8DC

I would be interested in having the hatch done this way, if it could be done without being insanely expensive.

Thanks to both of you! I'm off to retorque my bolts.

Does anyone know how many decibels the twicepipes system with header puts out while cruising? Under moderate acceleration? Idling? Would be good information to have if anyone has access to the instruments used to measure such things.

Thanks for the reply, this is what I did after putting my head on and running the coolant through it yesterday. ...but I have this feeling that something isn't right because I always thought that the retorquing process required you to back the bolt off a bit before retightening because the friction of the tightened bolt head would require more torque to get moving than the amount you were torquing the bolt to. To get an accurate reading, you would need to back the bolt off a bit, right? Or is that already figured into the 61 ft./lbs. final torque?

May be a bit of a beginner question for this forum, but what is the proper procedure to retorque the head bolts? Do you back them off one at a time or all at once in reverse sequence? Back them out until they are loose or just a turn or two? If one by one, do the two small bolts in the timing cover need to be removed prior to doing this (I know it's important to remove them first when removing the head)? If done one by one, do you loosen and retorque in sequence or reverse sequence? Thanks!

Finally completed my head work, slapped the hood on and rolled it out of the garage to rinse all of the dust, dirt and grime off.

Nice. I have one of those fiberglass bumpers sitting in my garage, how did you make the bracket to mount the sides?

Currently waiting for new manifold studs to arrive from MSA, so after work I've been cleaning other things up. Resprayed the airbox and dropped in a filter that is in slightly better condition than the last. Last night I sprayed the engine compartment in front of the radiator, reinstalled the horns, airbox, overflow tank, grill and bumper (which needs to be adjusted yet). It's starting to look like a car again.

See the wire sticking out of the timing chain? That's attached to the end of the hardwood stake I drove into the beast's heart to keep it immobile while I removed it's head. The old N42 head and exhaust manifold. Both bolts holding the thermostat housing on were corrosion-locked and snapped off when I tried backing them out. The thermostat housing itself seems to be attached with some kind of JB Weld-like adhesive, I'm not seeing any evidence of a gasket at all and couldn't get the housing to free itself by either rubber mallet or chisel (at risk of damaging both aluminum surfaces). Luckily enough, I just happened to meet a guy in town that had an L28 thermostat housing he let me have (said it was just sitting in a pile of aluminum destined for the scrap yard). What are the odds? lol Exhaust manifold was lightly ported, bead blasted and sprayed with 1200 degree matte black engine paint. The block after the manifolds and head have been removed, before scraping the deck. Deck scraped and cleaned with headgasket finally in place. New head is on. For a bit there I thought I was never going to get that timing chain sprocket back on without pulling the timing cover, felt like the chain tensioner had popped out down inside, but I managed to work it back in with a long screwdriver. I also removed all parts of the non-working air conditioning system. May replace at some point, but is just unnecessary weight and clutter in the engine bay (which I'm trying to clean up) right now...

The Z crammed into our little garage starting the tear down for head work. Yeah, that doesn't look good... The valve cover before cleaning and a light polish. The intake and fuel rail prior to being torn apart for cleaning and painting. Intake, fuel rail and throttle body cleaned, painted and reassembled.

Before tearing into the engine, I decided that I needed to replace the inop tach. It's a bit hard to tell if things are running right if there is no way to tell how hard the engine is working at various speeds, you know? After it was replaced, I realized that judging by the engine sound I was severely short shifting it prior. Bought a used (but working) tach off of eBay that had dust and dirt under the lens. Easy fix: While waiting for my rebuilt head to arrive, I also eliminated those god-awful diving board bumpers. They are large, made from steel, attached by heavy shock absorbers, and trimmed in thick black rubber. Serious weight reduction, and from the outer edges of the car. Unfortunately, getting to the bolts for the passenger side rear shock requires the gas tank to be removed: ...so while it was out, I blasted the rust from the tank and sent it out to a friend of mine's paint shop to be resprayed: Also removed the lower air dam in the front as it looked like it had seen it's share of parking blocks and without the giant bumpers concealing it, looked like a mangled mess. Replaced with a Xenon air dam (will have to remove and paint it later): $154.54 shipped from autoaccessories4less, much much less than what MSA charges for the same airdam.

