Phantom

FWIW - I did this years ago by going to a local locksmith and having him rest the tumblers in my locks so they all matched the ignition key. Cost me like $4/lock. I know this is pretty silly but did you try a little WD-40 in the ignition switch? I've had stiff lock issues before and WD-40 cured it by flushing out some time accumulated dirt and debris.

I originally had this in my 280Z with the original drivetrain and it was the front differential mount. Replaced it and the problem went away. Now I have an LS1 and T56 and the problem is permanently cured as the rear of the T56 is bolted directly to the nose of the R200 using a pair of C channels to create a torque tube that replaces the rear tranny mount and the front differential mount. Been driving it 34,000 miles now with no issues.

Looks like you have more that rust issues in that area to me. Has the car been hit there in the past? You need to find a really good metal worker shop. I'd suggest a restoration shop so that it gets done right. Just welding up the problem could cause other issues that would then lead to other repairs.

So do they let you pick what is on the plate - like vanity plates? Also, do you have to renew them every year? WA has a "collector vehicle" plate program where you pay $42.50 one time for the rest of the life of the car if it's 25 or older. No safety or emission inspections either. If they just let us choose what's on the plate it would be the best!

Some peoples children.

Back to the car mentioned. Looks like a rust bucket to me - especially since the hatch glass is missing. I'd look some more and pick up a driver for $2k or less rather than have a totally unknown - (are all the parts really there?) I got an early model 240Z mostly assembled in better shape than this for around the same price. I'd pass and keep on looking.

What is with the turned up exhaust pipe?

TonyD, Naw. I really like driving my cars. I only work on them to upgrade or fix them so that I can continue driving them. At this point I'm putting less than 3,500 miles/year on any of my cars except the Audi which is the vehicle of choice in the winter and on long trips so I feel no need to increase the size of the stable. I only picked up the 240z to "save" it from sure destruction.

One last round on this subject. The reason puller fans are more efficient than pushers is the shroud. The shroud allows the puller to draw across the entire area of the radiator rather than just the circular fan diameter which is what you see with a pusher fan. Conversely, however, if the fan can generate enough airflow it doesn't matter if it is a pusher or a puller. The goal is to get enough air across the radiator to remove the necessary heat to control engine temperature. The shroud, however, allows the OEM to use a slightly smaller fan and use less power to do the cooling which means less parasitic power loss from the engine.

Springs on the same end should be the same length. If you were building a spec full-time race car that might not be the case as they would be adjusted for specific corner weights and the type of track the car is being run on. A street car, however, should not have different lengths. i'd be highly suspicious of the springs with one being shorter. That might be why you got them for free.

Keep in mind that all these cars are really old and over the years specific dimensions have probably changed a bit due to years of driving stress. Even if a car has never been in an accident it's possible a 1/8" interference fit on one could be 1/4" loose on another. Just too much happens over the years.

My limit is currently held to the total number of vehicles that I can drive. Parts cars, garage queens, etc. don't count and aren't allowed. If I can't fix it and drive it in a short period of time I sell or give it to someone who will. I have 4 acres here but I maintain it like a city park (100 trees, creek, pond, 2 acres of grass) so I don't park cars on most of it. I do, however, have a 3,000 sqft barn with 7 garage bays in it. At this point my son has two of them filled with his stuff and then I also need room for the Audi A8L and the Suburban. With the home addition in progress the Suburban is about to get put outside to make room for all the bathroom stuff that's about to be delivered. Looking forward to things slowing down a bit so I can get some time with the Z's.

Wife and I were headed to prayer meeting in north Dallas years ago. Just as we were passing the old Dallas Cowboys stadium a shiny new bright red SRT-4 Neon pulls alongside. I was paying attention to the road when my wife says, "Bill, I think he wants to race you." That almost put me in shock as my wife does not like anything like that and is normally pretty vocal about it. Once I recovered I looked to the left just in time to see the Dodge jump ahead of me a bit. At that point I downshifted from 6th to 4th and slowly came alongside of him. Once I got beside him I caught his attention, downshifted to 3rd, and "puff' I was gone. When he finally caught me after I was back down to 60 he was actually laughing. The guy was cool about getting smoked by an old couple in an old Z.

