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Day 1 of installation. almost 12 hour day and got a lot knocked out. Pics below:

Heat advisory today, and I believe it, damn it’s hot. Started off replacing studs with APR extended studs then attaching 370Z wheel bearings to the custom spindle, did all that in the AC. Then to the outside, unboxed all the front suspension and got subframe, new plate for control arms and upper control arms up. Stupid plate was near impossible to install. It’s perfectly shaped to frame, bolt holes don’t align when carriage bolts are up, and plate doesn’t align and fit on when carriage bolts are down. Took forever halfway adjusting it, having my dad tap carriage bolts from top while I’m holding and aligning from bottom. Nightmare, but finally got it on. Hopefully the rest will go smoother. Did I mention I’m exhausted

Hello everyone and welcome to my 1977 280z project! I will be using this thread to document my journey with this car and all the little thing that will be done to it to ultimately restore and modify it to be my dream car. I bought the car last week at auction for the decent price of €20.500,- kind of on a whim as this has been my dream car ever since I first learned of there existence (thanks Wangan Midnight and the Devil Z, I know its cliché). Yes €20k is a lot of money but a mid-condition one sells for over €32k here in Europe nowadays. (You can see which side I tied up and which side my dad tied up 😂) What drew me to this car was the paint (absolutely not perfect and needs a repaint at some point but looks good enough for now), the goodies like new wheels and tires, new wooden steering wheel, factory 5 speed gearbox, R200 diff and the claim that the engine was rebuild 10 years ago. Although when picking up the car it turned out there was no documentation what so ever. The car runs and drives and is in fairly decent condition but currently has no valid inspection (called APK in the Netherlands) as the previous owner stats it’s because of the car running rich. Of course it has a cracked dashboard, some small surface rust forming and is missing bolts all over the car but these are all thing that can be fixed over time. For now my main goal is the fix some little stuff and get her on the road so I can start to enjoy the car. So naturally I placed the car on my Quick Jack lift and ordered a bunch of parts from Z-Services EU in France. There are a few thing I like to address before taking it in for inspection. The hood doesn’t open as the cable brackets are missing, the door hinges need rebuilding as the doors won’t close properly, some general maintenance and fixing some sweating oil seals around the car.

Came with four almost brand new tires and the original wheels on also pretty good tires. The original wheels good use a repaint tho.

Actually, it appears you can still buy kits! https://www.dkhardware.com/asp-a-16-105-auto-keying-kit-product-4838272.html?srsltid=AfmBOopXhi66Ub5objUsVLlPIOtGXJCK2Tf8aZSSusaSLkTvPvIAvVgg https://www.locksco.com/buy/product/New-keying-kit-for-Datsun/CLENC8ae41abfed476c50acd2d7916a7fb627 If neither of those are in stock or don't ship, Star Road sells a kit with blank tumblers and a file. https://jdm-car-parts.com/products/key-cylinder-re-key-kit-for-datsun-240z-260z-280z-make-matching-key-on-your-own

Original locks can be rekeyed, but I know at least in the US, there are very few locksmiths that still stock the tumblers. If you're lucky you could maybe find an old school locksmith, or if you're very lucky you could find an old kit. If not, you can always file your own tumblers out of some brass sheet. Here's a write-up on the process of rekeying Datsun locks. https://ratsun.net/topic/47412-how-to-dissasemble-datsun-510-ignition-switch-and-rekey/

Pretty cool https://www.seikowatches.com/us-en/products/prospex/special/datsun_limited/

Probably just fine. The polyurethane products were developed as a performance improvement. More precise steering, less wheel movement. The aftermarket will hype and sell whatever they can.

Found this on Grassroots Motorsport web page. Seems Legit Garage is adapting some interesting modern trannys to other platforms. Think $2k for a fully sequential used 8sp box, any HP needs you have. The ZF-8HP from BMWs, Dodge and others can be fully reprogrammed for sequential operation and even add a dbw pedal to simulate a clutch launch. Might be a good project for someone that could adapt this to an L6 easily....Derek? Transmission Solutions | "Seems Legit" Garage https://share.google/HyOxohcae82yQu0Th

This has already been done a few years ago. Reach out to Jakub at Datsun Europe, he's running a zf8hp50 behind his sick turbo L and has a few adaptor plates left.

This thread is ancient so I'm just posting in case others come along in search of a solution. If you install the MSD 8920 as indicated by the OP and the tach only reads 200 rpm, here is what fixed it for me. At issue, reverse the wires to the tach. Connect B/W wire to red going to the 8920 and connect G/W to 12V switched. After this my tach was happy.

