what rust is acceptable on a Z?

[Z-Matches]

I was searching for a 240z and 280z to start my LS project but most of the Z that I found have amount of rust. The problem is when I found a Z with free rust the price is very expensive and in the meantime I don't want to spend too much money on body work.

 

So, My question is 

 

What rust is acceptable on Z and in which area the rust will effect bad on the project? 

 

Thank you

[RebekahsZ]

Right after you buy a rusty Z, a clean one will show up for half as much. Just be patient.

 

The trans mount bolts to the floor, so floors with big holes would be bad. I can't think of any absolutes, but rust just kinda sucks in general. It takes a good bit of time, effort and money to put an LS in a Z. Why would you want to invest that much in a car that is near death?

[RebekahsZ]

Zs are unibody so the body is also the frame. Seems that the rust always attacks in the structurally stressed a areas like the rockers, doglegs, and cowl. But at the same time, I've never seen a Z break in half.....? I think you could tolerate a fair amount of rust without really being unsafe. Wear goggles when working on it.

[PLATA]

My 2 centavos,  converting a Z is not a limited budget adventure. There a many factors at play , there are plenty of testimonials on this forum , so do plenty research , good luck  and welcome to the Z vice   

[dsommer]

I think I have a link to somebody that has plenty of them forsale. You'll have to have is shopped but come on, better than a rust bucket.

[rturbo 930]

Right after you buy a rusty Z, a clean one will show up for half as much. Just be patient.

Not likely to happen in Rhode Island.

 

Anyways - Here's my basic list of what's acceptable, and what isn't. Obviously, you'll want to use a little discretion based on your skills, budget, and the severity of the rust. Our west coast members will probably disagree with my list, but whatever. And you need to accept that you will most likely have to do some sort of rust repair. I don't believe in rust free Zs, but a west coast car would be your best bet for a nearly rust free chassis.

 

Acceptable:

Floors

Hatch sill

Doglegs

Fender bottoms (which can sometimes mean rocker rust)

Rear lower quarters

Fenders lips

Batt. Tray

 

And depending what the rest of the car looks like, the TC Rod reinforcement area and maybe rockers, depending how bad they are. When the rockers need to be replaced, you really need to consider how much other rust there is, and whether it's worth fixing.

 

Unacceptable:

Inner Rockers

Roof pillars (Unless it's VERY minor)

Engine bay frame rails

Firewall/Cowl intersection

Strut towers

 

If any of these are rusted, most likely the car has rust in every area in the 'acceptable' list as well, and is not worth dealing with.

Edited October 20, 2014 by rturbo 930

[Z-Matches]

Not likely to happen in Rhode Island.

 

Anyways - Here's my basic list of what's acceptable, and what isn't. Obviously, you'll want to use a little discretion based on your skills, budget, and the severity of the rust. Our west coast members will probably disagree with my list, but whatever. And you need to accept that you will most likely have to do some sort of rust repair. I don't believe in rust free Zs, but a west coast car would be your best bet for a nearly rust free chassis.

 

Acceptable:

Floors

Hatch sill

Doglegs

Fender bottoms (which can sometimes mean rocker rust)

Rear lower quarters

Fenders lips

Batt. Tray

 

And depending what the rest of the car looks like, the TC Rod reinforcement area and maybe rockers, depending how bad they are. When the rockers need to be replaced, you really need to consider how much other rust there is, and whether it's worth fixing.

 

Unacceptable:

Inner Rockers

Roof pillars (Unless it's VERY minor)

Engine bay frame rails

Firewall/Cowl intersection

Strut towers

 

If any of these are rusted, most likely the car has rust in every area in the 'acceptable' list as well, and is not worth dealing with.

 

Thank you Sir so much, I will start looking for Z's and I but your list in my consideration .

[Tony D]

A car is a hole in the air, suspended there by four rubber doughnuts which you can not eat.
Into this hole, you throw money, which you will never see again.

[RebekahsZ]

