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06-24-20226 ATLAS Z UPDATE. Yesterday I picked up my rear spoiler, cowl and front bumper from getting wrapped in dry carbon fiber vinyl. Today I mounted them. PICS:

Either would work very well for you. I haven't had any first-hand experience with Intrax; but am extremely impressed by their technical data and the reviews I've read on them.

Great to hear that you found the problem! I had a similar problem when upgrading my dashboard backlighting to LED. I knew that they alle worked but after reinstalling the dashboard into the car and testing everything out only the tachometer backlighting didn’t work. Turns out that the connections to the backlight had reversed polarity. After switching the two pins around in the connector everything worked perfectly. This wouldn’t be a problem for incandescent bulbs but seeing as LED’s are diodes the switched polarity suddenly did become a problem.

I found the wire. The black with yellow stripe comes in on the turn signal side of the switch (see picture, blue arrow pointing to the wire). I had the ground connected there. That ground, which is on the turn signal side, connects to the ground on the combination side of the switch (see picture, red arrow pointing to the wires). After that all was good. I wondered why the circuit seemed to work fine with my crossed wiring of the black to black/yellow. As it turns out the switch was finding ground through the wiper motor. As I was tracing the wires for the second time, I disconnected the wires at the wiper motor and found my headlight would go out... Eureka! Problem is now solved. Thanks again !

The settings recommended for my setup (front and rear control arms, front crossmember and quick steering knuckles) by Apex Engineered where: Front: Camber: -1.5° to -2.5° However if it's a street car, it can be reduced to negative one to even zero. Caster: +4° to +6° Toe: 1/16" to 1/8" total toe-in Rear: Camber: -1° to -2° Same as above in the front in terms of camber Toe: 1/16" to 1/8" total toe-in I agree for the most part with these specs but unfortunately this was as far as they could go at the moment. At least the car is way easier to steer now and she drives stable and straight as an arrow. The steering wheel does self-center but it could be a bit more. The rear needs a zero toe or a bit of toe in but for that I need to increase the track width of the control arm a bit and then come back for a new alignment. My shocks are a little done for (especially the right rear is nonexistent) but for just cruising around this is good enough for now. I do plan to install a set of coilovers from Intrax (local to me) or KW. I was considering BC Racing but they were discouraged by the shop if I wanted to have them last more than just 2-3 years especially since I can’t park the car in my garage. Don’t worry, she still has a roof over her head as she is parked under my carport with a cover over her. The more time goes on the more things I want to do, it truly is a never ending project. The next thing I would like to do is add a BRE style spoiler and an air dam as they are a bit cheaper then the rest of the suspension upgrades. After that I want to replace the stock shocks with coilovers and some stiffer sway bars. Way down the line I also want to replace the stock EFI system with a Halltech ECU but I will probably combine that with EFI Hardware ITB’s and a Zstory exhaust system. Separately from everything I would also like to upgrade the brakes for a full set of Willwood disk brakes at some point but that would also require increasing my wheel size to 16 inch. But my current brakes work more then good enough and I like my wheels so that isn’t really a priority. And when everything is set and done and I have some money to spare then I will send the body off for a full restoration and probably some carbon body panels. But those are really long term plans, you might have guessed but I am never ever selling my Z. This thing truly is my one and only dream car and I will pour my heart and soul into it.

Converting the 240Z Passenger Seat in a Reclining Seat I found a need to convert my Passenger Seat into a Reclining Seat to gain additional Space. I know later models of Z cars 2 PLus 2 need to have Folding Seats to allow additional passengers into the Rear Passenger Compartment. So i removed the Factory Seat Tilting Mechanism and examined carefully. The mechanism consists of a Tilting Cam that limited the Seat Tilt to 15 degrees. A Steel Center Pin, in this case, operated as a Pivot Pin. So, removing the Cam and removing the Two Steel Pins should allow the Full Tilting of the Seat Back. First, Both Steel Rivit Pins had to be removed. A 4 1/2" Rear Angle Grinder with a Gringing Wheel was utilized to remove the pins from both brackets. Grinding the Rivet Heads off with Grinder Removing the Two Steel Pins-see Blue Arrows Internal Parts of the Seat Brackets Two Removed Rivets, Limiting Cam, and Outside Plastic Knob Weld two 12mmx 1.25 nuts to the Bracket Arms Amazon sells the new Plastic Knobs with 8mm x 1.25 x 30mm for $15. They come in a pack of Four Knobs but you only need Two per Side unless you convert the Drivers Seat too. Insert One Knob in the Center threaded hole to Lock the Seat in Upright Position. And Another Knob inserted in Center Hole for other side. Seat Folded Flat with both Knobs Removed-Maximum Space Available. With Both Knobs Inserted , Seat in Normal Position With Both Knobs Removed- Laying Back -Sleeping Position is possible. With Seat in Folded Position- There enough Space to Several 8 Foot Pieces of Lumber in your Z now. i hope this project will make your Z more useful and comfortable.

