Jeff G 78

Wow, it sure looked kinda, sorta, almost like a Z.

I run SU's on my 260 race car and my '78 has the stock L-Jet EFI. The '72 I had with triples ended up in Paris with forum member "Lazeum". I was moving and was forced to give up one of my projects. I should have kept the '72 and sold the '78. That was about 10 years ago before 240Z prices skyrocketed. Oh well...

It sounds like Weber is still the best gamble for long-term parts availability even though they might not be the easiest/best to work on. I had a Z with DCOE's years ago and I long to have triples again someday. Good luck with your borrowed carbs!

So, can a 280Z valence be swapped for a 240Z valence for a small bumper swap? Most people have to weld up the bumper shock holes when they do the swap.

Good call Steve. You're right about IdahoKidd.

Hmmm, I never knew that either. Nice to know.

Sorry to hear about Kathy. The Z community is thinking about you and your family.

When you dead head the fuel supply, be sure to plug the chassis return line to the tank so no fuel can puke out while driving.

Was that question for me? Either way, I do not run a return. I tried it with and without and found no benefit to keeping it. Before I eliminated the OE rail, it vapor-locked worse with the return.

One of the things I tried over and over was return vs. no return and not using a return seemed to be better for some reason. With the rubber hose replacing the OE rail, I did not run a return line. I looked through my files, but I don't have any pics of the new routing. I will eventually take a few pics and post them. I'm going out of town again for work, so it might be a week before I have time.

Yep, that's what we do.

I was part of the previous discussion. My racecar was a nightmare. It would run great for 30 minutes and then start acting up. At first, it would break up at high RPM and then after a bit more time, the engine would misfire at lower and lower RPM until it wouldn't pull at all on the straights. We changed everything including fuel pump(s), ignition, exhaust, heat shielding, carbs, etc. The only thing that worked was ditching the steel fuel rail and replacing it with rubber hose. The heat was transferring from the head into the fuel via the rail mounts. Once we made the switch, we have never had a minute of trouble with vapor lock.

Looking good!

You can get Rewinds really cheap from time to time from Discount Tire Direct. I bought two sets of 15x7 for my 260Z race car for $360 a set delivered.

There are no storage bins either. I think they were trying to make it more luxurious and quieter with the high deck. I liked the '76 cargo area better.

No Cliff, the '78 floor is spaced up like yours, but without the angled back. There is a plastic interior panel covering the tail lamps. The '78 uses the same spare and canister as yours. The hatch area in my old '76 was much more usable due the extra 3+ inches of cargo depth below the window. The only good thing about the raised floor is that it makes a wonderful place to hide audio equipment. I have two amps and a crossover sandwiched between the floor and the wood deck forward of the tire well. Eventually I will build a speaker box like the one MSA sells and put a sub in the tire well in place of the nearly 40 year old inflatable spare. As a hobby woodworker, I can't spend $150 for $30 worth of MDF.

BRE show isn't until Feb 20th. I'll only be there through the 5th. I will try to get to MSA though if I can. I have a few hours of downtime on the 4th. The beauty is that I can buy big stuff and ship it back in a van we'll have out there.

What about the www.xenons30.com site? That has all of the FSM's and FI manual. I thought they were all correct, though I'm not sure I have ever looked at the '77 FSM there.

Hey Cliff, I have a N47/spray bar head on my '78. I thought it was a unicorn, but apparently there were a few '77's built that way. I bought the head about 15 years ago. It was pulled from a new engine in '77 and had been sitting on a shelf for 20 years before I bought it. The story was that a race team owned it and had pulled it when they got the car new. It was really neat to see a brand new head that old. The cam/rockers had no wear pattern yet and the head had clearly never been touched. I put new valve seals in and dropped in on my flat top engine.

Does the '77 have a trap door in the rear deck for the fuel sender like the '78 has? If so, you could look in the tank and see how bad it is.

I did my tank myself, so I never checked the local shops. Call around to radiator shops and see if any of them boil gas tanks.

I have a pedal box that I will donate to the cause. I swapped an auto for a manual back in 1986 on a '76 280Z. I did it alone and I finished it in a weekend. It's going to be really tricky to work on the car in an apartment complex. Chances are really good that the fuel tank will need to come out and be cleaned. Every Z I've had that has sat had a rusty tank. Here's what the inside of my 260Z tank looked like after it sat for 20 years in an Indiana barn. I actually got it looking really good after lots of work. I was driving South on I-75 to Ohio with my wife and I saw your Z on a trailer a few hundred yards away going Northbound. I called it out and said "I know that car, it was just on Craigslist!"

Welcome to the club! Do I have a good eye or what? I figured the owner would show up here at some point. You are only 15 or so minutes from me.

I believe so Cliff. The shape of the lip is the same on all pans, I believe. Lay them on the pan and see if the shape is the same.

Thanks for the pics Guy. I was wondering how bad you got hit. So far, our winter hasn't been too bad. I've only had to shovel the walk once and the snow blower hasn't come out yet.