Tony D, Ok-OK!!! I drove my car year round in the DFW area for 14 years before moving to Washington state - on the dry side of the Cascades. That would be why my car has a good AC system in it and a cooling system that can keep the engine and the passengers cool in 100 degree temps with only one of the two radiator fans running. I understand the up early to get things done because the car was never a "spare". It was my daily driver to work until I did the LS1 conversion in '03. Then I went out and bought an '83 280ZX as a daily driver until the 280Z28 was done 14 months later. Then the ZX went to my son and the 280Z became my year round daily driver again. Here in Washington it's not driven in the winter because WDOT likes to use a deicing agent on the roads that would dissolve my car. It ate the wheels off my 300ZX in two winters so it doesn't go out after the first snowfall now either. The good news is that summer only driving allowed me to put high performance summer tires on the car - Dunlop Direzza's. Love those tires. And no - I don't get to sink my teeth into real projects when it's cold out because I'm busy with all the winter work that needs to be done on the 4 acre park my wife wanted. Try keeping about 100 trees pruned - especially when they are 50-60' tall.

PM DarthZ about the fuel cell he put in his 240Z. It is where the spare goes, is metal, doesn't hang low, holds 17 gallons,and the filler comes out behind the license plate. I'm old school and just stuck with stock 280Z tank and the external fuel pump. BTW -the only time I hear my fuel pump is when I turn the ignition switch to accessory and listen to it pressurize the system. After that I can't hear it.

Years ago I lent my son (DarthZ) my 280Z28 so he could take his young wife out on a date. While he was stopped at an intersection a "modified" Honda came up next to him and started revving his hamsters and indicating he wanted to race the shiny red old Z. Eric gently put his foot on the throttle, revved the car to about 3,500 RPM, and then let it idle down. The Honda driver suddenly realized from the throaty sound of the exhaust that it wasn't a 6 under the hood and then just looked straight ahead. When the light changed my son drove gently away and the Honda followed meekly after him.

Dave, Good to hear from you. Have continued with Z's up here in WA but at a slower pace. My son moved up two years ago and brought his '73 240Z with him. You would like it. LS1, T56, R230 with cryogenically hardened CV shafts. 17x8.5" wheels with 245/40-17 BFG's in the front and 17x9.5" wheels with 275/40-17's in the rear. He's doing the Reaction Research wide body kit. That brought the Z fleet here up to 3 with my 280Z and Chris' 300ZX convertible. Then about 3 weeks ago I "saved" serial number 1779 240Z out of a field and it is now parked behind the barn. It is a basket case but has good bones. It hasn't been registered since 1996 and the title has been lost. Going through the process now to see if I can title it. Someone needs to take this car home and love on it. It has some rust but not in any critical locations and appears to have never been wrecked. Anyway - fleet is now at 4 and I'm in the middle of a home addition so I'm not doing much with any of them.

Just had my 280Z 3-row radiator recored to a 4 row and it has worked beautifully with my LS1 for 34,000 miles now. Simple and relatively inexpensive.

Heck - having looked at the section width specs I wouldn't have tried to fit either tire - unless I put in coil overs and got room in the wheel well - and then remeasured everything to ensure the wheels centered the tires on both sides perfectly and then I would have wanted 1/4" clearance on both sides just because. Obviously that's why I'm running street tires and only go to the track to play -not to compete. I know the 36 year history of my car and know that it has never been in an accident. That said the wheel well clearance is not the same on both sides of the car. Oops. Did something move over the 36 years or is it maybe possible the manufacturing tolerances that Datsun was using would allow +/- 6-10 mm on the centerline alignment? Guess we'll never know for sure but person after person will pay the price.

