SteveInOakland

Hey, that was a great lead, many thanks. This place BTW is "Pick Your Part" on Winton. Here's what I found today -- probably some of them ones you note above. One '71 built in about 9/70 Two '73s, at least one built in late '72 Two early 280Z's, one of them a 2+2 There is a lot of stuff left on these cars. Anybody needing window cranks, door handles, some emblems, some interior plastic (almost all black, I think) -- it'd be worth a visit. There are a bunch of good sun visors sitting loose in one or two of the cars, all black -- I kept finding better ones. All these had good plastic, just some rust on the pivot piece. Also: An A- front bumper is on one of the 73s, a black car originally orange. Doesn't have the guards, but if you want 'em, there are some loose bumpers in another car that do. Two decent, black, passenger-side seats, but with differing upholstery. One had minor tears, the other had, I think, none. In case anybody doesn't know, you can use a passenger side seat on the driver's side if your own hinges and rails are OK--you have to put those on. Seats are cheap at this place. I know this isn't going to tempt Arne or Mike, but one of the 280's has a complete set of 10-spoke, deep-dish Turbine-style wheels on it. Don't know the brand or width. They are 14". The caps are NG. IIRC that place sells 14" mags for around $35 each. The black/orange '73 has a nice old two-shaft Clarion cassette deck in it, missing the door over the tape slot. Owner did a beautiful job fabricating his own plastic bezel. I bought the hatch (with glass) from the black/orange '73. $55 plus tax plus BS core fees etc. = $67 or so. That Hayward yard and the ones in the Pick N Pull chain have weirdly different pricing. Seats are less in Hayward, wheels more. Send me a PM if you want more info. There's about a 12-hour window before my memory voids out. Steve.

Pretty good? That is criminally good. Steve.

I had some of those -- they look great in the Z and fit easily. Also, they are nice and low. However, there's a good bit more bulk to the seat-back than there is with the Z seats and that's a problem if you're tall. I keep my Z seats at their very rear of the tracks, and with the Miata (MX5) seats, I was way too close to the steering wheel. --Steve.

Well, give it a try. Pretty damn easy to get those seats out though. 5-10 minutes. --Steve.

What Mike said. Except I think in my car there was only one of those right in that location. There's going to be another loop just like the one in the photo, on the other end. They come out either end of a stitched sleeve in the upholstery, roughly 9-10" long and then get attached to the metal below with hog rings. If you have a 72, it goes right to the steel springs. Should be very easy to deal with if you take the seat out of the car. Steve.

Great, many thanks. Any recollection of the hatch on that 280?? Steve.

I haven't been out to the yards in a while. The handy ones for me are the ones in Oakland, Richmond, and Hayward. It'd be pretty handy if I could find a replacement hatch, could be anything from '70 to '77. The Oakland place had a '76 back last December that was great for pulling from. I kind of suspect the hatch was still on when they crushed it.:stupid: That place does not keep cars on the lot for long at all. So, anybody seen a car in the Bay Area yards lately? Thanks, Steve.

Thanks to you both. I'll post something after I run new wires. Mike, that looks promising. John, for the early cars the power antenna needs a switch to choose between going up and going down. It's not an automatic thing that will go down when its power goes off. I found the ideal switch yesterday, an SPDT, on-off-on toggle, momentary, and very tiny. Contrary to its description, the Radio Shack switch of this kind doesn't snap back to off, it's more manual than that. The good thing about the one I found is that only the tiniest hole is needed. I'm going to mount it facing down, on one side or the other of the steering wheel, in the area of either the dash-lights dimmer or the trip odometer knob. Here's a pic. Steve.

That looks really good. Must be one of the recent-model RX7s? I had some from the original car and this is a much more appropriate look. Also, the first two model types of RX7 have got a weird setup for the inner rail on the passenger seat, due to extra width there in the transmission tunnel. Hope your recuperation is going well.

Has anybody got a tidy way of getting a speaker wire from the console to the very rear of the car? I can use what's there for the one (though not ideal) but am putting in a second over where the fuel lines are. Would rather not just have it lying under the rear carpet. Also -- anybody have a good place to put a toggle switch to operate the stock antenna? Appreciate it, thanks. Steve

Great, thanks to you both. Steve.

