Dragonfly

Well heres my 2c worth. Next time you take a look at an intake/exhaust manifold gasket look at the shape of the exhaust ports on the gasket. They are a funny diamond shape, the reason for that is so thay can make one gasket that fits round or square port exhaust. By using one of these gaskets (as far as I know they are all made like that now) you can easily mix square and round exhaust heads and manifolds. You will not get a quality port matched flow but it will not leak on you either. At this time with my spare engine in my car I have my square tube headers on a p79 head with round exhaust ports and no leaks, as far as how much power you may loose doing this take a look at my post about racing the 350Z to see my 1/8 mile times with this bone stock engine. Dragonfly

Sounds like your pickup coil inside your distributer may be going bad, here is how to test it and find out. Take off your distributer cap and pull the rotor off, then locate the connecter beside your distributor where the wires connect to the distributor. Disconnect the wires at the connection, using an ohm meter check the resistance of the wires coming out of the distributor, right this number down. With the ohm meter still connected use a halogen work light (or any other hot lamp) and heat up the top portion of your distributer and watch to see if your resistance changes, then after the thing is hot tap on the side of the distributer with a rubber mallet or something similar that will not damage your distributor, again watch for a change in resistance. If you see any eratic or obvious changes in resistance your pickup coil is bad and needs to be changed. Changing the pickup coil can be done yourself but it is not a job for the mechanicaly timid. If this is your problem it will only get worse and your car will start to die on you for no apparent reason, what is even worse is when you take it in to a mechanic they will not be able to find the problem and will probably just replace your entire distributor and charge you an arm and a leg for all there trouble shooting time. Good luck and if that is the problem and you would like more details on fixing it yourself just let me know. Dragonfly

I have to agree, he started pulling on me very hard in 3rd and would have had a clear view of my headlights by the time we passed the 1/4 mile mark. I was actualy there to practice my reaction times, now I really want to get my stroker back together so I can beat him with my car and not experiance. Dragonfly

I was at the Racelegal drags on Friday night and a guy showed up in a 350Z, I managed to get the chance to run against him 4 times. There are a few things I have to sy before I post the runs: This was the first time the 350Z owner has ever drag raced and I was running my spare engine (bone stock L28). LEFT LANE RIGHT LANE 5163 Entry # 5341 WINNER 0.00 --------------- Index -------------0.00 0.554 --------------- Reaction------- 0.494 2.196 --------------- 60 ft ------- 2.397 70.98 --------------- MPH ------- 76.14 9.770 --------------- ET ------- 9.737 First ------- 0.093 RED LEFT LANE RIGHT LANE 5163 Entry # 5341 WINNER 0.00 --------------- Index ------- 0.00 0.500 --------------- Reaction------- 0.681 2.297 --------------- 60 ft ------- 2.424 71.09 --------------- MPH ------- 74.87 9.811 --------------- ET ------- 9.882 0.252 --------------- First LEFT LANE RIGHT LANE 5163 Entry # 5341 WINNER 0.00 --------------- Index ------- 0.00 0.442 --------------- Reaction------- 0.720 2.268 --------------- 60 ft ------- 2.356 70.98 --------------- MPH ------- 74.74 9.830 --------------- ET ------- 9.952 0.400 --------------- First RED LEFT LANE RIGHT LANE 5163 Entry # 5341 WINNER 0.00 --------------- Index ------- 0.00 0.582 --------------- Reaction------- 0.670 2.217 --------------- 60 ft ------- 2.390 71.09 --------------- MPH ------- 75.12 9.758 --------------- ET ------- 9.804 0.134 --------------- First I am # 5163 and the 350Z is # 5341. BTW we were both running street tires. Dragonfly

Check this one out. http://www.sltrib.com/11122002/utah/15892.htm Dragonfly

Just my opinion here but if you are thinking about taking that route I would follow JeffP or Zgad and build a turbo stroker. If you are going to start from scratch anyway and you are going to use an sds or similar system why not shoot for the top of the ladder instead of the middle. BTW the F54 is the correct block. Dragonfly

In my stroker I am running an aluminum radiator from a Fiero, I am also running the Fiero fan which just happens to be a two speed fan. The radiator is NOT a direct bolt in but it is not difficult either. If you decide to go this route make sure to find a Fiero with an all aluminum radiator (and plastic side tanks) not the combination brass/aluminum with brass side tanks. Get the radiator, complete upper support, fan (if you want to go that route), and the rubber radiator mounts from the lower support. I made my own lower support and I modified the upper support to allow me to bolt it into the car, on the fan I trimmed down the plastic on the sides so it would fit closer to the radiator to allow the minimal clearance I have between the fan and the water pump, I also drilled two holes in the top of the radiator support so I could bolt the fan directly to the radiator. All the above may seem a little confusing but with pictures it would make more since, unfortuanetely I do not have a digital camera or a place to put the pictures even if I had them, but if you decide you want to try this set up let me know and I will give you all the help and details I can. Dragonfly

