seattlejester

Cross member is not the same, and if memory serves the frame rails are not the same If I recall, the reason Ryan Merrill got the tech2 kit was the original buyer had a 280zx and not a 280z which is why he resold it to Ryan. The original buyer speculatively listed the modifications needed to the kit to install in a 280zx, it was quite a bit of work, you would be better off with a one off. The kit dexter is referring to will also most likely not work as it is meant for a 240-280z. A similar style could be used to fabricate a mount pretty easily. Just wanted to set you on the right path.

Learning something new everyday, thanks john and leon. Oh I do the same, I mean when you lean in to stick your arms in-between the fender and the wheel to push the spring into place, I am just acutely aware that if the jack decided to go or something of that nature, my arms would probably be cut off if not severely injured by the fender and the wheel.

Even if it flops, if the engine, efi system, wheels, and suspension components check out you can always try to find a better condition shell and still end up a bit ahead. Honestly at that price the seller is either getting rid of the vehicle or doesn't want to deal with a bunch of hiding rust. I think on my local craigslist there is a guy selling just a rebuilt 280zx turbo motor for over 2k, so take it as you will. Personally if it drives, doesn't leak, and passes any scrutinizing with a point instrument, it looks like a good deal. ZRustGraphic.jpg Very good info graphic of places to look for. As long as your friend is familiar, it should be ok, although I have seen some Z's that I would consider scrap that people have advertised as just needs paint, and I have also seen Z's that are at the scrap yard that I could not figure out why they were there.

Ah I must have been looking at a stock photo, in my defense it looks like 9 coils in the rear, but looking at every other picture looks like the from does have 8 turns. To be fair my response was to 1/2 a coil, which would work out to 9%, which is still indeed significant. Before I retract my statement completely, one thing I thought when I was looking at the spring was the lack of an actual grounded end. Yes the spring does have less of a gap at each terminal coil then the coils in-between (the cause of my seating issue), but it was neither ground down or touching the next coil up which is why I originally wanted to only retract 1/2 a coil from each end. And technically if we were to cut off one end, wouldn't the first coil cut be removing the inactive coil? If my memory serves it says if you have a spring with a closed or ground down terminal ends, then removing both the terminal ends should actually maintain the number of active coils no?

I drilled some holes in the bottom to zip tie them down there, but even with heavy duty zip ties they seem to pop up at a weird angle, they don't fall out of the perches which was a big fear of mine, but I still have to drop the car until the springs are under a bit of compression and force them in place. Honestly it is just a bit of a hassle. When I had my alignment I had to take my jack as they would not set the springs (I don't necessarily blame them). I imagine a spring cup or an extension on the top spring perch to guide them in place would solve the problem pretty easily or droop limiter straps would probably cure the problem as well, but I really do want to revisit the rear end to build and install adjustable lca's and my subaru diff, so I figured might as well start saving/building parts for it while I can. If you don't cut them they don't have any slack so not a real issue, I want to say I cut quite a bit out which caused my problems. Definitely need to roll the car around a bit after each adjustment. Our cars have quite a bit of droop though, that has to be a killer hill to get one of the wheels off the ground completely.

My terminology was incorrect, I did not mean "not at all" I should have said "not very much" I hope it is alright if I drop some math for my reasoning, I know that you are fully aware of this as you have in the past educated me, so it would be nice to have someone glance over my reasoning. k = (Gd^4)/(8nD^3) k =spring rate G = modulus rigidity n = number of active coils d = spring wire diameter D= coil diameter The value we will be changing will be n, from pictures it shows 11 coils, and since the top and bottom coils are not necessarily part of the active coils we can say either 10, or more likely 9 active coils in the system. Removing 1/2 a coil would change the number down to 8.5 and 1 whole coil would be 8. G, d, D all stay the same, our variable is n and k Solving one side for in terms of G, d, D we get n*k = (Gd^4)/(8D^3) If we use the supplied spring rate of 185lb/in using a roughly estimated value set from above of n = 10 (math is easier) coils and k = 185 we get 10 * 185 = (Gd^4)/(8D^3) = 1850. Modifying that to solve the rate difference, we get k = 1850/n Thus if we remove 1/2 a coil we get k ~195lb/in Change - original / original * 100 = % change (195lb/in - 185lb/in) / (185lb/in) *100 = 5% Not all that much I think statistically insignificant in a very rough kind of way (5% cutoff) Granted if we used the active coil number of 9 we would get a 6% change to 196 for 1/2 a coil removed and 208 if we removed a whole coil a 12% change, which starts to make a difference (statistically) Oh I agree, it is not the end of the world, but I just have reservations of sticking my hand in-between the wheel and the fender to settle the spring. Pretty sure it is unjustified, but it seems like a good way to walk away without hands.

