Zetsaz
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Posts posted by Zetsaz
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Pictures as promised. Wasn't done with a regular mig, no gas, so the welds still need some more grinding down and cleaning up, but I sprayed it with a thin coat of black primer for now while I get a chance to clean them up more down the road when I'm actually prepping for paint. Note I have way more pictures of rust but for the sake of comparisons and seeing a few in between shots this is all I'll upload.
Cut up
Passenger side
Driver side
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Rocker panels and other bits have been done for almost two weeks now, just haven't had a chance to upload pictures. I'll have them uploaded sometime tonight once I've sorted through them for before/after deals.
Still have some more bits to weld including some floor patching and the frame rails, plus the holes from the old bumpers in the back but for now it's really coming along and starting to take shape. It's far from any sort of ground up restoration but a lot of major issues will be taken care of.
The passenger door aligns quite well and closes, but the driver side door (unfortunately) closes just as poorly as before and I haven't quite figured out why. It's no different from before swapping the rockers, so I know it's not that, but it's still bugging me that it's harder to close and almost needs to be slammed to shut completely.
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Looks like plug welds are gonna be the way to go. Haven't been able to find anyone with a spot welder, and even the cheapest Harbor Freight ones are like $170.
And I was really hoping not to have to drill or cut any of my shiny new panels :/
Updates to come with pics: Both rocker panels are fitted and ready for welding right now. Just need to fit the passenger dogleg. Once that's done I'll be working on the rear lower quarters.
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Rockers are completely removed. And I definitely haven't been driving it, it's on jack stands and will stay there until the rockers and rocker ends are welded on
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Your dad too? lol. I know the feeling. I can't really say for sure, but if you think about it, I think it's obvious which weld is stronger. A spot weld is in the middle of the flange (meaning load is spread more evenly), and there's also 360 degrees of metal surrounding it, whereas a butt weld like that is only on the very edge of the flange, and, at most, 180 degrees of metal around it. My gut feeling is that the spot weld is stronger. The factory used spot welds, and I imagine there's a good reason for it. And if that doesn't work, tell your dad you're doing it this way, and that's that... which is what I do haha.
Latin American dad. Working on his own to support family from the time he was a teenager when his dad passed away. It's not like it's a surprise, but it's definitely frustrating a lot of the time haha.
I need to look into getting a spot welder or borrowing one then. If not, I may weld it up whichever way we do it for now and spot weld it a bit down the road before painting. It's not like I'm driving it much and it definitely doesn't have enough power to start affecting the frame. I could be totally wrong of course. I know the rockers are structural, but I assume anything that has them welded pretty firmly to the rest of the car will work well enough for now on a car that makes maybe 120hp as is, and is barely going to be driven until another several months or even a year down the road.
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Second question: Is there a legitimate reason NOT to just weld a long seam along the edges where the new rocker meets the old metal?
The reason I ask if my father is the most infuriatingly stubborn man and he seems to think that would be better than spot welding it.
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Put it on the same way the factory did - with spot welds. The rockers are a major structural point of the chassis too, so make sure you put some bracing in to keep everything square. And make sure to mock everything up with the fender on to be sure the mounting points are in the right place.
Awesome, thanks for the response!
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SUPER IMPORTANT QUESTION:
When putting on new rocker panels, do people generally just spot weld them on like the originals, or do they make a seam like on butt joints? I've been searching for hours and most of the pictures I've found are sparse to say the least and there's not much detail in the descriptions on how to get the whole job done. I'm almost done completely removing the driver side, but I'm still slightly confused by a couple things.
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No pictures right now, but I've taken everything apart to prepare for metal work and hopefully sandblast this thing. There was way more bondo in some areas than I thought and it turned out to be more rust than I was hoping for, but the worst is in areas I already bought replacement panels for so I'm not too bummed.
I'm gonna have to buy the lower panel for the passenger fender though because I had no idea it was pretty much just rust and bondo. Live and learn I guess. The project keeps getting to be more and more work than I expected just go the the shell in decent condition, but my fuel setup will be solid for pretty much any engine I choose to swap down the road (especially an LS engine), and the interior with few exceptions is pretty much done. Just gotta patch up this metal which is gonna be a pita.
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Haven't been posting much lately. Been trying to apply for full time jobs and I was in Oregon for a few days just recently checking out a job offer. Finally made a cover for the tank. Made from aluminum my dad got at the scrapyard. It's bolted around the sides so I can access anything I want on the tank or the rear end down the road. Welded the fancy little things you see around the circle so I could bolt the plate down. It works well enough for now
Dad cutting the cover and a mockup
Fancy schtuff
Gives you an idea of placement pre-welded
Aaaand, painted and bolted on (mostly, you get the idea)
It's not perfect but it'll do for now.
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Been raining a lot here the last few days. Haven't done too much last weekend, but earlier I got the chance to clean up the glass, particularly the nasty tint that was left on the driver side window. Took a couple hours of scraping even after using a window film adhesive remover.
Before (note that this is just a couple minutes after I had started. don't have a true "before" pic):
After:
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Frankenstein lives:
Obviously I haven't put everything back on yet. Threw the taillights back on super fast just so i didn't feel too ratty, but she moves! Still finishing the back piece for carpet. Not sure if I'll have that totally done tonight, but pics will come as soon as it's done and I've thrown them on for a test fit.
