Tony D

3 to 400 HP from a 4 liter engine can easily be done N/A... A nice individual throttle body wouldn't be that hard to rig up, much like sheetmetal tunnel rams fabbed for NHRA cars... Of course, using two L20ET turbos (hmmmm, 4 liters, turbos sized for 2 liters, twin turbo.... cheap OEM parts availability...) would also be interesting, and with 10 to 12 psi of boost it would not be a big deal, because you could use a lot of WRX cast-offs, just in duplicate...

The Maxima Tranny used identical transmission ratios in the Stick version, as did the petrol versions. I have a 275K mile Maxima Tranny in my wife's 260Z right now, and it had the same .7X O.D as the 82/83 N/A ZX cars did. The LD engine had a redline of 4600rpm (so I'm told) and most people have the "comfort level" of shifting in a passenger car around 3000rpms, so Nissan geared them identically. I was disappointed that the tranny and rear gears were not something spectacular---I was hoping I could use them on the Bonneville Car! The only place the gearing is different is that the Auto Tranny First Sun Cluster DOES have lower gears to move the car along. The gearing in that first hub IS different than the petrol versions of the Maxima. Theoretically when swapping to a petrol setup, it would let you come out the hole a bit harder, yet still retain the .67 OD of the 4 speed autobox for cruise. On a petrol powered car, that could mean a realiztic 4.3 or 4.6 gearset for off the line (if you can hook) and decent cruise economy for highway usage. Some things I noticed that were neat on the Std LD I dissected: Teh flywheel seems to be a dragracer's delight. Much heavier, and using the 240 style collar and pressure plate would allow it's use in petrol cars. Makes for speedshifting glory... I liked the D-Pumps Gilmer drive.... Looked at it for some time thinking of neat little crank driven accessories I could use that for, but...... And of course, there's the intake manifold... What hasn't been said about those huge runners! I was made aware that a turbo version of this engine was available in Europe, anyone happen to have any photos of that setup?

Randy, I may have to stop through Modesto on the next trip up north! LOL Ianz has one from a good, running vehicle in his garage right now, and has offered it to me, so if that does it, then I may lay in a supply of "spares" because the 81 units seem few and far between. It also makes sense to "do the swap before you have problems", so anybody thinking of "rejuvinating" your 81 ZXT using MSS, realize GIGO! If the sensor is already bad, you will need to fix THAT before converting to MSS. The Magnet Trigger is sounding pretty good to me. My wiring is such that I could easily make a modification and run some triggers off either the cam snout, harmonic balancer, or the flywheel. That mod intrigues me, it lets me say "I built the trigger myself" also! Which would be neat in and of itself.... We are all truly diseased! LOL

sounds like my old Corvair. Nothing till the top of first (maybe a pound), then then in second I would get 5, third gear gave me 10, and when on it hard in fourth I would spool to between 17 and 21psi depending on the weather. The Corvair didn't have a wastegate... That should point you to what is going on.... I will lay money you need some more tension on the actuator arm to hold it closed! Sounds like you are constantly blowing past the wastegate, and the spool is directly related to the load you have on the engine! Let us know what you find, because it sure sounds like you don't have enough tension on the flapper to hold the exhaust pressure, and it's bypassing on a variable basis.

The 82/83 ZXT's have an integrated electrically driven vacuum pump and reservoir complete with a vacuum actuated switch to pump down it's little vacuum reservoir to allow the HVAC controls to continue to function (as well as the Idle Air Regulator) at all times. If you ever noticed some Fords, the HVAC controls will change state when climbing hills due to the vacuum loss. The stock Dstsun system will turn on the electric pump to keep the reservoir at a set vacuum level for proper opreation of vacuum operated accssories no matter what---the reservoir is also ducted to the intake manifold with a check valve inline, so under normal conditions, the engine supplies vacuum, but under the conditions talked about above, the electric pump steps in at a predetermined value to keep everything functioning flawlessly. On the ZXT, vacuum is what moved the heater controls, as well as AC dampers. On a 110 degree day, the last thing you want when you pass that vette is for the AC to start pumping "full heat" onto your feet! For those of us who remember vacuum operated windshield wipers, the first thing that comes to mind after seeing the Datsun Pump Assembly is (that would fit under the dash easily enough, and I'd never have slow wipers again! PssshTA, PssssshTA, Psssssssssssssss(WHACK!)TA! Some of you guys will never realize how nice electric wipers really are! Even the "slow" 240 wipers! LOL

when in doubt, reburn straight to MS code, check on stimulator with laptop connected, then reburn back to MSS and try again. This is the process I started doing to make sure it wasn't in "the box"... And in most cases, it wasn't. When it WAS in "the box" the thing just quit working altogether---havn't gone back to see why yet...