Parts wise and price wise it looks like you are quite a bit ahead. I wouldn't be surprised if it did not last long König rewinds (I paid 300$ for just the rims of a used set) Rear disc brake (I paid 500$ for my kit without pads) Efi system (I paid 700$ for megasquirt) 280zx swap (last time I looked people were selling the complete swap for ~1k in decent condition) That alone adds up to 2500 or so, not a bad deal at all. I am with new zed on this one, definitely go and take a look. People's definition of surface rust and rebuilt are quite different. Badgering someone with a barrage of questions can be tiresome though, it may be wise to go up with a friend who is familiar with older cars or has done a restoration of some sort that meets your caliber of desire that knows what to look for. If you don't have a friend, join a local z club and see if anyone is willing to help. The rust is a bit concerning, this could either be a deal or a nightmare and it all depends on the condition of the chassis. It does seem like the seller is familiar with the cars given the work they have put in, and the pictures they have taken of the rust prone spots. Still a good idea to go with a strong flashlight and really prod and poke some areas with the sellers permission.

Yea finding an automatic that can handle a lot of power for the 2jz is going to be pricey. Maybe look for a scatter shield? I know they do make them to adapt quite a variety of engines to transmissions. Seems like you know the details, just up to you to decide. Rebuilding the V8 will be the cheapest and fastest route, swapping in the L6 will be more costly and time consuming. If you want a fabrication break down, the toyota section has an excellent walkthrough on what is required. The walkthrough ends with the engine in the car at the end of the weekend, so not an impossibility at all to do in a time table if you have the resources and space. From my experience: Drive shaft Wiring to splice in the toyota harness into the datsun harness Exhaust modification Fuse/relay box for relayed power sources A way to mount engine, either use the 2jz mounts and make a new cross member, or use a generic mount and make new mounts to the motor Radiator hoses Higher flow steel lines High pressure and flow fuel pump Fuel pressure regulator unless using stock unit Electric radiator fans unless you can get the factory fan right up there Intercooler piping kit Intercooler Little fittings/adapters for lines/hoses <-that stuff will kill your time table and budget, beware If you have the stock wiring harness, accessories, and ECU and the motor was running, then it is just a matter of positioning the motor, mounting it, feeding it fluids, and giving it an ignition power wire, and you will be away. Won't steer you away from it, but for me it was a lot more then I imagined, but I threw a lot of upgrades and other tidbits in on my build which complicated things.

It is a headache to be sure. Kind of a different situation when it is from an L motor, but having a v8 car kind of changes perspective. Really depends on what you want out of the car. It can be argued either way that one engine is easier to build than the other. It kind of boils down to what you want out of the project. If you decide to play with what you have, it will just be a matter of rebuilding a block or finding a suitable swap and swapping it in. If you decide to try and swap a 2jzgte, that is either a pretty pricey swap kit, or quite a bit of fabrication, potentially a lot more down time. This will also require changing the fuel system to fuel injection or the addition of a swirl pot (that may not be the right term but the term is escaping me). You can get quite a lot of power out of a v8 with cams, heads, headers etc, and if you choose you can always boost down the road, lots of torque on tap. You can also get a lot of power out of a 2jzgte with a bigger turbo, injectors, and a tune, most likely a higher peak hp number. Make a list for both and see which one comes out on top, the 2jz will be most likely down a bit since you would have to buy the motor, a swap kit, run a new fuel system, etc. If you do plan on swapping a 2jz, it may be wise not to invest in a v8 swapped car to start, kind of throwing all the work that went into getting that motor into the car out the window at that point. Choice is yours to decide, don't build the v8 if you love L6's, and don't swap the L6 in if you love your wallet. Wish I could give you more, but I haven't pushed my toyota inline 6 turbo motor yet. I have to say boost is quite nice, not sure if it is 10k worth of nice though.

Definitely considering a removable hub down the road, not really a necessity but if I add door bars again it will really be required to get in and out of the car. Plus in all honesty it is a small fantasy of mine. Managed to rewire up the steering wheel, used a much thicker heavier duty cable with 18gauge wires and used the the old cable and twisted it into one to run just the horn. Sorry for the bad pictures, but I think the idea is pretty apparent, please don't mind the wiring mess, I had to pull all my wires out to get to my megasquirt and wire in the new fuse box, it cleans up really nice when it is put away. Ignition on Left turn blinking The wiring was kind of a whole fun ordeal. Given how the stock switch is wired (turn signals are actually part of the braking circuit) had to incorporate some diodes to regulate the flow. At some point I wanted to add a quick disconnect cable and spent an hour or so soldering all that together when I realized I could just get a hook and hang it as the coiled cable would stretch a good 6-7 feet. All in all I think it turned out great, I just want to change out the old flashing units and I believe I will be golden as right now they click very slowly. The new sensor came in, trying to figure out the best way to mount it. Will have to find some space at a friend's to do most of the work and tack in the piece in my storage locker and finish elsewhere. Definitely finding a pool of oil under the car, I replaced the valve cover gasket and grommets which seems to have taken care of the dangerous oil onto exhaust problem, my thought is that my oil relocation kit is leaking. The lines are never covered in oil, but the relocation bracket always seems to have a bit of oil on top of it and that is sitting on the chassis rail. I've read that the casting is not that great so will have to take a look at that when I get the car to the exhaust shop. To finish it off, picture of the engine bay I have the cable wrap for the wires, just have to install once everything is finalized, and would like to try and get my hands on a 7mge valve cover so I don't have the silly studs sticking out. Almost there .