I'm not sure I understand the question. If you buy a Z with some rust, which I agree is pretty hard to avoid, do you plan to try to repair it or just drive it like you found it? If you plan to repair it, think thru the repair. The Z has lots of blind cavities with complex bends. That's where trash gets stuck that holds moisture and promotes rust, like the doglegs and rear fender arches, rear hatch. If you can get to both sides of the damaged panel you can fix it, but if you can't get into the area that is rotten, the best you can do is to put a bandaid on it. If the rust is in a panel that can be unbolted and replaced, like the hood, hatch, doors or front fenders, you are golden. Like TonyD says, the rustier of a Z you start with the more time and money you will spend on rust instead of driving the dang thing. And rust ALWAYS comes back. But if you are ratrodding, it's not as much of an issue. If you plan to flare the rear fenders, a lot of the rust in the fender arched will be cut out to do the flares. Remember, blind box-sections like the rockers and doglegs rust from the inside out, so what you see on the outside bubbling thru the bondo is the tip of the iceberg. I have my eye on a car that has been in dry storage for over 10 years with a lot of the paint sanded off the hood, roof and one door. Those panels look rusty on the outside but that is surface rust and will take 30 minutes to remove with a common disc sander. The rockers, floors and doglegs are perfect. The battery tray has a little heavy surface rust, but I think it will sandblast without popping all the way thru. If I wind up getting that car, it will get the rotisserie treatment and white epoxy paint before I start bolting parts on it.

[Tony D]

Back in 1979, my friend bought a 1969 Corvair Monza for a price I forget... He then spent $3500 doing 'rust restoration' adding fiberglass replacement panels, etc.... Extensive work that would be considerably more now, plus paint.
In 1989 I landed in SoCal, and for $1,600 I bought a 1966 Corvair Corsa Turbo. No rust. It was the first Corvair I ever saw with all the original panels underneath it, where the cables and linkages weren't rusted to nothing...where GM Part Tags and grease pencil markings were still on it.

 

Yeah, I was a stupid kid back then. There wasn't this thing called the internet where old dudes could tell me "Take that repair panel money, fly out to LA, spend a week with a bus pass and the classifieds because they are RUST FREE out there, and selling for $500!" All I had was the local Michigan paradigm that rust was inevitable, inescapable, and cost money to fix. Of COURSE they will tell you that, it's paying them to do so!

 

My advice: Get on Craigslist, line up a dozen prospects, fly into LA on a cheap one-way, spend a few days looking around for a rust free driver....and drive it back.

 

You will be money ahead.

 

Rust repair on a car that is readily available WITHOUT the rust for a reasonable/comparable expenditure---with the lack of provenance or sentimental attachment to the chassis is a disease of the mind. There is no logic for that.

 

My friend could not BELIEVE the condition of my 66 when I showed him. Frank280ZX didn't believe my stories, either until he bought a 1979 ZXR out of a garage in Garden Grove for $500 (off a Craigslist ad he saw in Amsterdam cruising the internet. Made a call "go buy it" and it was done. He shipped it to Amsterdam before really looking closely at it. When he started tearing it down (you know, "doing it right" in the rust-belt tradition of total disassembly because SOMETHING is bound to be at the failure point at this time!) he actually called me on the phone "THE SCREWS ARE STILL YELLOW! (cad plating intact) WE DON'T NEED TO USE PENETRATING OIL ON THE SCREWS! I WILL NEVER BUY A Z IN EUROPE AGAIN! (His prior purchase of a stateside Z was one from WISCONSIN which was exactly the paradigm he was expecting.

 

It's not that way everywhere, and it's not more than what you would spend making it structurally sound and proper to go there and buy one and simply drive it back.

 

Those who have heeded that advice, to a man, have not regretted it!

[ls240z]

I flew to LA from the middle of Canada to drive back a car without rust. It has a little rust, but significantly less than what I'd find up here, and considerably cheaper than what they sell for here as well.

[johnc]

No rust is acceptable.  The price gets reduced based on the amount of rust found.  If you have to replace floor pans, figure $1,000 per side discount.  Keep doing the math...

[RebekahsZ]

Johnc-why did you name your race car the Rusty Old Z?

[Chris_Hamilton]

I've been in the AutoBody trade in one form or another since I was 10. (My Dad owned a Body Shop and unfortunately I caught what he had. ) Collision repair to start out and for the last 12 years Restoration and Custom work. My feeling is that I want the absolute least amount of rust that I can afford to buy. Reason being is that a patched Unibody car is almost never going to be as nice as a rust free one. Can it be done? yes but you will spend more than what it would cost to buy something rust free or almost rust free. And then you are dependant on the skill of the guy doing the job. Mig welding a panel and then putting a 1/2" of body filler over the repair is not something that I call "restored". Very few guys have the skills to repair something and make it invisible or nearly so.  When you spend more upfront on a rust free or nearly rust free example you will actually save money in the long run.  Just my 2 cents.

Edited October 22, 2014 by Chris_Hamilton

[Tony D]

More like 350,000 cents in my friend's case Chris! LOL

[johnc]

Johnc-why did you name your race car the Rusty Old Z?

 

Actually, it was called the Rusty Old Datsun and it was meant as a joke to tease the Corvette, NSX, and Evo guys I raced with.  There was no rust in the car.  One of the few cars I can say that about.