OK Tony - shut the heck up! RebekahsZ - Socorob has it right. John Radevich and I spent about 45 minutes driving around at different speeds setting up the dip switches in my car vs the 280ZX I was driving as a "standard". Since then I've compared against other vehicles and the tach and it's really close. If your tach is accurate you should be able to mathematically compute your MPH at certain RPM's and get the dip switches set right. BTW - anyone know why I have the funky "No Permission" instead of my normal one. Not a conscious decision on my part.

I was pondering this after reading several of the posts on the forum. Over and over I see guys doing things with their cars - just because they can. Don't get me wrong - that is how the innovations occur that benefit us all. But then there are the others. How many times have I read about guys with overheating problems? I've lost track - and most of them have the issues because they made a change that wasn't thought through or researched on the site. Undersized radiators, fans that aren't shrouded, etc. Components that are swapped in from other cars that are a one-for-one replacement for the functions performed by the original part - and sometimes don't even do everything the original part did. Why? All it does is further confuse the parts list on the car for maintenance and reliability purposes. When I went for my LS1 swap back in 2003 there were two rules. 1) There were to be as few "hybrid" parts as possible. Wherever possible keep Datsun Datsun and Chevy Chevy. An obvious exception to that was the driveshaft since the T56 had to be connected to an LSD R200. 2) Make it look as OEM as possible and make it as reliable as a daily driver as a non-modified factory vehicle would be. Looking back I feel I only failed in one area - I should have put the optional tailshaft on the T56 that gave a mechanical output for the Z speedometer rather than using the electronic output with a CableX Converter. The results is a vehicle I have now driven 10 years, much of it as a commuter to/from work, and I've never been left stranded. I had infant mortality on the two relays for the radiator fans but they failed separately so the car never overheated. I also had a starter wire burn through because it was too close to the headers. Have other things broken - sure. I broke a universal on the drivers side halfshaft but that was on the track and it did have over 200,000 miles on it. I also blew out my KYB struts - after about 70,000 miles. I've spent a lot of time and money on my car but what I love most is driving it. I'm not into having a garage queen that is always needing something tweaked or repaired. I've run an exhaustive benefit analysis on every part that I've put on the car and that generally means I spend a lot of time on this site figuring out who has done it right - versus just who has done it. Now the car is slowly starting to morph. Since I now live in Washington and can only drive it about 7 months out of the year I'm modifying it a bit more extensively to increase my "fun factor" when I'm able to drive it. Do I still look for reliability - you bet. I don't want to get stranded on some backwoods road where there is no cell phone service.

I guess that's the advantage of the LS1 over the turbo, torque is there instantly and is very flat giving it benign manners in stop-n-go traffic. I drove mine in Dallas-Ft. Worth traffic with the T56 for years with no issues. I averaged about 8k per year driving the car to/from work and on errands. I must admit, though, that even DFW doesn't hold a candle to LA when it comes to miserable rush-hour traffic. I remember driving in on a Friday night about midnight a long time ago and I thought I'd driven into a Grand Prix. Locals were making up for the rush-hour traffic a few hours before.

Amazing the difference in the ride quality with the struts set at their midpoint. Also lowered the front about 3/4". Jacked the passenger side rear up a bit as some combination of 36 years of stuff had the car sitting lower on that corner than the drivers side with the same set points. Now it sits level. Anyway, car still handles really well and feels well planted but is no longer busting my noggin or my kidneys. Looks like the midpoint is a good daily driver setting and I'll save the full firm for the track - as long as it's relatively smooth. Something like the Maryhill Loop might still require a less stiff set-up since it's essentially a 90 year old paved road.

I would've thought they would fit too. I'm running 225/50-16's which are 8.86" wide tires and I have about 1/8"-!/4" per side clearance. Guess a little website perusal to get section width on the tires would have been good foresight.

Yup - that's why I'm running 7" wheels with 0 offset. If I had bought them after the coilovers I just put on I would have probably gotten 8" wheels with a +10 offset and possibly be running 245's instead of 225's. I am very happy at this point with the 225/50-16 Dunlop Direzza summer high performance tires I'm running. Best tires I've had on it in the 21 years I've owned the car.