Tim at this time my plans are to put my spare engine in, repair the stroker and make a couple of changes to bump up the power a little, seat the new rings, get a dyno pull or two then put it up for sale to help finance the V8 swap. I would have to say that unless 1fixer1 buys all my parts before I make the repairs I would be interested in doing some trading with you. You are correct about the transmission, not only do I want an overdrive I would also prefer to run a T56 or at least a 5spd if I just can't find a reasonably priced T56. By Monday (11-11-02) morning the repairs will start on the stroker and at that time I will no longer be willing to sell parts, it will either be all or nothing. Dragonfly

1fixer1 if you would like to talk me out of the parts before I do the repairs send me an email no later than Friday and we will talk about what I have and how much I want. Since you are local (to me) there is a chance that you may have seen my car before. If you have made it down to the racelegal races at Qualcomm I have raced nearly every time they were open for most of the year running this engine. I am also the VP of the Z Club of San Diego so if you have ever seen a large group of Z's cruising by I would have most likely been in the pack. My Z is a white 72' with black hood vents and inspection covers, black type "R" whale tale, black air dam that is aprox. 3" above the road, and very large Centerline wheels. The car also has Dragonfly written of each side and a hand painted graphic on the power bulge on the hood. I can be contacted through this forum or you can go to www.zcsd.org and look under the club officers section. Dragonfly

Well Tim now that you mention it... I was thinking almost exactly what you just said. I am going to get the engine running again, get a dyno sheet on it and put it up for sale to try to recoup some money then go V8. Since you have a stock pile of sbc stuff laying around you may have just saved me some shopping time. Do you happen to have the JTR manual laying around as well? I have a spare (bone stock) L28 in back that I am going to put in the car until I get the stroker back on its feet then I will start working on the sbc. Dragonfly

My little problem I had with oil fouling on #4 cylinder just became much much worse. I pulled the head and took it into the machine shop and the owner said it looked like #4 piston contacted the head he told me when I got home to see if there were indications on the piston of contact. Upon inspection of the piston (which was at BDC) I found evidence of contact but I also found two perfectly matched and radiused grooves cut 1/8" into the cylinder wall thats when I realized that my circlip on my full floating (damn expensive) forged piston broke and allowed the wrist pin to do some custom machining into my cylinder wall. My delima is that I have 3K into this stroker and this is going to cost me aprox. $700 in parts, labor, repair work etc. and of course there is no way of regaining these expenditures. If I decide to go V8 then I need to get the engine, transmission, JTR manual, and any number of small misc. stuff to put it all together and get it on the road. This is where I need profesional help... are there any shrinks on the board ? Dragonfly

I am running a lightened flywheel, my engine is a 3.0L stroker and I had the stock flywheel lightened to 16lbs from 24lbs. For me this has been very good for the street and on the track. The primary thing about going overly light is that your idle will suffer and taking off from a stop can be tricky, remember your flywheel is designed to balance the energy created by cumbustion and keep the engine rotating steadily at low rpms. Dragonfly

Yea its going to get everything cleaned up etc. it has already been ported and polished. To make a long story short the head should have had new guides also but they went into a head that was bad and I missed having them put into this head. While I have it off I am going to have the head shaved a little to bump up my compression. Dragonfly

Last night I pulled the springs off the valves for #4 cyl. and the seals were fine, what I found though is that the valve guide for the exhaust valve is worn out and the valve has enough movement that I can easily feel it. Looks like the head is going to have to come off even though I had hoped not. Dragonfly

Mike I hope you are correct with your assesment, I will check them tonight when I get home. Demidion I hope you are incorrect but if the simpler solutions do not pan out I will start checking the ones I don't want to hear. Dragonfly

I pulled my spark plugs the other day and all of them looked good except #4 which appeared to be oil fouled. I ran a static compression test and #4 was 165#'s while the others varied from 173-179#'s. I do not have a leak down tester so I put #4 to TDC and pressurized it to 70psi and I could hear air escaping past the rings (none out of the intake or exhaust). I squirted oil into #4 and checked the compression again and it still read 165, I checked three more times and each time it read 165. I do not understand how I can hear air getting past the rings but adding oil did not raise the compression, am I missing something? Dragonfly