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Didn't get a chance to get some pics or video of the car moving today because we've been getting some pretty good rain. I'll get something once it's sunny again.
In the meantime I started cutting up the carpet that I bought over a year ago. It's all laid out and ready to go. center piece at the rear of the console was finished earlier. I'll have pics up in the morning when I finish the rest.
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Very nice. Congrats on getting the car running and congrats on grad!
Thanks a lot! It's been a lot of hard work, but I'm excited to actually do something with it that'll make me money now haha
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Major milestone in both life and in the Z car.
I graduated from my university this weekend, but more importantly... I bled the clutch properly and the car shifts quite well right now. Pumped up the lousy tires for a test drive and it actually feels quite good! I'll have a video when I take another short spin around the neighborhood tomorrow.
Time for metal work and paint stripping
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I thought I had figured out the clutch, I was wrong. I think there's just not enough throw in the new clutch master cylinder. I realized that a lot of people actually have this problem so I swapped out the push rod from my old on into the new master cylinder. It's installed right now, but I haven't had a chance to bleed it.
Only things left to get it moving is clutch bleeding and new tires. I got a battery for it this week so I don't have to jump start it. I'll have to replace the air flow meter boot soon. I have a plugged up one from a 78 on there right now, but it's torn up and the engine is running super rich.
If anyone has alternatives for the AFM boot on a '76 I would greatly appreciate some suggestions... $50 for the one from MSA is money I could spend other places :/
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Used some test leads yesterday to check the Racetronix pump that came in the Camaro tank. It's working beautifully, the guy that last did the job did a terrible splicing job. I'm redoing wiring later today and seeing if the stock connectors on the pump assy aren't busted as well. If not, I removed the evap sensor and ran the wires through the hole. I'll do some more custom stuff to make that work with some quick disconnect cables. It's satisfying knowing that pump is working though, shouldn't have any pump issues for a long time even with an engine swap.
Will update post with my final wiring when I get to it later tonight.
Update: Pins on the pump assembly were busted or at least bent enough that the original connection wasn't making proper contact. Fed the wires through the hole where the evap pressure sensor used to be (since I can't use it anyway), and respliced them to some quick disconnect ends. Cut the hoses down to a more appropriate size too now that I know I'm using the internal pump and put the interior trim back over the filler. Looks much more complete than before, just need to make a cover for the spare wheel hole.
With that, the fuel delivery is pretty much done.
Will be wiring the sending unit next before I put the cover on. Won't be accurate until down the road when I get new gauges, but this will work for now. -
Here are some pics of the filler neck I made for the Z to keep it semi-oem looking.
Looks like a frankenstein of a filler neck, but the welds are really well done where it counts (where the bottom of the camaro tank meets the top of the '78 filler)
If you have a late model Z (77-78), this is actually not a bad option if you're going for the camaro tank. All it takes is cutting the top of the camaro neck, an inch or two off the bottom of the Datsun neck, and then joining them together. I cut the lower bend from the camaro filler, but I almost wish I'd figured out a way to angle the camaro piece towards the tank because right now the filler hose is in a really tight S bend to get the whole thing to work, but it's not bad so far.
Here are a few not so great pictures from when I installed it after getting home from my last concert as an undergraduate trumpet player.
Cap ended up a bit offset from center but I'm not too concerned about that. And yes the hole from the pipe at the top that would originally lead to the vapor tank will be plugged.
Edit: Also... ignore the weird paint at the filler.... that will be fixed when the metal work is done and I start paint haha.
Edit 2: There was a small kink in the hose from the tight S bend by the original opening in the car where the hose is routed. Solution: extra hose clamp did the trick
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Finally got a semi-permanent solution for the filler neck going. Update in next post once it's installed and I have some pictures. It involves the top half of a late model filler neck, the rim from my original neck, and the lower half of the Camaro filler to narrow it down into the hose I'm using. Gotta cut off a couple inches on this hose and adjust the rim so it screws on properly. The upper portion will need to be cleaned up later for appearance sake and in case of spills but it'll work quite well for now.
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Work in progress:
Pardon the crappy picture quality. I saved it from snapchat when I was sending the picture to my older brother haha. Still needs carpet and the driver door panel needs to be installed, but it'll all be taken apart at least one more time before metal work for rust repair and repaint.
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Dad got home at 2 in the morning yesterday. Got a chance to grab my seats and console lid to see how it all fit together. I'm pretty happy with the result. It almost looks like a proper interior now.
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Minor update:
I repainted the taillight panels last weekend. I still want to take them apart again to resand and recoat a couple spots that are still a bit rought rough but they look quite nice now compared to before. The bezel around the lights is a gloss black and the rest is a satin black.
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Didn't think I'd get an answer so fast, thanks a lot!
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Weird random story:
My dad's still in Mexico for another few days, I took this picture in the Summer of '09 which was the last time I was there. This was back when I only dreamed of a project car, but I thought the car looked pretty good.
This is my dad next to the same car earlier today!
Will be wiring the sending unit next before I put the cover on. Won't be accurate until down the road when I get new gauges, but this will work for now.
A musician's therapist (The $300 Z)
in S30 Series - 240z, 260z, 280z
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Couple more randoms of the full rockers in the middle of alignment, some rust, a couple of welding shots, and the passenger door rust I'll have to patch.