NO!!! Actually it seems well suited to a billet solution and I can't compete with billet solutions. The only reason I can play in this arena with my equipment is leveraging my pattern making abilities.

Actually it's rubber in the back, poly in the front. The front bushing takes the force under braking on the Z's, under compression, and is the one that you don't want compressing too much, making the steering squishy. But the poly should not have split. It does take a lot of side forces as the rod moves up and down with the suspension. But usually it causes the rod end to fatigue and break off. Seems like you got a bad batch of polyurethane. Bad chemistry, or a knockoff.

Hello everyone! I'm new to this forum and today I'll be picking up my very first Z. It's a silver 1977 280z coupe with a 5 speed manual gearbox. Any recommendations of what I should be looking for? I bought the car site unseen at an auction. Yeah I know, not the greatest idea but I got a good deal on the car. I do know from a dealer I saw the car at a while back that the frame rails might have some rust spots but the seller listed the car as "free from rust and structural damage". Luckily the seller won't get his money until we bother agree the car is as advertised so I can still low-ball the shit out of hem. (The seller was bragging to the dealer how he would make a massive payday trough the auctions the dealer told me. But guess what, he lost money on it) My plans for the car are to just get it road worthy for now and then upgrading it over time. I was thinking about rear disk brakes, ITB's with new engine management and some carbon fiber body parts like the hood, fender flares, spoiler and aero bumper. After the cosmetic upgrades I'll be painting the car Nissan Midnight Blue as I just love the color. And yes the car is loosely inspired by the anime Wangan Midnight I saw when I was a kid. Call me a week but it was my first interaction with the S30 chassis and I loved them ever since.

Just got home with the car and finally took it a good run around the block as the registration is suspended at the moment. The seller told me it didn't pass inspection as the car was running rich. I did notice there was a wideband sensor and a crank angle sensor installed but not connected to anything. Maybe it was used to tune the engine? The car isn't perfect but I did get it for a pretty good price. The bodywork isn't all straight, I suspect it had some damage to the rear at some point in time. The hood latch cable has popped out of place so the hood won't open anymore (why did I close it all the way). The passenger door isn't lined up properly, it only closes with force and the bottom rear part of the door sticks out a bit. And the car sweats some oil (pretty much everywhere). But all in all I'm happy at the moment as it has new wheels and tires (got the original wheels with almost new tires with the car) and it drives pretty good even though it's running rich. Clutch and brakes work very good and even all the electrical works. I did notice some nice goodies too. The car has some kind of aftermarket suspension I think and a brand new wooden steering wheel with NRG adapter. It is indeed a 5 speed and has the R200 rear end. I'll look some more into the forum and will probably start a build series documenting the car as I have no documentation what so ever.

Yes I have both. And bleeding the clutch is as simple as opening the bleed screw, let a few drips out, and tighten. The thing that takes longest now is removing that giant shifter and the 3 shift rods. And adjusting shift throws when reinstalling. 3 bolts hold shifter and 2 rod ends per shift rod. I can't find a better way to speed it up. AND I cranked the car Saturday and the clutch is close but still not fully released. So another round is coming.

The turbo lamik stuff is very trick, and it has a lot of potential. The weight is a downside, but it's low and centered. I have a buddy who just put one in his 2JZ swapped FC RX-7, and he didn't have to touch the tunnel. There are a couple guys on IG as well who have swapped these in with good success. I think compared to the T56's they are only slightly heavier, but much stronger and have nicer ratios.

I think the only downside, other than size, is the 180 pounds these weigh, from my research. DCGs are very heavy and have a deep oil pan that limits ground clearance. For a high HP car where the weight isn't a problem, I think that they could be a good solution. The MaxxECU is a nice bit of kit. I got to see one being put on a friend's car and it had tons of IO for the cost.

