarily net you more HP, but they will help you get a more consistent, stronger spark up to a higher rpm, which is vital. Throwing money at a set of triples will not get you anywhere without the others first (if it does you were either running flat tops or there was something else wrong), as was mentioned the stock round top SU's perform very well, a friend of mine (with his own Dyno) spent several days tweaking a set of triples on a stock L24 and only got a few (under 10) BHP more and he runs 2 650 HP mustangs for fun on track days (yes we have got some HP figures like that in the UK) If you want bang for bucks -- go to the breakers yard spend a couple of hundred, get a low mileage L28, put a P90 head on it, cam it, put triples on it, decent headers -- that will get you into the 200 BHP region.

Well After doing the old strip clock out malarkey, cleaned it and oiled it, the clock ran for a few days then went on strike again so I thought sod it and put in a quartz mechanism that I had knocking around, modded the hands to fit the new shaft size and epoxied the mechanism to the back of the face, fits inside the old shell a treat It took and hour or so but looks like stock and the front adjuster even works. As for power I put some tails on it and a trim pot, tweaked it so I got about 1.5 volts and it runs from the cars supply - never have to bother with it again. EDIT Now using a voltage regulator as the pot wasnt a stable solution due to the voltage variance Right, now for cold fusion