Yes, should not really affect them at all, if you cut too much though you will have to set the spring every time you jack up the car. That's one of the reasons I am looking at coil overs having to go around to each corner afterwards is kind of a chore.

^Yes, definitely avoid using everything in the energy suspension kit. The sway bar bushings will be too stiff for the sway bar mounts and the tension arm bushings are quite overkill. Even worn out rubber bushings have enough force to violently spring up when you unload them, I can only imagine with the poly bushings it would either snap the bar or snap the mount off. If time is of the essence, acquiring a spare mustache bar and control arms will make things really easy as that can take a couple hours for the mustache bar, and depending on how easy the spindle pins comes out a couple minutes to a couple days for the rear lower control arm bushings.

I used to be in the camp that coil overs really were too much for daily use, but modern coil overs can be pretty comfortable for street use, and a well built coil over will really make you faster on course. With that said if you don't plan on racing much, and you don't plan on lowering the vehicle too much, it probably is a lot of money to invest, money that could be spent elsewhere. Just because you have all the adjustably also does not mean you have to use it all the time, but it really can help if you notice something down the road. After I trimmed my 280z springs for my 240z I noticed the spring settled more then I thought, if I had coil overs I would just have to raise it back up. Now I have to either order another set of springs or just deal with it. Luckily my combo is tried and true, but if you found your springs were a little stiffer then you thought, being able to adjust the dampening would help, and if you add or remove quite a bit of weight (tire, passenger, cage) being able to dial dampening can really help with over dampening/under dampening. I suggest against eibach springs, they are progressive and can be quite bouncy. The 280z tokico springs are linear and a good rating. A little on the softer side but that means a nicer ride.

I have used the atlantic z recommendation for bushing replacement. Energy suspension everywhere except for the tension arms which had G-machine ball and socket bushing in the front and a standard rubber bushing on the back side. 555 ball joints instead of the poly ball joint caps and I think my steering rack bushings were from somewhere else, I bought mine all through MSA, kind of pricey, but they had everything I needed. I had to trim the sway bar bushings if I recall, and I used quite a bit of grease as I have had some squeaky bushings in the past. Only noise I hear is the metal creaking, no rattling or squeaking. If you have a press everything goes together easy enough if not some C-clamps and some pieces of wood will do the job, burning out the bushing and cutting out the sleeve was probably the most difficult portion. Give yourself enough time to take the old bushing out and then clean up the piece and maybe squirt some paint on it before putting everything back together. Makes me smile every time I have to crawl under the car when I see my shiny stock pieces.

Not new, I think one of the vendor's on our forum has had them for a while. Benefits would be more camber you can look up the benefits that that supplies with a quick search. The spacers will push the LCA's lower so it will cause correction of suspension geometry if your LCA's are parallel or facing upwards. If you have the room to accommodate the extra width it would be beneficial, but I am not sure how much the struts would like being pushed out at that angle with the stock top hats, a spherical type joint may be required to run these without binding in some way. I plan on getting these when I go for adjustable arms and coil overs with camber plates.

Messed around with it a little more today. Definitely ignition based. Sitting on the limit floored it sounded like the antilag/launch control. I played around with distance and I only got running to not running sensitivity did not seem to be phased much. And playing with the pots did not seem to do anything, went from 0-5 turns in half turn increments. I did floor it to see if it was TPS based, after hitting 4k and limiting for a while it bumped to 5k intermittently and then dropped but never went higher which makes me think it is something to do with the trigger wheel/sensor. Next plan is to order the tabbed sensor and get some thick steel and some time in a friends garage to try and make a workable bracket. Thanks for the brainstorm guys.

Ah, so I did read it correctly. Definitely on my list of things to do then, I know the car went from not running to running with half a turn at one point, so I can definitely appreciate that it is a sensitive situation.

Blah, read it too fast, you are correct, good eye, didn't make much sense to me either. Did make me look at the other sensor though, it has a larger range in both RPM and it seems resolution, may be worth while to make that the basis of my next visit on the mechanical side.