Bought (rescued, lol) this car from my younger brother back in March. He acquired it in near showcar condition 5 or so years ago and used it as a daily driver before enough maintenance issues piled up that it was undriveable and left to sit. I wanted something fun to wrench on so I offered to take it off his hands for $3k. The following pics show what it looked like in 2007 (found these on conceptcarz.com): ...and here are the (admittedly poor) cellphone pics I took the night we brought it home: Had to recharge the battery and change the oil (it wasn't even reading on the stick) just to get it home. The clutch was slipping and would let itself out, so the first weekend I flushed the system, replaced the clutch master and slave cylinders, and refilled it with new Dot 3 fluid. My brother said that he was having overheating problems before he put the car away, so I also replaced the water pump and reinstalled the thermostat (he had removed it as a "fix" for his overheating problems. This must have repressurized the system, because then the upper radiator hose developed a leak and needed to be replaced. Now that the car was heating up properly it was also blowing the dreaded blue smoke that always leads to head work. So within the first week of owning the car, I found myself purchasing a replacement rebuilt n42 head from datsunpartsllc (figured with the abuse there was good chance that the head was going to be cracked or have some other irreparable damage and this way I would have one less delay after I started tearing it down).

Personally, I like seeing more "car-like" cars... It's a nice concept and deviation from the norm, but I don't think I would want to see the whole field move in this direction (which is bound to happen if it starts proving itself competitive).

Fogged some rust to primer and black paint in the area in front of the radiator and mounted my front 240 bumper.

Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?

Odd that he was taking down your license plate number, but while you are out and about driving it's pretty much public knowledge. What exactly are you worried will happen? He could follow you home easier than doing research on your number...

Grills and fiberglass bumpers to be added after engine work (have them hanging in the garage): How it sits currently: More pics and progress here: http://www.cardomain.com/ride/3976294/1976-datsun-280z

*post merged and deleted*

Fortunately I don't have to worry about getting them out, new (rebuilt) head and I was lucky enough to find someone nearby that had a thermostat housing. I don't know what the previous owner did, not only have the bolts become one with the housing but also the housing looks like it was JB Welded (or something) to the head, there's no gasket that I can detect on there and I can't even chisel it apart (at risk of damaging both surfaces but I had exhausted all other options). Yeah' date=' I will probably have to do that. I was hoping someone would know the exact length of the bolts though so I don't accidentally run one into the timing chain. lol Okay, thanks!

Attempted to move the thermostat housing from the old head to the rebuilt one I just installed. Of course the 2 bolts holding it on were corrosion locked and snapped off when I tried breaking them free, so now I need 2 new bolts. What size are these bolts and what are the chances that I will be able to find them at the hardware store? I also see that "reddat" sells the set of 4 (2 for the housing and 2 for the outlet) on eBay for $25, is that my best option?

If you are running the stock n42 block, which has dished pistons, your compression ratio will drop to about 7.3 with the p90 head. It will feel noticeably slower. I was considering the better flowing p90 head on my n42 block for a bit, but unless you are planning on also swapping the pistons for flat-tops (to keep compression up) or going turbo (where you may want a lower CR), it doesn't seem to be worth it. I just replaced my stock n42 head (with spraybar) with another n42 head (internally oiled).

Because it was the only one I could come across at the time (I needed a new headgasket fast), I purchased a '77 Ishino headgasket set for my '76 280z. This is what arrived from PartsGeek: Ishino is Stone? o.O Knowing that '77 has round ports and my '76 has square, I also ordered a FelPro exhaust manifold gasket. Much to my surprise, both exhaust manifold gaskets are identically cut with a hex like shape at the exhaust ports. Are these universal now (thinking that the hex shape is meant to cover both the square and round holes) or is there another exhaust manifold gasket? Also, the Stone/Ishino gasket (top) is made from a metallic material and slightly thicker than the FelPro gasket (bottom), which is made from a thin metal sheet sandwiched in what looks like cardboard. Would one be preferrable to the other?

I would be interested in a set for my '76 280z. I can take measurements if you still need them.

Does anyone know the part # for these?

Not my car (I wish! lol), but here's a link to the build thread of the cleanest s30 in existence: http://www.6speedonline.com/forums/other-japanese-supercars/187324-check-out-my-datsun-240z-build.html It's in the original lime green color.