I just tried to e-mail you something, but excite freaked, and lost the whole thing... I have been instructed by IT that I must remove any messaging program off the company Laptop other than Lotus Sametime. I had YM, but rarely used it. Bummer... Anyway, the gist of the e-mail was with the preponderance of "Fidle not working" complaints, and the bulk purchasing of prebuilt units that have THREE RELAYS HARD SOLDERED TO THE RELAY BOARD we may want to add a graphic image to the sticky that impresses upon new owners of prefab units that they will either have to specify from their builder to not install the third (Fidle) relay, or they will be doing a modification themselves regardless of the "prefab" nature of their purchase! I have a series of photos that went along with this as well as a phone dialogue that was pretty funny: "Well, a plastic cover came off, and now there are wires, metal connectors, and some small coil on the board, is that what it should look like?" If you want them for a post, let me know Moby, I'll send them via Yahoo E-Mail, excite seems to be freaking out a bit too much for me lately!

was the inside of the pan painted at all? I think the last on I pulled was bare metal... In any case, the only paint I have ever used [/i]inside[/i] the engine peoper is Glyptal (red electrical insulating varnish). Google Glyptal, and you should find it. It is good for sealing up a freshly-hot-tanked engine block.

I am truly wondering if the 81CAS is marginal, and the signal deteriorates when heated. Sims, did you see your IN DASH tachometer start going crazy at the same time? I have not had the in-dash tach fluctuate UNTIL this last go-round, which leads me to think it's the triggering circuit in the CAS giving a bad sensor signal, and throwing everything else off. The in dash tach senses firing of the coil, so that pretty much isolates it outside the MS and what it's doing. All the MS does is pass through the signal it receives... I also note nobody with the 82/83 CAS is not having these sorts of problems... So when Moby says take it from a RUNNING DRIVING CAR, the only thing I have to add to it is LISTEN TO THAT ADVICE!!! I have another 81CAS that has been offered to me, as well as the stuff required to convert to the 82/83 CAS setup. It will have to wait till after MSA to diagnose further, I am hardheaded and want to PROVE beyond a shadow of a doubt that the 81 CAS is useable (which is pretty much a foregone conclusion) but after the modification to the pulley, I want to prove it again with full advance. Man, the way this thing pulls and the throttle response is phenomenal! And as an aside, I talked a guy through an MS problem the past two evenings (bought the stuff assembled) and his relay box had hard-soldered relays on the board! But we got it running the first night, and the next evening he DROVE it to Irwindale for the drags on Moby's maps! So I know the "back end" of the equation WORKS! It's just my "front end" that is making me appear as a "rear end"! LOL

I will go with Jkube on that one let me try this: 12V+ ----- Resistor Pack-----Inj1+ Inj1(-)----- 12V+ ----- Resistor Pack -----Inj2+ Inj2(-)-----SPLICE -----INJ1(Gnd for Injectors thru MS) 12V+ ----- Resistor Pack-----Inj3+ Inj3(-)-----/ 12V+ ----- Resistor Pack -----Inj4+ Inj4(-)----- 12V+ ----- Resistor Pack -----Inj5+ Inj5(-)-----SPLICE -----INJ2(Gnd for Injectors thru MS) 12V+ ----- Resistor Pack -----Inj6+ Inj6(-)-----/ Basically I have one common 12V+ lead to the resistor package, a stock unit from an 81N/A ZX, and then the grouping of the leads for the ground through the MS is what is important. You can run this setup in either simultaneous, or alternating. I found better results while idling using alternatings two squirts per cycle... The way you have it wired (if I understand what is there) will not have correct resistance, and is running injectors in series, which is not the way you should do it from what I understand. I hope this looks better now that I edited it! LOL

I recently took that laptop into the dealer for servicing. When I got it back, I had a new motherboard, hard drive, touchpad membrane, keyboard, and whatever else they deemed necessary. It would connect to my network at home via the PC Slot wireless card, but would not show up via the ethernet port on the back of the machine. It would SHOW a connection, it would SHOW that it was connected, but you just couldn't GO anywhere! At first, when at the service counter, they thought it was "my settings" but after a quick checkout, off it went for the above mentioned repairs. Have not tried that laptop since. The USB to Serial adapter on the Dell is working fine, using a Pentium 4 Chipset, and HP Pro. It's just something that on the board nobody would even ACKNOWLEDGE as an issue. It was rewriting the tables randomly, and ACTING like a dirty tach signal. Remember the KEY thing in diagnosing it was to put the "RPM CALC" gauge on the screen, that is the High Resolution signal FROM the MS that the COMPUTER is reading to determine the RPM to show on ALL the other "Tachs" in all the other programs! My RPM Calc was steady as a rock, but EVERYTHING ELSE was jittering around like crazy!