The three grey panels -- one goes under the plate, the others are surrounds on the taillights. What do the fasteners look like? The ones that bolt onto the deck where the hatch closes -- 6 holes. And do they go into speed nuts? Thinking of my '73, here. Many thanks, Steve

Thanks to all for help with last week's seat cover questions. Re-using the wire bead for the seat bottoms worked just fine... Is the passenger side seat designed to not go back as far as the driver's side seat? There's not as much travel in the slide with the lever, in mine -- passenger side vs. driver's side. That is, the teeth can't go into as many rear-ward holes. Although even on the driver's side, travel is limited and some rear holes don't get used. I've got a slide from a '76 where there's no limit to the travel and all holes get used. Anyway -- I can't tell if this passenger-side slide is not working right, or if it's designed that way. Thanks for any help. Steve.

Thanks, Victor, big help. What do you suggest using for a wire in the seat bottom? The original stuff seems too stiff to pull through. But without some stiffness, it can't do its job... Steve.

I've got new foam from MSA (looks great) and new seat covers via eBay, also look good. Neither has instructions. So if anyone who's done this can help... 1. Seat bottoms. My original seats ('73) have pointed tabs all around the base that poke through the vinyl and fold over. There's a wire bead running through the upholstery where the drawstring is on the new stuff. Common arrangement. Are people getting good results with just the drawstring, or should I try to thread a wire through there as well as in the original job, using the pointed tabs? 2. There's a crosswise slot in the MSA seat bottom foam and a wire rod in corresponding place on the springs. For the low area in the seat. How did you guys handle tying these together? 3. Horsehair. Should I try to substitute something for where the horsehair was, between the seat bottom springs and the foam? Or just forget it. (Seatback horsehair, between foam and upholstery, looks re-useable). 4. Seatback, headrest. Orignal foam in two pieces; headrest separate. There's another one of those wire rods, at the bottom of the headrest area, attached to the seatback metal. MSA foam is more or less two pieces, conected by gauze. The rod deal is clearly for holding up the headrest foam, keeping it from sliding downward. Suggestions? Some kind of strap over the top of the headrest foam? Any other tips would be really welcome. Thanks for your time. Steve.

Did you check ZHome.com? There are some pages there that get into it.

I'm going to put a Dynomax Super Turbo muffler on my '73. It has the stock exhaust, but with the pre-muffler/resonator swapped out for straight pipe (nice improvement). I'm trying to choose between 2" and 2-1/4" for the muffler; both larger than the stock, I realize. My friend Beandip has been helping me with this but I'd also like to see what others think, and maybe Gary has more to say now. The amount of noise -- stock muffler vs. 2" Dynomax vs. 2-1/4" Dynomax -- anybody care to estimate the differences? Like, say, 1.5X louder than stock, 1.8X etc? Thanks! Steve

Forgot to add -- dunno about Orange County, but Precision Z up in The Valley is a terrific place. Canoga Park. Very bright, knowledgeable guys. They also stay abreast of any cars their customers may want to sell.

For Southern California, "cars.com" is even more useful (more listings -- variety of sources drawn on, including classified ads). Go to "Buy Used Cars" / "1982 and earlier" and click in your model, range of years, and location preferences. Steve.

I picked one up at a junkyard for about $10. Beware the finish on the plastic of the mirror housing. Amazingly, it is water-soluble, at least on the one I worked with, and very quickly the pebbling began to come off and disintegrate when I cleaned the housing. A real mess. Steve.

http://www.craigslist.org/sfc/car/152265833.html Could be a good deal at $800 "OBO."

FWIW I got a bad unit from Pertronix. They e-mailed me directions for a way to bench-test it at home, and it failed. They sent a replacement that worked with no problems. Did you do the bench test at home? (I still have the instructions.) I was told that there are some limitations on the way Pertronix is able to test things in-house; at least in the standard test that is done pre-shipping of a part. Steve.

You might talk to Chau's Auto Sport in Oakland. These guys can do anything. Their work is excellent. IME, reasonably priced for the level of care they put into it. If you're not nearby, call first and see if you can get Eric to the phone.

Have any photos of the exhaust? Header bolts up with no leaks? Thx, Steve.