Daeron
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Posts posted by Daeron
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With boost and a lead foot....I don't even want to talk about it.
But WE do!!
Not to pick on your post in particular, but the idea of being bashful about the MPG of your performance-built vehicle, or not wanting to talk about it has always struck me as odd...
It isn't like its something to be ashamed of... Fast cars burn gas, it goes without saying. There is a reason I don't even look at any boat larger than 25 feet... Even a 25 foot Mako with a 150-200 horse on it would drink too much gas for me to "just take it out whenever..." I would need to think about gas money. A 19 footer with a 90-125, on the other hand... HUGE difference. I make that decision when I buy the boat; you make the MPG decision when you build the car.
But it is a data point just like any other, and I think that the PURPOSE of this thread is to compare the fuel consumption of Z-cars in EVERY trim, from stock DD, to eco-modded DD, to full blown race. (John Coffey, Greg Ira, Tony, Braap, jmortensen, any other racers want to chime in?)
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too cool, subscribed.
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A 1976 car should not have an alternator from a 1978 car installed, unless it has had other modifications done. The '78 was internally regulated, and the '76 was externally regulated.
Were you saying that the shop discovered you had previously been running with a '78 alternator, and they replaced it with the proper one, or are you saying they installed an alternator from a '78 into your car? This can be done, but it does require a minimal wiring bypass to remove the old, external voltage regulator. If this is NOT done, all KINDS of wackiness can happen.....
Your turn signal issues are secondary to this. You need to determine what was done by this shop; it is entirely possible that when they said "we put the one from the 78 in" they meant that the whole conversion was done. Sometimes "new" rebuilt alternators are simply bad; the shop could have gotten a defective rebuild and installed it and it died in short order. It isn't your fault, or their fault, but rather the fault of the MBAs who decided to move the remanufacturing plant to some country where labor standards are so low they can squeeze an extra .002 cents out of every rebuilt unit.
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YES!!!! that is EXACTLY what they were telling you! Granted, our friend from Australia said "globes" instead of "light bulbs" but jhm said it in plain, american english..
As Zedman mentioned, a burned-out bulb may sometimes cause system problems. -
I would *really* tend to stick with keeping this car relatively stock, and letting it be an old quirky antique car, and dropping the V8 into your 280ZX. This car would be such a head-turner stock, and eventually if you wanted to, after doing a low-budget refresh to it (clean everything, don't let anything go backwards, but don't go spending oodles of cash replacing things that you can live with "for now") you could sell it for a ridiculous amount of money.
Haven't people run into issues swapping SBC into RHD vehicles? No steering shaft interference with the distributor?
As for Japanese Z fans digging LHD cars... I wonder what you could sell a LHD, SBC converted 240Z for over there????
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Incidentally, the Camry I have as a rental right now has a manual bypass for the foot on brake function. All I need to do to put the car in a gear is press the button (reached with a fingertip when my hand is on the shifter) and shift away! Think the '09 Camry's got that in the North American Market???????
If they did, it would probably only be accessible through a keylock like turning off the passenger airbags in Chevy pickups...
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Injectors.
They sound like a gang of maracas sometimes. If you want to be certain, grab a largish screwdriver, and rest the butt of the handle against your ear. Gently set the tip of the screwdriver (flathead works best) against the base of the injector with the engine idling and suddenly the sound of the injector WILL become greatly amplified... and you will know for certain if it is the loud ticking you are hearing or not. You ARE able to hear it with your head under the hood sometimes, right? This isn't a road-only condition?
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Give the guy $500.
While you are pulling the engine out, repeatedly grab things and ask him "Can I take this, too?" fifty thousand times, getting everything under the hood, the fuel pump, and the 76 280Z gas tank. Despite the contradictory answers earlier in your own thread, the 76 tank will be a useable, EFI compatible fuel tank for you to put into your 72 240.
You will get a perfectly good deal, provided that it does all work well.
Hydraulic head or not is no problem whatsoever. News of its great detriment has been greatly exaggerated.
Have fun turbocharging your 240!!!!!
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I also *think* those are the Nissan Comp headers, but I've had my foot in my mouth before and I'm sure I will again in the future, somehow, so keep that in mind.
I don't see much extensive damage. Got any better images of the dents and dings?
If I were you, I would make a posting on your local craigslist asking for advice to find a good welder, and post up the situation... "Have these expensive headers that are NLA/hard to obtain, would like to repair this minor damage, anyone got a shop to recommend?" Post some pictures, you should get SOME replies of individuals who have had similar experiences.