I am posting this to celebrate my triumph! After full assembly of engine and tranny I could not get the clutch to release. Quartermaster 7.25 v-drive attached to L6 flywheel from TTV Racing. Quatermaster 710 series TO bearing. Chevy clutch disks to mate with 4sp Jericho. QM Button clutches require precise gap from fingers to TO bearing of .120-.150 so I removed tranny multiple times and reset the gap with shims. Everytime I measured gap I got a different measurement. The clutch slipped a little with pedal in but required a breaker bar to rotate driveshaft. Remove tranny, reset gap, reinstall, bleed clutch, check release. After maybe 8 times I stopped and thought about it. Then read directions for the 10th time. Suddenly it stuck out, make sure clutch disk does not interfere with flywheel bolts. I've seen this before. Years ago I ran a similar set up with the head ground down on OEM flywheel bolts. This time I am using ARP flywheel bolts for a RB26. They are 12pt bolt heads already kind of thin, so I didnt consider they could interfere. Well I was wrong. So I ground maybe 0.020" off the head and reinstalled. In the pic you can see marks where the clutch rivet went across the bolts and 3 bolts I have already ground down. On the positive side, I am very efficient R&R the tranny now. Maybe 90min total. And it pops into the pilot bearing like a glove.

A simple solution for door slamming problem? I finally finished my 8.8 Super Duty 8.8 Differential Conversion so I had time to handle all those small detail work. During my restoration work, I used Precision Weather Stripping to my worn OEM ones. But the Precision Weather Stripping always seemed too stiff for its job. So anyway, I gave them about 4 months but still had to slam the door to seat the weather stripping. It never got better so I know some members used late model KIA weather stripping from Amazon and good results. So I tried the Kia weather stripping. It was a lot softer but still had to slam the door. I decided to remove the Door Latch and study its operation. After removing it, I cleaned it and lubricated it with White Grease. Everthing seemed tested fine when it was out of the car. But after installation, the problem was still there. The Door Latch seemed like it still needed a little more inward movement to function properly. So with the Door Latch installed, I watched the Locking Mechanism operation. As the Door Glass was not installed yet, you have a good view of the Locking operation. this is when I noticed that one of the Latch Mounting Phillips Screws( 6mm x 1.0) was hitting the Linkage. This Screw is 4MM too long. The Easy Solution was to cut off about 4MM of the threaded end of the screw. Pic of the Long Phillips Screw-Inner Bottom Mounting Latch one. ". , Pic of "Corrected Phillips Screw" I really don't know when the Phillips Screw was mistakenly replaced with a Longer One. Owning the 240Z for 54 years, I am sure I removed the Door Latch at least 4 times. Anyway, if you are having Door Slamming Problems, check the LATCH MOUNTING SCREWS. It was a Simple Solution for me, maybe for you, too.

Don't tell my wife Like I tell other people. some like to fish, some like to bowl, I like to make.

Even if 100 people commited to purchase, its still tiny small numbers vs an OEM production. Its got to be done out of passion and at least not to lose money. This is why this is such a huge acomplisment for someone like Derek, We are fortunate the passion runs deep. I cant imagine the hours of "un-billed" time

He's saying although we are launching a DOHC head in 2024 we readily admit it will be pale in comparison the mighty KN20 from Datsunworks. At least that's what I'm hearing.

Update: Bored and Stroked to 393 with SCAT internals, Holley Sniper 650, Hyperspark Dizzy and now blow-thru instead of draw-thru

My74 260Z Scarab. Had it since 2000. Bored and stroked to 393, still using the Rajay turbo but converted to Sniper blow thru from the QJet draw thru and added Meth Injection, swapped the T10 for a T56.

Thank you guys. Since I finished this body restauration, I started my new job in a body shop. This project brought me toch a New level. The door mirror is nog vibrating since I untighten the screw.

350 4 speed muncie

Here are some updated pic of my 77 280Z.

Here is a few pics of the 1977 280Z that I started on in Sept. 1994 Z28 Camaro donor car with 74,000 miles. LT1/4L60e transmission. Swapped out the R180 for R200. Keeping all stock gages and Datsun shifter.Suspension upgrades coming soon.

Change over the year

Hers my 385 sbc, mounted old school.

In my intercooler(ice) tank, it is a rule 3700 billage pump.Here is a picture of the tank. The tank feeds the air to water intercooler,then goes to the trans cooler, than to the engine,then back to the tank.I can make a 1/4 mile pass drive it back to the pits and the temp will only be 140 degrees.

Here is the 355 sbc with twin 67mm, FAST system on E85.47232:DSCF0046.JPG]

Here’s a few more pics of that plate with the impossible carriage bolts, I circled where they are. They definitely could have designed that better.

I got mega burned by Apex on the rear track attack. Was one of the first buyers of it and back then it didn't even have enough parts to even bolt it to the car. The design of the rear kit is just for looks. Much feedback was given to them in how to improve it, but it was widely ignored. Shame because the cradle design is a good base to start off of.