[Z-Matches]

I'm not sure I understand the question. If you buy a Z with some rust, which I agree is pretty hard to avoid, do you plan to try to repair it or just drive it like you found it? If you plan to repair it, think thru the repair. The Z has lots of blind cavities with complex bends. That's where trash gets stuck that holds moisture and promotes rust, like the doglegs and rear fender arches, rear hatch. If you can get to both sides of the damaged panel you can fix it, but if you can't get into the area that is rotten, the best you can do is to put a bandaid on it. If the rust is in a panel that can be unbolted and replaced, like the hood, hatch, doors or front fenders, you are golden. Like TonyD says, the rustier of a Z you start with the more time and money you will spend on rust instead of driving the dang thing. And rust ALWAYS comes back. But if you are ratrodding, it's not as much of an issue. If you plan to flare the rear fenders, a lot of the rust in the fender arched will be cut out to do the flares. Remember, blind box-sections like the rockers and doglegs rust from the inside out, so what you see on the outside bubbling thru the bondo is the tip of the iceberg. I have my eye on a car that has been in dry storage for over 10 years with a lot of the paint sanded off the hood, roof and one door. Those panels look rusty on the outside but that is surface rust and will take 30 minutes to remove with a common disc sander. The rockers, floors and doglegs are perfect. The battery tray has a little heavy surface rust, but I think it will sandblast without popping all the way thru. If I wind up getting that car, it will get the rotisserie treatment and white epoxy paint before I start bolting parts on it.

Thank you so much for giving me this information.  I may wait more to increase my budget and find rust free Z, so I can avoid body work. 

 

Thank you 

[Z-Matches]

Back in 1979, my friend bought a 1969 Corvair Monza for a price I forget... He then spent $3500 doing 'rust restoration' adding fiberglass replacement panels, etc.... Extensive work that would be considerably more now, plus paint.

In 1989 I landed in SoCal, and for $1,600 I bought a 1966 Corvair Corsa Turbo. No rust. It was the first Corvair I ever saw with all the original panels underneath it, where the cables and linkages weren't rusted to nothing...where GM Part Tags and grease pencil markings were still on it.

 

Yeah, I was a stupid kid back then. There wasn't this thing called the internet where old dudes could tell me "Take that repair panel money, fly out to LA, spend a week with a bus pass and the classifieds because they are RUST FREE out there, and selling for $500!" All I had was the local Michigan paradigm that rust was inevitable, inescapable, and cost money to fix. Of COURSE they will tell you that, it's paying them to do so!

 

My advice: Get on Craigslist, line up a dozen prospects, fly into LA on a cheap one-way, spend a few days looking around for a rust free driver....and drive it back.

 

You will be money ahead.

 

Rust repair on a car that is readily available WITHOUT the rust for a reasonable/comparable expenditure---with the lack of provenance or sentimental attachment to the chassis is a disease of the mind. There is no logic for that.

 

My friend could not BELIEVE the condition of my 66 when I showed him. Frank280ZX didn't believe my stories, either until he bought a 1979 ZXR out of a garage in Garden Grove for $500 (off a Craigslist ad he saw in Amsterdam cruising the internet. Made a call "go buy it" and it was done. He shipped it to Amsterdam before really looking closely at it. When he started tearing it down (you know, "doing it right" in the rust-belt tradition of total disassembly because SOMETHING is bound to be at the failure point at this time!) he actually called me on the phone "THE SCREWS ARE STILL YELLOW! (cad plating intact) WE DON'T NEED TO USE PENETRATING OIL ON THE SCREWS! I WILL NEVER BUY A Z IN EUROPE AGAIN! (His prior purchase of a stateside Z was one from WISCONSIN which was exactly the paradigm he was expecting.

 

It's not that way everywhere, and it's not more than what you would spend making it structurally sound and proper to go there and buy one and simply drive it back.

 

Those who have heeded that advice, to a man, have not regretted it!

 

The only problem that is most of Z's on LA are expansive but I will try to find a good deal with near rust free body.

 

Thank you    

[Z-Matches]

No rust is acceptable.  The price gets reduced based on the amount of rust found.  If you have to replace floor pans, figure $1,000 per side discount.  Keep doing the math...

wow... 1,000 per side!!  I didn't know that. I'm so glad that I wrote in this forum.

 

Thank you

[Z-Matches]

I flew to LA from the middle of Canada to drive back a car without rust. It has a little rust, but significantly less than what I'd find up here, and considerably cheaper than what they sell for here as well.

I might do the same thing that you did. I wish I could find one in LA with a good deal. 

 

Thank you