The hard part is finding an exhaust shop to do the repair work that doesn't suck. If you know of a good exhaust shop you trust highly, then simply take it to them and ask them what you should do with it, and how much it'll cost.
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(i hope this isnt too annoying of a question but alot of what i've read "poo-poo"'s the NAPS manifolds and I cant see any good reason to. I have read plenty of posts about people considering using NAPS manifolds or dicussing sequential throttling but no real feedback after fitting and tuning. My experience has be wholely positive so far)
Well, I am always interested to read as much information about foreign market intakes and in particular, tandem throttle body setups as I can find. In particular, the twin butterfly TBs with a large secondary and small primary bore setups have always caught my eye.
Regarding the rest of the manifold, it seems to have plenty of advantages to build towards. The thing to bear in mind is that many people select a manifold only thinking "Which manifold is the best?" rather than "Which manifold is going to match my desired power output and economy, when paired with the cylinder head and engine block I am also designing with these purposes in mind?" These people will always poo-poo any manifold that doesn't look the biggest, and have he highest numbers on a flow bench, and the biggest throttle bodies, and the least extra unnecessary junk on it. So they shave their early non-egr N42 manifold and get rid of all the bossses on it and pay some guy to megasquirt it and go all out spending $10-15-20K and wind up with a car that is a glorified weekend warrior, and they hate the way the air conditioning bogs the car down in ONE way at idle (because their is no AC idle-up control) and it bogs the power down ANOTHER way at speed (because the engine doesn't make as much power as it SOUNDS like it does.. but that is harder to notice because A) this fictional driver is dumb and
without it, it feels and MOST IMPORTANTLY SOUNDS fast enough to fool him. So this guy has a problem, not with the manifold, not with the jerk who built the car for him, but with his AC. That high-flowing, super smooth powder coated manifold, that he spent $5-600 on, man that thing is GREAT.People == sheep.
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Okay, now, Pete, Tony, and Paul all seem to be saying things that are somewhat at variance here on this.... My brother and I noticed the difference between the two cam gears a few months back, and given the selection of cam gears available I believe he used the lighter one of the two. We didn't think too much of the difference at the time, but now I want to compare them to other L-series and even some old U-series cam gears and see what we have to see.
If the cast cam gear pictured above, with the Off-Centering Cam Adjusting Magic Bushing of Wonder is in fact a cast aftermarket piece, then what does tonyd's "early cast steel" piece look like? I would have simply said "earlier" and "later" with the heavier and lighter gears, respectively, and given that statement about a 60% likeliehood of being correct... but I would have wagered highly that one was earlier and one later and both OEM.
I wasn't around and doing regular maintenance on chain-drive OHC vehicles in the 70s and 80s, but I was under the impression something like a cam gear was going to be an OEM only part, and that the commonality of things like that in the corner parts counter was a thing of the last 15-20 years.
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Wowsers, that looks like crap. How did they come out?
One very useful mild abrasive material I like using on steel when I am concerned about material removal is a green scotch pad.
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Cam, compression, and gear ratio should all match.
If you want a fast drag car with good top end then use 10:1 cr, a cam in the 290 degree range, proper springs and lash pads, and a 3.90 to 4.11 gear. To get 10:1 cr use flat top pistons and a N42 or N47 head.
If you have a 8.3:1 cr L28 (1975 to 1980 engine) then it will not take much cam. A stage 1 MSA cam would be about the max you should use. It will help but not that much by itself. A change to 3.90 will help if you are using a 3.55.
A great post; the only thing to add to it is that the very first statement is the truest part. The rest is EXTREMELY ABBREVIATED, but you could write books and books covering the second two paragraphs of this post. The first sentence, though, is the simplest answer to the OP's question, and any other answer you listen to should be listened to with THAT grain of salt.
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I just counted the drive shaft turns and it is somewhere closer to the ~3.364-3.545 range than 4. It does have a new clutch so maybe that is it.
A new clutch would grip solidly, and you would have virtually no chance at slipping, and increasing RPM without increasing speed. In other words, a new clutch would PREVENT this problem.
There is no 3.365-3.545 "range." Get a paint marker and mark a bright spot on the driveshaft if you have to, and start it with that mark at 6 o'clock dead low. If it is a 3.364, then you will get three full revolutions and then it will stay between 9 and 10 o'clock when you complete one revolution of the halfshaft. If it is a 3.545, then the mark you made will be just PAST the high noon position. That is almost a quarter turn difference. Apologies for spelling it out, but 9 o'clock and 12 o'clock are pretty difficult to mix up.
What Size Tires Do You Have?? I asked for specifics, not "I think" followed by an extremely rare and hard to find tire size. (In other words, you probably don't have tires the size you said you did!!!) For all we know, you're running 13" tires to boot.