I can spend a few minutes getting someone's MS-S unit running over the phone, meanwhile mine is acting up again. Can't even drive it now. BAH! Scratching my head on this one, started backfiring, and now has a "tach irregularity" again... Above 2500 it starts going haywire... So much for taking this one to MSA. Freezit didn't help. I will kill someone if I actually have a Bad CAS unit, that simply didn't show up until I drive the car to get it to 200F and good an heat soaked. I give up again. For another year. This sucks.

I second the suggestion to get the multimeter! You are onto something with the voltage sensing wire from the battery to the alternator's regulator! If there is corrosion, you will run all sorts of screwy voltages! Grounds do the same thing. I added ONE 14 Gauge wire from the external regulator on my 75, to the ground point on the fender well. Before I ran this ONE wire, the voltage was all over the place, upwards of 15 VDC! After the ground wire was in place, the voltage went to 13.8VDC at idle, and in NO case would it go above 14.5 VDC even with all the accssories running (including the 100W H4 lights up front!) If the grounds for the accessories are gone, it gives spurious indications, and if that feedback line is corroded, or bad in any way TO the alternator, It will CRANK out the voltage till it SEES 13.8V back to it on that line. There is supposed to be less than 1VDC difference between what is at the battery, and what is at the alternator feedback line to the alternator (at the alternator). If that is not the case, fix IT first, or most likely you will waste another Alternator (though AZ and many of the mass merchandisers are not that great at providing properly rebuilt parts like Datsun Alternators!) And remember, always CHARGE your battery before you run it up to do a charging system check. Nothing kills the diode pack faster than overamperage from trying to fast-charge a battery. The windings will hold it, but the diodes will literally melt the solder off the end trying to keep up with the ampreage requirements!

At THAT point, the turbo is that more efficient. See above on tip speed for blowers... There are compromises in everything, and how you compromise when designing depends on how things respond... As far as vacuum secondaries in a blow-through, they have to be modified to work on pressure, or totally manual conversion... For a blow-through, a non-progressive mechanical synchronous secondaries is what should be done, depending on pressure activated dashopts to overcome boost reliably is tennuous at best. Generally vacuum secondaries work better on draw-through applications, and in that case, you can also modify them to actuate at a PSI rating rather than a vacuum setpoint for a more reliable operation.

Drax has it dead on with the drawthrough/blowthrough differentiation. On my Corvair, I needed to run a main jet size somewhere near .145" diameter, just so the jet area will flow enough fuel in a VACUUM situation to supply a proper fuel mix to the engine under boost. In my Turbo Z with triple Mikuinis, it was jetted a bit fat initially, before I learned how Maserati used Modulator Rings. After finding out how Maserati used a modulator ring on the front of the carburettor to cause a differential between the float bowl blanketing pressure, and the air pressure in the main throat (not to mention the delta caused by main and booster venturis) to force more fuel out under boost so you can run RICH on-boost, but properly jetted for a comparable N/A engine size, my life was much easier. Having a 2.8L 275 to 350HP Blow-Through setup that was driveable in daily commuting and returning 17+mpg kinda hooked me on that system... Until EFI became affordable! Even without the modulator rings, though, the main jets were never as large comparably as what I had to run in the Corvairs' SU, or even the Holley 650 Secondaries on the draw-through drag Z I helped build up. Clear as mud now? LOL As for the efficiencies the turbo map is a series of "islands" of varying efficiencies. So a turbocharger, or a centrifugal belt-driven blower will pass through the same islands on the way to the peak efficiencies... But the same goes for the Blower! The blower will have it's efficiencies at a rated "tip speed" for the lobes/screws. Ideally, you will match the peak tip speed efficiency for the flow/pressure curves to coincide where the theoretical torque peak is on the engine you have selected, for the best boost in power. It will make for a REALLY large bump in peak torque. If you skew the blower higher or lower in tip speed efficiency, you can broaden the torque curve on the engine somewhat because you have less losses (more efficient compression) at a point different that peak torque, making for an artificial VE Boost in those ranges... Like mentioned above, a stationary powerplant will use the waste heat for a recovery turbine, and in most cases to heat incoming air etc etc etc.... The more efficiencies you recover, the more power you put down the line. Kinda like those cooking kits that pump exhaust gasses through a chamber in the engine compartment to cook food. More efficiencies! Mmmmm, roadkill stew cooked by exhaust gasses! I'm blabbering again aren't I? I'm not helping much, I'm shutting up now...