PART 17- Fabrication work on the Gull Wing Doors is going at FULL BLAST!!! Detailed fabrication work on the Gull Wing Doors is very impressive. Actually, some of the work to correct "mistakes" are truly expert workmanship in action. Years of experience demonstrated how to solve problems.

06-23-2026 ATLAS Z UPDATE. Cut and fit the 4" pipe for the intake. Using a 45 degree bend, and the 90, I cut turn/twist, cut on angles, and as you can see in the pics, trim off pie cuts to get the angles going where I want them to. This requires drawing a line where the pipes have to meet and welded in just that spot. It's exactly what I did with the other pipes. After welding, the welds are sanded down smooth and then my polisher does his part to make it look like a seamless one piece unit. I also used the new air cleaner and marked where further cutting on the hood was necessary and then cleaned up those edges. later, I will spray gloss black into the cap and use some q tips to paint the cut edge and it will blend right in. I also got the call to go pick up my 3 parts I had wrapped in black DRY carbon fiber....the cowl, rear spoiler and front bumper. PICS:

Pete! Looooong time! Can't provide help regarding your specific query, but it would be a lovely thing to have an old-timer reunion, if only virtually. I left the thorny wilds of Ohio and relocated (so-of back) to Los Angeles, where occasionally... maybe once every 3-4 months... one sees an S30 Z on the road. Not a "hybrid" (whatever that means anymore!), one presumes, but at least the body-lines are familiar. My Z is still with me, after 27 years... but like yours, has been off of the road for a while. The irony is that the chassis, suspension, brakes and so on, are decently OK... operate better that one might expect for a 50 year old car. But that engine! Never ran right, and now doesn't run at all.

toe out (especially significantly) will definitely make a car drive "twitchy". I've always felt a road car benefits from toe in stability. A track spec may vary from that but street toe in is usually an improvement. I'm really surprised by the caster number. 1º is very little. how well does it self center the steering wheel? If your happy with it then that's all that matters. but you may even have a little more improvement if you can get 4-5º out of it.

Took the car to an alignment shop near my work last Friday to have them realign the wheels. I was in luck as one of their most experienced techs was in that day (old guy with almost 40 years’ experience with wheel alignments). He immediately recognized the car (old Z’s are pretty rare over here) and remembered working on a few of them back in the day. I gave him the recommended alignment specs I got from Apex Engineered and with that, my own complaints about the handling and his own intuition he got to work. Turns out the previous tech just absolutely butchered the alignment. He told me he set everything (camber, caster and toe) to zero but turns out I actually had a lot of positive camber and toe out in the front. For reference a -0,67 degrees toe means a 0.286 inch toe out, that’s massive! The rear still has some work to do as the track with needs to be increase slightly (by turning out the rod ends) so camber can be improved and toe can be turned in. As the rear control arms sit now (stock as shipped from Apex) the toe adjustment is slightly too long and the outer rod end needs to be turned out a bit. Unfortunately the front office didn’t really get how modified the car was and didn’t plan enough time for the tech to tackle this himself so I’ll have to do it myself and come back later for final adjustments. But man the car feels so much better. I have way more control over the car now and steering has become a lot lighter. I hope to make some time next week to fix the rear as I can feel she doesn’t like going over 80mph but that might also be because of a lack of aero. I do plan on buying a reproduction BRE style spoiler and an air dam. Zservices in France sells them made locally and even offers them in a textured black at no extra cost which might be interesting and won’t look that out of place on a silver car. They are also easy resell afterwards as I plan to replace some body parts with carbon fiber down the road once I have the body stripped down and restored. But those plans are for way down the line.

I am using the stock headers. They had to get cut short to make the turn around the frame rails. It is using an OEM ecu ( I believe it was manual) that is running UPRev. The mounts are Mckinney that were sold by ZFever. Not sure how they got them sinze McKinney went out of business a couple of years ago.