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Just took a 4 tank average. 1976 280Z, Stock EFI, 205 65R 15 tires on 15x7 Konig Rewinds. 93 degree heat in S. Florida, A/C on the entire time. Car has factory 4-speed and the usual R200 diff with 3:54 ratio. Driving is about 60% city 40% highway. I drive it moderately hard... Plenty of down shifting and 80mph runs on the Florida TPK. No effort made to "keep my foot out of it". Mobile Gas 89 Octane with Summer Blend 10% ethanol (hurts MPGs) Results on 4 tanks---17mpg
Overall--never worse than 15.5 mpg---city/stop and go ONLY with a/c on.
Best ever is 23mpg at 75 to 80MPH with the a/c off in cooler weather, ONLY on the highway. A lighter foot might stretch this a little. But an overdrive would put the car into the mid to high 20s on the expressway.
A little MORE COMPRESSION would help a lot too. But the motor only has 159K on it...
So you're tellin me that there is a 76 280 on Konigs running around in Lake Worth??? How the heck have I never seen you? Granted, I usually stick around the north end of town (PBG thru Lantana == "Town" to me; I am an old skool West Palm baby.)
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If you can find another tach that's known to be accurate, you could do a temporary install and compare the two.
I would suggest comparing the two at cruising revs, maybe 3k and 4k rpm. At idle I doubt the error will be large enough to be accurately measured and adjusted. FYI, mine read about 300 rpm high at 3k rpm meaning it was ~10% off. At 900 rpm that's only 90 rpm error which I don't think you'll be able to measure.
There is a potentiometer that is adjusted with a small screwdriver through a hole in the back of the tach. Hint: only do this with the ignition off. Otherwise you will damage the tach. Ask me how I know.
That is freakin awesome to discover about a car thats been a part of my life since I was born almost 30 years ago.... Thanks!
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Delete the wing, reinstall a stock hood and front bumper, and the car suddenly isnt that awful.. The scallops in the sides sure isn't my kind of idea, but it isn't horrible itself. Other than the scallops and the taillights, none of it is that permanent, really.
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If we could actually get it together, I'm close enough to DO the purchase.... We've got a flatbed trailer and a truck we could haul it on, if push comes to shove, but I've got nowhere to put it. keep it, or (most importantly) burn it... and I also have no organizational capacity/time/effort to spare to put anything together (although the seats WOULD be rather nice, nd a spare 5 speed is always welcome....)
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Me and my buddy took his 260z out with the GPS and checked his 4th (he has a 5spd swap) since they are both 1:1 and 60 was 3k, 70 was 3.3k and by 4k we're nearing 90. Same tire size and stock rear end as far as he knows. Basically what that calculator says.
I wish I could figure out what was causing this. Even 4.11 gears doesn't explain the HUGE difference.
http://www.atlanticz.ca/zclub/techtips/drivetrain.htm
According to two different sources linked to from that page, no S30 ever had a differential with a gear ratio higher than 3.545. The 260 Manual cars had 3.364. You have 4.11 you say, and all the transmissions had 1:1 4th gears so that point is correct.
http://www.geocities.com/z_design_studio/
According to that, a stock 260Z, in fourth, at 60mph with 215/60-14s, (thats probably what you are running, just a hair taller than 205) is 2808. 3300 for 70, and 86 at 4K.
The 4.11, now, according to the calculator, puts you at 70 mph at 4K RPMs, almost exactly. The calculator says 3431 for 60 mph, and 3546 for 62 mph. If I am wrong about my guess with the tires, then the numbers go even more towards what you are experiencing... and if we were both were wrong and you've got 195 or 185s on there, then its even sharper. 205-50s maybe?? That would cross 4K just about 67-68 mph.
ALOT can be done with shorter tires, and a Whole Boatload has already been done by dropping the 4.11 gears in there.
Just pretend its a Civic or a Miata *ducks*flying*brake*rotor*aimed*at*head*
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Its a Butterfly Netting Car.
*turn dry humour notches up to 11*
In Japan, they eat Butterflies like some people eat Shrimp. Turns out, they also CATCH them the same way they catch shrimp.. Aerial Trawl!!!!!!!!!!!
DISCLAIMER i know nothing about butterflies, japanese cuisine, or the practice of netting any live critter. no animals were harmed in the posting of this sarcasm. unfortunately, though, it was too late for the Datsun. RIP. offer void where prohibited, viewer discretion may be advised, no purchase necessary but proof of purchase must be presented at time of purchase.
