2ManyZs

If you want the best 280 motor (L-28) try to find an F-54 block with the flat top pistons, you will have a displacement increase while keeping close to your current compression ratio. If you get an earlier L-28 they will have dished pistons and your compression ratio will drop to about 8:1 unless you replace the pistons.

Ground Control offers camber plates for both the front and rear. They can set you up with a complete set to go with their coil-overs as I believe they use different top mounts. Not sure what you are referring to as to the body numbers. If you are looking for spring rates GC should be able to tell you a close estimate for what you will need when you tell them what you are going to do. I know road racing and autox'ing is different as far as spring rates so you will need someone like John Coffey to give you ideas on that. I mainly did road racing with a 75 280 so what I used will not be the same as what you will need.

Here's a link to Kyosho's die-cast cars... http://www.legacydiecast.com/xq/asp/maker.kyosho/step.70/qx/showroom.htm

The People's Republic of California? Now there's an oxymoron if I ever heard one......Where the only people making the decision are CARB officials........ Wonder how many synonyms we could come up with for CARB??

Oops, I got the transmission calculator mixed up with the engine calculator. The transmission calculator is in the web-links under tech info if you are interested in that. Now I can't remember where I downloaded the engine calculator from, perhaps it was from a post on the site. Let me look again. :stupid: Take a look at this post and you can download it. I knew it was here somewhere.... http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1292&highlight=Z+engine+calculator

The only bad part is finding a 3:90 R-180, they were offered for a short time in the 720 4X4 pickups as a front diff. They were offered from only 1/83-6/83. Perhaps a better solution is to get a 4:11 from the 720 4X4 pickup as they were offered form 6-83 to 12/85. Might have an easier time finding them in a junkyard. Also the 84-88 NON Turbo 200sx had the R-180 4:11, so take your time and look around the junkyards, hard to tell what you might find. There are a couple places you can get an R-180 with either a 3:90 or 4:11 but can't remember the website right now. Send a message to mperdue as I think he recently bought one.

If the PO had taken the time and spent the money to repair the small amounts of rust to begin with, you would have a good car to work with. The rust problems were only exaggerated by the fact the bondo or bog cause even more rust by soaking up even more water and holding it until the panel was completely gone. This is one of the main reason so many Z's have met their "death" by the rust monster, too many shoddy repair jobs. I've seen cars with as much rust or even more that were 5 years newer if it makes you feel any better. It all depends on how well they were taken care of by PO's. Shame they couldn't have done it right the first time. :disappoin

I think jcdozier was talking about the Maxima auto swap a while back. Might try him as he may know where to get more info.

Right Spudz, I just added that to answer Britt's question.

Uh oh, now you will be torn between two "babies". Guess that will mean getting two rooms ready when you get both new "additions" to the family home..... Congratulations and Good luck!

An early model 260 is just as good as a 240. A lot of guys here in the DC Region raced early 260's for their slight displacement advantage. Their weight is not much more than a 240, so they don't have the weight disadvantage that the later 260's and 280's have when running against the 240's. The 72-74 1/2's are nearly the same weight, with the ealier 240's being slightly less. Late 260's with F/I and the large 280's style bumpers are the nearly the same weight as the 75-78 280's, or about 450lbs "overweight".

You seem to have a pretty good plan so far. Only a couple things to think about before you do it though. First is your choice of a 2 3/4 exhaust pipe. If you lower your car with lowering springs or coil-overs you might have some problems with the pipe being a bit too large and giving up ground clearance. You might be better of to get a 2 1/2 exhaust and make sure it is tucked up tightly especially around the front diff mount, which is where you will normally grind the exhaust on a lowered car. Either of the heads you have picked are a good choice. The N-42 is a bit better in that it will already have the larger 280 valves in place. Might be a bit easier to find a good N-42 due to the larger numers of 280's imported versus the 240's and 260's with the E-88. I'd stay with the ZTherapy SU's only because they would end up being cheaper to buy intially, and a bit easier to synchronize. Try to find an F-54 L-28 block out of a later 280ZX as they have more webbing in the cylinder area and should already have flat top pistons to boot. With a light shave on the cylinder head and a thinner headgasket you should be able to come close to your target of 10:1 without buying custom pistons. Look in the downloads section here for the L engine calculator and you can play around and pick the best parts to give you what you are looking for. Pick the ones that give you what you want, with parts that are the cheapest and easiest to find... Cam choice will depend on where in the rpm range you want the best power and where your car will spend the majority of its time. If it were me, I'd go for a cam with the best power under 6500rpms down to a low of 2500-3000. A lot will depend on your rear gear too. If you can find a 3:90 R-180 you would save 20 pounds or more over the R-200 and not have to change the mustache bar or rear control arm crossmember. R-180's will hold up to almost anything a good L-28 will dish out, the R-200 is better only if you go to a turbo or V-8 conversion. Hope that helps a little, and yes, unfortunately E-31's are getting harder to find in good condition.