The 3 screw carbs are the newer style and the reason for the sleave being pressed in is to remove an adjustment that should never be made by a novice. Every thing about the 3 screw carbs that are different from the 4 screw are there to make the carb more user friendly, so as long as yours are not hitting the needle against the jet they are going to be easier to set up and tune. The flat thumb wheel with the stops are so the mechanic who has never seen those carbs before can not screw up the settings as bad, with the thick thumb screw you can turn it down until the jet falls out the bottom. It usualy takes me about 20 to 30 minutes to undo the 3 hours of adjusting some one else has done to a set of SU's then less than 10 minutes to properly adjust them using a color tune and a flow gage (manometer). Since you have two sets the set with the best (condition) throttle shafts will be the set that runs the best. Dragonfly

The value of the 3 screw carbs vs the 4 screw carbs is negligable, the differance between the two which is why ZTherapy will not let you exchange 3 screw for 4 screw and vice versa is that on the 4 screw the brass sleave that holds the jet in place is threaded and therefore adjustable while the 3 screw is pressed into place and can not be adjusted. I talked to Scott Brunning in person at length about this and he explained to me that the pressed in sleave will sometimes be pressed in at an angle (not perpendicular to the bridge) which causes the jet and the needle to come into contact with each other creating abnormal wear and poor behavior. My personal recomendation is that if you have the 3 screw carbs pull the piston and check the needle to see if it has been rubbing on the jet, if it has and they are ZTherapy carbs you can exchange them. Dragonfly

Yes I have heard of the R190 and I personally do not know much about them but I would highly recomend that you contact Les Cannaday at http://www.classicdatsun.com/. Les purchased all of the spare parts that Nissan had for the R190's not to long ago and if you ever need anything for that diff he is the guy to talk to. Dragonfly

As far as I know if you are ever caught with a deliberate igniting device in your exhaust system (ie. a spark plug) it is a huge fine and possible loss of the vehicle. As far as the race cars putting flames out the exhaust I believe (but could be wrong) that the cars run a rich fuel mixture to get more top end power and when they let off the accelerator raw fuel is pulled through the engine then ignites in the very hot exhaust system causing those really awsome flames. Most of the rest of us only get enough fuel in the exhaust to cause a backfire but no flames. Dragonfly

Mike you may want to look into converting your steering to rack and pinion from a 79' zx, I'm not sure how much work it will be as most people are doing the opposite and getting rid of the rack and pinion in favor of the power steering. As for the inside of the car what can go but you may miss more than your AC is you speakers, if you feel you still need some tunes get some little cheapies and put those big boat anchors you have into your SUV. If you have roadside assistance you can dump your jack and spare for a can of fix-a-flat. Beyond that you are starting to get as extreme as me which may make your car a little uncomfortable to drive every day. Dragonfly

Most NOS systems after being charged (bottle open) use a micro switch either below the gas peddle or on the throttle linkage which activates the selinoids at wot when dry reving his engine he hit the switch and caused the car to severly over rev. I am sure that on top of putting the NOS on the car he also changed a chip which defeated any governer or rev limmiter that may have been on the car. Dragonfly

I was at the race legal races in San Diego the other night when these two mustangs pulled into the burnout box. Both of these guys started dry reving their cars, well one of the cars (an 02' Saleen) pushed the gas a little to far and activated his NOS, according to the track announcer the hood of the car bulged out so far he thought it was going to pop open. After they burned off all the oil they swept up a pretty decent size pile of iron and aluminum some of which looked like it may have been piston parts. I felt sorry for the guy until I realized that he was the guy in line who was being a complete obnoxious ass to everyone within earshot. Dragonfly

Jt1 I am not saying what you did with your drive shaft bolts is incorrect but I want to tell you what I was just reading last night. I am reading the book "Engineer to win" by Carrol Smith and in the chapter on bolts he says that the weakest part of a bolt is where the threads end at the shank and if the bolt is being used to fasten parts the shank should be shorter than the thickness of the part it is inserted through, this allows the bolt to exert its maximum clamping force. If the bolt is being used in a double shear application (which the drive shaft flange is) he says to make sure the shank goes all the way through then you add a hardened washer to torque the nut down to. The other important thing he said was not to cut threads into the shank of a bolt as a die will tear the metal and create numerous stress risers that you can not see with the naked eye which greatly reduce the life expactancy of the bolt. The reason I am going on about this is because it will not break untill you need it most ie that race you just bet your mortgage payment on or that semi you pulled out in front of so as not to be stuck behind him blah blah blah. Dragonfly

With my 72' I had to shorten the drive shaft by 1.25 inches. I also noticed that I was not able to use some of the tricks that I had read about for mounting the T5 which leads me to believe that each car is different just enough that you will have put it in and measure for your car and go from there. BTW a compitent drive shaft shop can shorten the turbo drive shaft at the ends between the end flange and the taper on the shaft, if a shop tells you they can't do that find a different shop. Dragonfly