Oh, I thought closer would be more helpful, you have found further out lost less signal? I am using the threaded type that says 1.5mm maximum air gap. Well current plan: Mess with pots slowly turning center pot clockwise until maxed out or revs don't disappear. Adjust sensor away from teeth to look for signal improvement. Make measurements to make a thicker steel mount, consider ordering new wheel and bolt adapters as well as the tabbed hall effect sensor.

My friend broke my key off in my original ignition. Using a 90* screw driver you may be able to get to the two phillips screws that hold the switch to the lock mechanism. All you need to actuate it is a screw driver or a key something flat, that's how I drove my car for a few weeks. You can definitely see if it is worth your time by actuating the switch mechanism to see if that cures your problem, if it does then yes new ignition setup needed, if not, then it seems you just need to work on the lock mechanism. For what it is worth I bought my complete replacement ignition setup on ebay from a thailand seller for 60$ and it works fine. The lock and key looks quite different though if originality is your goal. http://www.ebay.com/itm/NISSAN-DATSUN-240Z-260Z-280Z-IGNITION-SWITCH-STARTER-KEYS-SET-/160976339870?pt=Motors_Car_Truck_Parts_Accessories&hash=item257af0039e&vxp=mtr

Newzed: gotcha, I don't think it is noise though, as that would show as extraneous teeth and cause the RPM's to jump not drop suddenly, I am leaning towards maybe too much noise filtering drowning out the actual RPM signal, and the wire is shielded, not sure what else I could try and do to lower more noise, additional shielding? More grounds? AkRev: Eyeballing about 1mm. I basically made the sensor touch the teeth and then backed it out half a turn or so.

Newzed, starter is not engaged when this happens. Unless you are indicating maybe a failure to retract all the way, but I think then the starter would have worn out by now. Metro: Gotcha, glad to see a light at the end of the tunnel, I'll give that a shot. The only thing I can think of that is left is to redo the trigger wheel and hall effect sensor if the pots fail. After that I am back in the stumped bin.

Related files attached. Current MSQ Compiled Datalog Toothlog Reset pots R52 and R56, and moved R56 two turns clockwise as mentioned earlier in this thread (will double check, but I had this thread opened when I did it so whichever one it said) Moved the hall effect sensor closer as well, but still cutting out near 4000rpm. Removed rev-limiter as well still behaving the same. Symptoms: Looses RPM signal, goes from 4k to 1k or 0 and then back up to 3k as the revs drop Registers signal loss Gauge cluster indicated cranking when RPM signal lost Catches after letting off the throttle Runs rich enough to not register, lower then 10AFR From what I can tell from the tooth log as the RPM increases the time between the teeth shrinks to around the 0.4ms mark which coincides with an RPM of about 4150rpm 1ms / 0.4ms/time between teeth = 2.5 time between teeth/ms 2.5 TBT/ms * 1000ms/ second = 2500 TBT/s 2500 TBT/s * 60 s/min = 150000 TBT/min 150000TBT/min * 1 Rotation/36TBT = 4166rotations/minute = 4166rpm So it comes down to the teeth are not being read. Either it is mechanical or electrical or ECU. Mechanically the hall effect sensor may have trouble at higher rpm? Although it is the one DIY suggests Electrically, the wire is not carrying the signal at that speed? Or the pots need some additional adjusting, although I do not see how you can get any more adjustment then opening zeroing out the pot completely. Any insight would be helpful. MSQ and datalog 07-06-14.zip

Just a pre work update, The MSQ is the same MSQ as previously used. The throttle rev limiter is set at 5000 rpm with 80% throttle, and the coolant temp based rev limiter also kicks in until the car reaches 120. Car was not revving past 4k rpm fully warmed up (temp 180). This was load independent as well. Thoughts thus far: Hall effect sensor needs adjustment Need to zero out and then play with the adjustment pots Need to add capacitor, although voltage does not drop enough to indicate this Throws in the dark: Board setting is set incorrectly, need to re-examine jumpers Someone with a similar problem solved with removing c12 and c30 More info to follow.

I will definitely get some time in later this week. I remembered while driving home that I did enable a throttle dependent rev limit in addition to the coolant based rev limit, I am pretty sure that is the culprit or at least a factor, as I wasn't flooring it in the little straight I was playing with. I think I got a little too involved with setting limiters after watching a Ferris Bueller rerun. I definitely know how annoying it is to try and help without both those pieces of data, so I will adjust and report back this weekend. Regarding boost, I have it currently set to PSI, and I have not seen it go positive maybe up to 1 or 2 psi, but usually in the negative range. I can switch it back to kpa and see if it reads any different.