06-21-2026 ATLAS Z UPDATE. I started with installing my side view mirrors, and then poured in the engine oil....then decided it was time to get the R200 differential and swap pieces done and out of the way. I first had to clean up the gasket surfaces, then I installed a factory NISSAN gasket, and then filled it with 75W140 Synthetic gear oil. Then I masked off and painted the rear cover with silver engine block paint and then a coat of clear. Tthe case itself I wire wheeled clean,t hen wiped it down and gave it a coat of clear. After that, I painted up the 280Z mustache bar in gloss black and then after cleaning and wire wheeling it clean, I painted the front differential mount in gloss black as well, and then put all of it in the corner out of the way. Quite a bit of work to get it all ready for install. I will remove my existing R180 diff and then clean up the entire area like this before installing the rear end. I also have some TT3 Techno Toy Tuning axle shafts with the Porsche 930 CV joints to put in. PICS:

06-20-2026 ATLAS Z UPDATE. I wired the firewall forward body wiring today. I managed to get it all done except for the fans. I also installed the turn signal surrounds and upper and lower grill. In doing this, I also started the run of braided line back to the water methanol tank from the nozzle up front. The electricals for the Boost switch was also wired today into the passenger footwell of the cockpit. I don't have a horn picked out yet, but I now have wiring ready for it. PICS:

beautiful car, nice rims and nice ride height

so, i failed MOT. there was no brake lights. fixed that it was loose connector on brake light switch but i found that parking light fuse was burning hot, measured current draw it was 5.6amps, seems to be common problem to melt fuse box. i did my math thought aging pressed pins heat cycles might have added resistance between those two connection so i soldered every connection. as i said earlier every load has dropped voltage slightly, no load its 13.8volts, press brake and it drops 13.3V. lights on wipers on fan at full blast i remember seen under 12volts on lighter socket. lets see how it goes after this work, if that park light fuse still gets hot first aid is led bulbs

you cant see it well, but no, it is cut out so it clears as the hood sweeps up.

Are you going to have to take the intake off whenever you want to open the hood?

06-19-2026 ATLAS Z UPDATE. I picked up my gas pedal from the fab shop today. I got it home and wiped it down, masked it off and gave it a couple coats of Rustoleum 2x gloss black paint. Should be ready for install tomorrow. PICS:

06-18-2026 ATLAS Z UPDATE: Well, after having people tell me about the intake and issues I will have with the MAF meter, and then researching on it, I decided to just redo the intake from the MAF sensor forward. I ordered some 4" pipe, a coupling and clamps and dug in. I did a layout and then cut the hood to start the process of making additional room for a smooth long radius 90 in 4" along with a vortex air cleaner to give the MAF Meter what it needs. In just a couple hours tonight I got a good start on it.....but I will have to do a notch in the radiator support to get the pipe to where it isn't being forced up over it. I am still waiting on the Air cleaner, but the job is well under way PICS:

I would like to get a gas lid for my GTO and wondered what size to use on the rear quarter panel. Doesn't look like anyones been here in a while. thanks

Thx for the comments. I have tested the switch and harness connection points and all is working as it should from what I can tell. I did install the honda wiper motor swap with relay so that might be causing part of the issue. However, the fact that the blue line goes to 12V when the button is pushed is still an enigma. I believe the wire should connect somewhere but it is not clear on my harness. I have replaced both the dash (used in great condition) and engine (new) harnesses along with the fuse panel to blade type so it could be a mismatch of parts that is creating the issue. For now, I intend to run the blue wire directly to the washer motor so I will at least have washer capability even if I have to manually activate the wipers.

Thanks for the feedback!

The "rumor" about Silvermine comes straight from the Z Power Steering site, but it isn't necessarily wrong. I believe Silvermine uses an EZ-Steer kit to make their units. Those are designed for ATVs that weigh more than most Zs and experience a lot rougher roads than a car does. They likely don't have the factor of safety of an OEM automotive unit like the ZPS, but it's up to you if that matters. I have seen multiple people who run the Silvermine kit on track and have never seen a complaint, and the EZ-steer kits get used on street rods a lot. If there were an issue with the SM units, I would have expected to see some firsthand accounts of failure online, but I've never even heard secondhand of one having issues. Here's a discussion we had years ago about delay with these units. Interestingly, the only complaints were about force-sensing units. The GPS is also only necessary if your car is stock without an electronic speed signal. I'm not sure how your car is setup, but with a VSS signal, there would be no chance for lag. If you have an aftermarket ECU, you could even setup a custom assist curve if you wanted.

It’s an 8 groove, I got the pulley kit from CVF. I would think a standard rotation wp would be more common for the SN95, I mean a lot of people mod and race it 🤷‍♂️