2ManyZs

Oh, it's your car. Wow, all I can say is good luck putting that much in a small space! You'll have to post a pic of that when you get it in there. Good luck, got a "fender stretcher"??

Bought this car in 1987, still have it. I started racing it in ITS at Summit Point in 1989 and retired the car in 1994. Shamefully it doesn't look this good anymore. Has the Ground Control suspension, a stock ATK crate motor and the required safety equipment. No, I never won a race, best was 6th place in a race in 95+ degree weather when all the 240 drivers were smart enough to stay home. Still was a lot of fun all the same, just too darn expensive for a toy.

I think about the only difference in the doors is the 280 doors had the side guard door beam. They are probably about 10 lbs. heavier, its a flat plate of steel welded across the outer door frame. You can identify it by looking at the pinch weld on the rear of the door, it will have about a 4 or 5 inch wide raised "hump" where the beam was welded in. You'll need the taillight panel for a 240 or early 260, 280 taillights had the separate back up light.

Paul, You definately do good work, the car looks very sharp. I would imagine it looks even better in person. I like how you put the spoiler on the back, the kits I've seen don't have one on them, the one I'm talking about has a very small one molded into the fiberglass cap. You make me want to try one on my own. That being said, you do very good body work but a 472 Cadillac?? Now that sounds like a lot of work! It will be interesting to see if there is room for that. Sounds a bit too big not to mention heavy but hey, it's his car right??

If you are buying that good looking red Z I don't think you have to worry about too much except basic maintenance such as you described. The body sure looks good, if the underside of the car is as good as the outside I'd say you have it made. Hey, that site was in French! Good thing I took French in high school, about 25 years ago!! Of course I never could speak it like what is spoken in Quebec, I learned proper French with no slang. Kinda like learning Latin in school, how many people still speak it eh??

Wow, only 120 ever?? Welcome to the club. You are probably the first from your country. I have one question. Do you have access to parts there? If only 120 were imported I don't think it will be to easy to find a parts car. There are many parts suppliers here in the states, and many of the people here have parts to sell. Here's my advice. Before you buy check on the availability of parts, either used or aftermarket. Most of the rust can be fixed with repair panels except for the inner front fenders and strut towers and the radiator core support. Check under the battery tray, the floors, the inner front fender behind the struts, and inside the hatch above the taillights. The floors are prone to rust as are the front frame rails. These can be fixed if you are good at metalworking or know someone who is. I would say if you can get the parts almost any car is worth fixing, especially if the cars are that rare.

I don't know if they ever gave an interval that the timing chain and tensioner should be changed. I always thought about 50,000 miles would be a good time to replace it, not so much for the chain or gears but the tensioner. The wear pad on the tensioner takes quite a lot of wear, but since you will probably have your head off to do your valves if I were you I would replace it now. It may never have been replaced before so at least you know it is done and can go from there.

Don't feel bad 240z I've been trying for a week to post a pic and no matter what I do I can't get the resolution down small enough. I guess that's what I get for using a scanner, one of these days I'll have all these high tech gadgets for my computer, just before they are all outdated!!

I don't remember seeing one done, but I guess it could be. But you would have to do some chassis reinforcement, same as the convertible kits do. You would be taking out a lot of the structural integrity of the car taking that big a chunk out of the roof. The 240's were made of rather thin sheetmetal to begin with, that's why so many have rusted into oblivion. If you want to look at the convertible kit, go to www.reactionresearch.com then click on automotive and look for the Z Spyder. The have a chassis reinforcement kit in the price list.

Eastwood is a company that specializes in tools and supplies for automotive restoration. They have a good selection of paint, supplies, tools you name it. I can't go on their web-site anymore without buying something. Check it out at www.eastwoodcompany.com

Eastwoods has a paint they call Bumper Black. It's in a spray can but after using some of their other spray can paint when I was re-painting my suspension pieces I'm going to give it a try. They recommend using their self-etching primer under it so if you have it sand blasted or maybe even media blasted first you could give it a try. The paints are fairly inexpensive, and the quality might be a little better than some, then again, proof is in the use and as yet I haven't tried it.

From you and everybody else!!!

That's the good thing about a two seater, not too many choices!!! I can't say anything about where you sit, I've been kicking myself for years for not finding a way to by a Fairlady a friend of mine was selling, I might not have been able to shift with the "wrong" hand but it sure would be nice to have that car in my garage right about now!!

