boomer3

I did not have to swap bearings, or do any machining. It was a direct bolt-on from the 4spd to the 5 spd with the only difference being the bellhousing pattern. The rear case has the shift linkage design from the 71B, and looks to be the 81+ case given that picture description of speedo gear and number of ears on the tail.

Maybe you're right, but the rear case is certainly 71B, so I haven't quite figured out the bellhousing alignment yet. Will be interesting if somebody can chime in on this one. I think I have oil coming from a few locations now, likely the shift assembly at rear, but also a little oil up front. Good catch on the clutch fork bolts, I can't recall what I did there, so I won't be surprised if that is a culprit up front.

Hey Guys, I have a '76 280Z, that originally came with the FS4W. I exploded the 4 spd a few years ago and picked up an unknown 5 speed, that supposedly came from a 720 truck. When I went to put it in the car, the hole pattern was out by probably 20 or 30 degrees clockwise when looking from behind the trans, so I swapped out the front case on the 5 spd with my 4 speed no problems. I am sure that it is a FS5W71B, somewhere in the 81-83 range? It looks like the 71B may have even stayed in some trucks until '85 or so, but that could be wrong. Either way it looks most like the 81-83 rear case with the single ear and 6:00 bolt location on speedo as shown here: I am pulling the trans soon to put in some new seals in the shifter assembly (looks like leak may be from there), as well as front and rear shaft seals while I'm at it. Where do you guys think the leak is from? It may be wise just to change all seals, it could really be coming from anywhere, hard to tell once wind has pushed oil around. Final question; I don't have any useful casting #'s on this transmission case (ie 71B), but it does have "NMCA #5" cast into the left side of the rear housing, see pic below. My understanding is that this stands for "Nissan Motor Co., Australia". Interested in other input on what this means for this transmission. Was it common to the truck transmissions perhaps? I was planning on ordering parts for this off of one of these sites, but not sure how careful I need to be with this trans. It looked 71B through and through but I have read that 2nd gear synchro can differ (maybe this is only in the 71C?), advice on trans parts source would help too. http://www.drivetrai...erhaul_kit.html http://www.datsunpar...ts-and-Packages http://www.manualtra...com/FS5W71.html

I'm not sure I understand which component you are talking about when you refer to air flow box under the hood. My accumulator is hooked up and I think is working quite well, I may try doing a little pressure test on the system some time with my vacuum tester. If you can explain what/where the air flow box is, that would be pretty helpful.

Hi guys, when I first got my Z the heater controls were not working so I pulled the dash off and got to work. Basically the vac lines just needed to be replace/re-run. Some were rotting out, some had been taken out all together. I got the heat working, but it is now intermittent. Sometimes I turn on heat and it works perfectly, sometimes it will not come on for period of time and then randomly start blowing heat, sometimes it doesn't work at all. When I move the dial to heat, and to defrost or bi-level for example, it will blow as though still on vent when malfunctioning, and then I presume the flap move to correct position when it "chooses" to start working. I'm a little baffled about what factors would cause it to be sporadic. Could it be the little solenoids under the hood, or is it related to the valve under the driver side of the dash?

Agreed, would be good to have a vacuum former to do this kind of thing. I have access to a co-op shop that has one, would be fun to try a few parts.

Thanks for the input I think i'm with you on this, I'm not too worried about it and have just made sure the wires and joints are sealed. Was just curious if other people had the same take on it or not.

I have a 76 280z, with no sort of inner fender protection for the headlight and wiring forward of the wheels. I imagine that water, dirt, and stones get thrown at high velocity toward the headlights and wiring and have always wondered if my 76 came stock with some better protection, IE plastic bolt on cover. After looking through various forums it appears that there were plastic liners from 1978 and up, (I believe #79 & 80 in one of the microfiches I saw). Do most guys run without these and let the elements splash up against the headlight bucket etc? Or am I just in the dark on this and should really be investing in this before I kill the wiring and the headlight gaskets etc.

I agree with you on the wrecking yard being the competition, but when the local wrecking yards no longer have l28et drivetrain you are forced to go with a private sale at an inflated price. Unfortunately this one has been sitting so long that I wouldn't want to start it up without cleaning the injectors/fuel system, so i will likely have to purchase on good faith that everything was running decently well last time he drove it. Anyways, not a huge expense to have all of the components in one package, I can always use my N42 block if necessary, and will clean/do partial rebuild if necessary. Still much cheaper than any other swap fortunately.

Thanks for the input. Seems to line up with my thoughts.

Hey guys, I just want to toss this question out; how much do you think a stock L28ET + type B 5spd is worth, (including all accessories, wiring, ecu, etc). Naturally you could say it is worth whatever I am willing to pay for it, but I want to get a general range of $$ value from you guys. The conditions are - used engine, sitting around for a couple years, ok compression, bottom end used but not too tired or burning tons of oil. Has been covered under a hood but outside for the period of time it has been sitting, no exhaust past downpipe, maybe corrosion up toward turbo? 5 spd is said to have shifted and operated well last time it was used. I have seen values ranging from $350 to $1500 online, he is looking for $750 which doesn't seem totally unreasonable to me, what do you guys think?

Awesome, thanks guys, very helpful. I am not using metal flake (I chose not to given my level of experience with spraying), I will experiment with metal flake soon enough. I think I will try spraying clear directly after base as you say rather than sanding. I presume I can sand out orange peel from the clear as long as I lay enough down, and then wet sand right up to 2000ish before buffing. Just taping off the car today, and hopefully spraying will be done next week or so.

Good advice. Always use the high quality charcoal filter mask for this kind of thing. I could even smell it a little through my mask, that's when you know it's toxic stuff. I am planning on throwing up a thread about this partial restoration.