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It is truly FLABERGASTING that members of this forum are just now discovering reverse flow COOLING. This concept is at least 15 years old. The L24, L26 and L28 engines all appear to have cooling system design defects. It is truly amazing to see that now it is beginning to be recognized and something done about it. As John C has pointed out these is something that is considered LIQUID HORSEPOWER. This should be used as a last resort and the design defects should first be overcome.
Well, that isn't exactly true. Just because it hasn't become "Official HybridZ Canon" thru sticky-ism until the last year or two, doesn't mean that nobody has done it. This thread was largely compiled of peoples' experiences, both personal and those seen on racecars, from the last 30-40 years. I've known, at least in a vague sense, that "the racing guys" did this sort of thing "a long time ago" for a good ten years or so.
If I am not mistaken, the idea had been batted about (and almost certainly used SOMEWHERE) for years and years before the SBC got it integrated (what was that, Gen II, something? Early 80's? I don't know my Chevies....) The first thing I asked when I learned all about iron blocks with aluminum heads, versus iron/iron, was "Well, where does the coolant go first, the block, right? Can't you just flip it around and let it cool the hot, softer cylinder head first?" or something to that effect, so I guess what I am saying here is that the sense of discovery, the tone of "Eureka" this thread holds is alot more superficial than it might seem. It is something that is getting widespread, knowledge that "another forum" failed to be able to convey, but hybridZ is finally making public and popular. In a more perfect world, this thread could have been around as long as ten years ago, but the timing wasn't right.
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I might seek them out for redoing the interior as the prelude had a very nice adjustable lumbar support, and adjustable "hugging" sides.
"Kidney Pinch" FTW
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http://miami.craigslist.org/mdc/cto/1336398098.html
This car has been posted before, but not listed for $1000!!!
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I was reading a thread about a Twice Pipes setup, and wanted to post a link to something I had done in the past. I couldn't find it, so I thought I would post this up here and nominate it for s Sticky for reference purposes.
We all like to HEAR our engines. The lure of big, loud pipes calls gearheads of all ages, no matter what kind of machine their motor is attached to. Dirtbikers, riverboat racers, weekend lawyer Harley riders, Pontoon Boat captains, helicopter pilots, racecar drivers.... we ALL love our pipes.
Unfortunately, though, due to a tricky arithemtic process called squaring, whereby the radius of a pipe is multiplied by itself (and pi) to obtain the cross-sectional area (and thus, the flow capacity) of a circular pipe... Many of us find it very difficult to easily visualize and compare the differences between a 2" and a 3", and dual 2" vs single 4", and dual 1.75" versus single 3" (or was it single 2.5"?) pipe setup.
Rephrase: Comparing potential exhaust/intake tubing sizes is tricky because you have to square the difference in size. Our brains are used to comparing the difference in size in a linear manner. Thus, two falsehoods easily take root in EVERYONE'S mind (until education prevails!!):
A: The difference from 2"-3", and the difference from 3"-4", would seem to be the same;
AND
B: The capacity of a single 3" pipe should be roughly twice that of a pipe roughly half the size, 1.5".
Unfortunately, both of those statements are dead wrong.
Let me go do the math for you!!
:wc:So!!!!!!!!!
Here you go.
The numbers in the two columns on the left are pipe diameter. This is how pipes are sold usually. The numbers in the columns on the right are cross-sectional area. THIS is the number that you compare apples-to-apples with between different size pipes when determining flow. Double the cross sectional area, you double the flow capacity. However, lets look at the cross sectional area of a pipe that is 1.75". At 2.405 square inches, we want to know what to compare our nice, new dual system to, so we double that number to get about 4.8 inches. Scroll down on the chart a few lines and there is one at 4.909 square inches. Scan back over to the left and we discover that the twin 1.75" pipes have just a hair less flow potential than the single 2.5" pipe. Further inspection reveals that it takes twin 3" pipes to beat a single 4" pipe!
These things are not as intuitive as they might seem, and the further away from Zero you get, the more drastic the changes make themselves felt. I hope this helps as much as I imagine it could.
without it, it feels and MOST IMPORTANTLY SOUNDS fast enough to fool him. So this guy has a problem, not with the manifold, not with the jerk who built the car for him, but with his AC. That high-flowing, super smooth powder coated manifold, that he spent $5-600 on, man that thing is GREAT.
:wc:
How much miles per gallon does your z give?
in S30 Series - 240z, 260z, 280z
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14 mpg is not all that bad for a hi-po sports car at ALL, I was afraid you would say more like ten. My brother estimated that his ITS car is going to yield about 5-6 mpg, and that blew my mind even though I know it is likely true...