100 bucks eh?? Hmm, guess I better go find mine!! And hide it!!

byunique, Take a look at look at this link to the Datsun Garage. It might help you decide if you really want a lighter flywheel or not. Personally in a car that is not an all out race car I don't see any benefit. http://geocities.com/zgarage2001/engine.html With the money you save you could always go to a lower ratio rear, say a 4:11 or 4:37 if all you want is a little quicker acceleration while maintaining the driveability of the car. Yes, a lighter flywheel will reduce the rotational mass and allow the engine to rev quicker but it's not going to be of that much benefit since I doubt you are going to turn 7,000 plus RPM's. There will be a lot of people who disagree with me, this is just my opinion, it's your car, so perhaps you need to look at the info and decide what's right for you.

If you have access to a parts washer clean out the case the best you can, or I guess you could spray brake cleaner in there to dislodge any buildup. Yes, the detergents should clean out any sludge builup, but any metal shavings should go to the bottom of the case, the magnet on the drain plug will attract them and hold them there. I'd go ahead and put only new lube in, but if you don't want to you don't have to. It's your car so you can do whatever you feel is best. I've never heard anyone say to put old in with the new and I've been tinkering with cars for 20 years. Maybe I'm just getting old.....

I'm not going there, I talked my fiancee into letting me race back in 89. You don't want to know what I went through after that! Get her in a Z first, then maybe she'll let you have another toy. BTW. I got rid of the fiancee, now have the old race car. Can't do much with the car if you catch my drift. So I went out and bought 3 more cars, one is another IT car that was wrecked. Now I have more cars than I know what to do with! Now just got to find a better female that will let me have my toys. I don't know if it's possible to have one with the other. Good luck!

Good question. I looked in my service manual and it doesn't say what the stock pump is rated at, but the pressure regulator is set for 36.3 psi.

If you already have a shaved flywheel I kinda doubt you would get the kind of performance gain you could really feel. I may be wrong but for the money I doubt the benefit would be worth it. As a side note, most people recommend using a Centerforce clutch (or any other brand) with a higher clamping force to use the benefit of having the lighter flywheel ( at least over a stock one) so right there your cash outlay just about doubled. Since you say you don't race the car all the time it would be my opinion to stay with what you have, as long as it works well for what you need why change it?

Thanks, here I thought I was in the beginning stages of.... what do they call that ?

Fiction: Why would anyone say to put part of the old gear lube back in? It's contaminated with the metal shavings that come from normal wear. If you have it drained and nothing looks like it needs attention (ring gear wear etc.) use new lube when after you seal it up. If your diff has a lot of wear it's going to be even more likely you will have a lot of shavings, might not be a bad idea to spray some cleaner in there to make sure you don't have any crud built up in the case. Be sure to clean off the magnetic drain plug too. You will probably find quite a bit of build up on that, no sense leaving it in there to contaminat the new gear lube.

I do hope you mean you want to convert her into a Z lover!!

I've already been thru the insurance hassle with my 71 just putting it on the road. I guess it might be time to go with one of the collectors car insurance companies that will insure it for an agreed upon value. I haven't seen Scott's video, I knew about it from an article in the old Sport Z magazine though. My metal working abilities might be a little too primitive for that. The kit from VR gives you a choice of two folding convertible tops (both are pretty expensive) or a removable fiberglass hardtop. I don't plan on driving the car except on sunny days so if I do one I'll save the money for a top and put it into a better paint job or something. There were two 280's on ebay before Christmas being sold by the same guy in LA, both were the original Origin Design kits, if I hadn't been un-employed at the time I would have bid on the red one. I saved the picture for my wallpaper just to torture myself, that is until I got a scanner and could put a picture of my own car in.

If you do the conversion to rear discs from a ZX don't you use the proportioning valve from the ZX?? Of course you could always go with the adjustable if you wanted to. I've read quite a few things on the rear disc set-up including using the Nissan truck master cylinder (1 inch). I just wish I could find where I saw the 4 piston four wheel vented rotor set-up. Must be losing it............ This is only my opinion but on a street car rear discs aren't really necessary. The ZX conversion would be OK but anything more would be overkill. On the race track we could only wish we had more brakes. Of course our enemy was heat with the front discs not being vented. For my street car I'm planning on going the four piston calipers in front and leaving the rears alone with some good shoes. Of course when I raced my 280 I was at a serious disdvantage since I was carrying extra weight with the same brakes as a 240. If I was going to race in E Production I would definately go with discs in the rear since I'd be running on slicks instead of DOT tires.

Looks GREAT!!! Did use use a kit or did you do this yourself?? I have been planning on doing this for years, just never had a spare car. Now I've got the car to do it and have been seriously considering the kit from www.reactionresearch.com which is the old Origin Design kit with the working trunk lid. I'm not the greatest when it comes to body work so I'm a little leary of trying to do it myself. If anyone wants to look at the kit I'm referring to just go to www.reactionresearch.com then click on automotive. I tried to use the link but the page wouldn't open without going to their homepage. This is VR Engineering the same ones who do the Subtle Z and the Velo Rossa Spyder body kits.