Great, thanks for the tips guys. I'm enjoying the process, but it has been extremely labour intensive so far. I know the pros know how to short cut it and still come out on top, but being a novice, the efficiency goes way down. Good to hear that I need to cut it with higher than 400, I assumed that since it looks pretty glassy and can't see the scratches too much that I could just spray base, but I will take some more time in these steps now! Also, I thought that once I sanded out the orange peel that say 1000 grit wouldn't give the base coat enough mechanical grip (causing me to have to scuff with lower grit prior to next coat), but I take it that I am wrong here, also good to know. I am not using metallic base, I chose to do it this way so that I could water sand, knowing that I'm not experienced enough to bank on proper spray technique etc. I wonder if pearl pigments in clear react the same way to wet sanding as the metal flake does? Hmmm

I'll start this out by this premise to save any preconceived notions: I am a novice painter.. I have done all of the metal/body work on my '76Z, and have just finished priming. I have done several coats, and have just wet sanded out any orange peel with 400 grit. Now that it's fairly smooth, do I need to scuff it lightly with a lower grit paper prior to base coating it? I don't know how much of paint bonding to paint is chemical versus mechanical bond, hency why I ask the question. If it is primarily chemical bond, then I assume I don't need to scuff it up post the 400 wet sand. Once I've done multiple base coats, I want to let it cure and again wet sand out the colour base coat with 400ish to cover up my low hvlp skill level. What do I sand with prior to clear coat at that point? I presume 400 may even show a little under clear?? Do I move up to an 800 and then spray directly over the 800 sanded surface? Once clear is complete, I plan to wet sand 400, 800, then right up to 1500 or 2000 + cutting compound to buff it shiny. Thanks for the help.

Sorry I should have said checking the clearance, (feeler gauges). Not shimming.

Thanks for the info, I am a bit illiterate when it comes to diagnosing engine wear. You have helped clarify multiple things here. I am mixing a few things together here for sure. I would say i'm burning about a quart of oil every 2-3k miles, so not very much. I can see quite a decent puff of blue when I rev her up. I have always presumed that burning oil is synonymous with blowby, (again my lack of understanding). If it is able to make it past your oil rings, won't you burn oil regardless of whether your top rings are good or not? It's a litte un-nerving that there isn't a decent benchmark for compression testing and engine. I understand that as you change the variables, (ie engine temp, wet/dry, etc etc), the numbers will vary, but if it's a difference of 35 psi, then one of the methods should be ruled out as ineffective I'd think. I'm happy to be told i'm wrong though. Regardless of all of this, the engine still seems to haul quite well given how tired out I have been presuming it is.

I did a cold/dry compression test on the L28 in my '76 Z last fall. I got around 120-125 across the board. I think that the bottom end is running somewhere in the range of 150k miles, and the head was rebuilt about 8000 miles ago. My throttle response seems a little lacking, and it's burning a bit of oil on acceleration from what I can tell. I re-shimmed the valves as I could hear a little noise, but nothing was out of tolerance too much. I think she ran a little better after shimming, but this didn't solve the compression/oil burning issue. As I understand it, oil under accel. is typically rings, on decel. it's typically head. Everything is pointing toward the bottom end potentially needing a little work. I haven't checked the advance on the timing, it could be that it hasn't been bumped to spot 2 or 3 on the sprocket. If it weren't burning oil, I would just assume that it's a timing issue, but I'm suprised that it's burning some oil at the mileage it has! These engines usually go forever without needing rings from what I can tell. Please chime in with your advice/what you think about this. I think the next step should probably be to try to advance timing and see if that bumps up the dry compression test. Beyond that I should probably do a wet test and see if the oil rings are shot.

I just had a look at a few BMW seats, it seems as though the profile may be to high. I think you need a very low seat for the S30. Maybe somebody can still chime in regarding E32 seats, although I get the feeling nobody reads the "interior" forum.

Anybody?

I am curious if anyone has tried BMW E32 seats. I just found some in good condition that I thought could work, but wondering about height of course. I didn't find anything about E32 seats in this thread or a few others. I know that E30 80's style recaro's are an option. Still more curious about the E32's at this point.

The best Python could do was give me an estimate on what the injector might be. He thought they were 20lb/hr, for 40-50psi. Not very precise info unfortunately. The guy thought they were probably originally sold for a 300zx.

I'm not quite sure that i'm jumping the gun. If they are higher flow rate injectors then that must be a major contributor wouldn't you think? But you could be right, I am a novice at troubleshooting EFI still. I'm calling Python tomorrow to see if I can find the flow rate. If it's high, then I'll probably replace the injectors with stock like others have suggested. Save the AFPR and AFR for a future project that actually needs it.

Thanks for the reply guys. First of all, it's 95% stock. Just has a 2.5" exhaust. I think it's running rich first because of the smell, second some black smoke, 3rd a little bit of popping in the exhaust and idle isn't quite perfect. I pulled the injectors yesterday as i'm in the process of changing the manifold gasket/ replacing fuel lines. The only thing I could find on the injectors was the name Python, and a number 15 somewhere else on the injector assembly. So i'm not sure how i'm going to find out the flow rate of these injectors. I'm going to see about posting a pic of them for you guys to have a look at, as i'm guessing this isn't enough info to go on.

Hey Guys, So my recently purchased 280z is running rich. I gave him a call and he said that the injectors are larger than stock but doesn't know the size. It has the factory FPR in it now. I haven't done a lot of EFI tuning so i'm not exactly sure what to do. I'm assuming that with a constant pressure, and larger injectors it will automatically get more fuel every pulse. Can I get an adjustable FPR and crank down the pressure a little? The problem is that I don't have an AF meter, and i'm sure it's dangerous to mess with fuel pressure without one. Any suggestions would be appreciated! I would definitely like to get an adjustable FPR if people think that is an option.