First question could be a simple one or a really tough one to fix. First thing I would do is to check yoru fuel system, starting at the pump with a fuel pressure check, then check your fuel filter. It could be something as simple as a dirty filter or a bad pump. If not then you'll need to give us some more info for us to come up with some ideas. When it does it again, cut the car off and check the color of the plugs. It would be nice to know whether the problem is fuel related or ignition related. With the FI it's going to be a bit harder to figure this one out. Ahfter a fuel pressure check you might be able to start checking possible problems off the list of things to check. Second problem, have you had your starter checked? Does it try to turn over or is it completely dead? Might it be the ignition switch? Or possibly a fuel pump relay that is getting hot and then causing the problem that might even be related to the first question? As you can see it is not going to be an easy dilemma to solve, but with all of us putting our heads together we might be able to help.......

Well with a 180 degree thermostat it should read just past halfway on the gauge. The noise you heard in the heater core might have been trapped air. You can try to run the car at idle after it has gotten up to operating temperature with the cap off and turn on the heater to let the coolant circulate through the whole system. With the cap off you will allow any trapped air to escape. Then re-check your coolant level to see if it has dropped any. If not, the air is gone. I'd be tempted not to run a 190 degree thermostat for the simple reason that the temp gauges aren't all that accurate and it leaves little room for error. If you overheat the engine it could warp the head. I'd go for a 180 or possibly a 160 degree thermostat, but that is my personal preference.....

When the light turns green, think about this. On average at a busy intersection, three cars will try to beat the red by speeding up and blowing through the intersection on yellow........unless there is a red light camera at the intersection, in which case you might better figure on two....:stupid:

Looks great! I noticed you got rid of the ZG nose, a bit easier to get up closer in the draft?:devious: Hard enough to keep track of the nose sitting low in a racing seat with the stock nose, don't know that I would like the ZG nose, probably end up cracked all to pieces.......:disappoin

Actually there were a lot of copies on the market at one time. I know Appliance, Western, American Racing and a few others made look-a-likes of this style of wheel. I just got rid of a set of old American Racing wheels very similar to these not long ago.....

YUp, it's easy to make a body for a vehicle with a frame, uni-body cars are kinda SOL there. There used to be a complete tube frame made for a Z, I think Arizona Z car made it primarily to build race cars. They still offer control arms and such made from chrome-moly tubing, tad expensive for a street car though...

If I remember right, it should slide in from the front fairly easily. You will need to remove the glove box door by removing the screws on the hinge plate and then take the insert out of the side where the door stop arm is. Then you need to remove the screws holding the latch plate and after that it is just a matter of wiggling the liner out. Been a long time since I removed one so if there is anything else it should be fairly obvious....

If the rust is just in a small area under the hatch on the flat panel, I would try to cut it out and have a patch panel put in. The panel is available I believe but if you don't have to replace the whole thing there is no reason to cut it all out. You can't get a complete panel as it is the whole rear of the car all the way to the bottom, but patch panels are available if I remember correctly. Just can't remember who has them right at the moment. :stupid: Silver with the red interior is one of my more favorite color combinations. Since your car still looks pretty good, I think you might want to just do the rust repairs and concentrate on the mechanical side of the car for a bit. As long as you don't have to worry about rust problems you are ahead of most new Z owners in that respect. And as long as the car looks good on the outside, fix the things that need to be fixed for the time being. Unless you are like some of us who can't resist tearing a car apart....:cross-eye Good luck.

Well sorry to tell you this, but it looks like the exterior color is not original. Looking at the engine bay is the biggest clue, if it were original it would be the same color as the exterior. Looks like the engine bay was repainted black, but I see what looks like possibly silver underneath the black on top of the strut tower on the drivers side. For positive proof, look under the floor mats and see what color is under there or in behind the kick panels or the front of the floor pans under the heater near the firewall. This will more than likely still be the original color as most times people don't do a complete job of changing the colors. But, it still looks like a really nice car, so even if it isn't original you still have a decent car to work with. The interior looks pretty good with only a little fading of the plastic panels and vinyl. Most cars of this age have been re-painted at least once in their life, so an original color factory paint job is very hard to find as most people end up picking a color they like better than what the factory offered.

Not sure that there has ever been a breakdown with the actual production numbers of each interior color. If there is it would be interesting to see the actual numbers. Red and blue would probably be the rarest of the earlier interior colors. The vast majority were black, with tan being one of the next most popular colors. It is odd being a red interior and red exterior, most red interiors I have seen in person have been with the silver exterior and white exterior colors.

Not sure where the pic came from except a friend sent it to me in an e-mail. Have been in your neck of the woods many times, and I can definately say if it didn't freeze over then it should have by now....:cross-eye

Complete front inner fender panels would be nice too, not only to repair the rust out above the frame rails, but for those cars that have been hit in the front. Also the structural member that runs along the top of the inner fender back to the firewall. Front strut towers would be a help too.......plenty of them have been patched in a lot of cars over the years....

Haven't seen the complete kit being sold in years. Used to be MSA and Impact Parts also sold the complete kits with carb linkage and all, however, MSA still sells just the manifold.