The Problem(s). 1) Won't hold a charge 2) When running my voltmeter spikes out to 18volts 3) When spiking all lights in the car fluxuate 4) The idle is ragged while running and sounds like she wants to die on me 5) (Now heres the mind bender) When I step on the brakes everything drops back to normal. FIRST AND FOREMOST: Get a REAL voltmeter, hook it to your battery leads, and see what is REALLY happening! Use a good digital unit. Fluctuating lights in MY mind at least means you have a diode or two going bad in your Alternator, and this will KILL your ECU in short order! SECOND: The brake pedal thing may be indicative of a DIRTY GROUND POINT ON THE DASH CLUSTER! When the common ground point gets dirty or corroded, the dash starts doing stupid things in a ZX, amongst them voltage meters that read wrong, dash lights that come on and off randomly, spurious "check light" malfunctions, etc etc etc. I am no S130 guy by any stretch of the imagination, but from friends' cars and their maladies, I would say to VERIFY what you have first, THEN move on with replacement of components. What I am getting at is the Alternator will KILL other components, so you need to check what it is doing INDEPENDENTLY from what the gauges in the car are telling you. I believe the 81's have INTERNAL Voltage Regulators in the alternators, so that will be a simple fix if you ARE seeing 18V at the battery (and if you've killed the batt a few times this is a good bet)---replace the alternator. If you see the gauge on the meter flicker, move around erratically, or pulse chances are the Diode packs are bad, and you need the alternator also. Remember that the surest way to KILL an alternator is trying to make it charge a dead battery! Once you have the alternator dialed in and working correctly, check everything again to see what it is doing when it gets a GOOD voltage stream to it. Some problems may dissapear altogether, some new ones may appear... (not what you wanted to hear, right?) But sitting for the duration of a WestPac indeed IS enough time to get corrosion buildup on terminals and connections that will cause a problem. The best advice I can give ANYONE regarding an older Z (and especially ones that have electronics in them) is to buy several cans of DEOXIT, and some Dielectric Grease, and GO TO TOWN on all your dashboard and critical connectors! You will be amazed how much better everything works after such a cleaning, and if you Dielectric Grease all the connections upon reassembly, you will be amazed how long they STAY clean! Good Luck, man... I don't envy the task ahead of you!

just wrap more electrical tape around the outer diameter...

What Grumpy said. I mixed my temperatures in one of the statements. By 160 degrees, I meant COOLANT temperature---which woulod translate generally to around 200 degrees F OIL temperature. That is the bare MINIMUM I would ever run anything! My 160 thermostat cracks at 160, and is fully open at 170, and on my wife's N/A is running 200 to 210 with that setup. I have gotten into arguments at other sites about using a "too cold" thermostat, but when you monitor the OIL temperature, and know it's the IMPORTANT temperature to watch, you can figure it out easily... 200 to 210 OIL temperature, did it again!

It's friendly, I just wanted to impress upon you that you twice said you altered the EFI harness, and wasn't sure you understood the wiring you needed to access was not in the EFI portion of the harness. The MS-n-S is totally isolated from this part of the circuit, you can hook it up without any problem. The only application that might have an issue, is the 240, due to that funky "+" setup on that tach...

That depends on how hard and long you are running it. I have seen coolant temperratures of 270 degrees for an hour straight climbing a grade in the mountians, and not havingt an oil temperature gauge could not say, but since they generally are about 40F higher.... 310F? That's cookin! Normally you want between 220 and 240 thermostatically controlled, and in no case less than 160F (condensation problems). If you see temperatures climbing while coolant stays steady, it's telling you something is mismatched, or undersized in your oil cooling system. If both coolant and oil rise, you're hosed, time to do some redesign or find out why the thing is overheating (heat input not equal to thermal rejection of the coolers)

Bastaad, The 240 tach, when used with the original power transistor firing a ZX coil will hook up exactly the same as the 240, and will work. I had that question myself, and we decided "Lets hook it up and see what happens". So with the STOCK system, the connection of the 240 Tach to the "+" side of the coil will trigger the stock tach just fine. For an MSD, like Randy said above, the MSD's multiple spark system will draw more current that the stock system, so the stock Tach will not read right until about 4000rpms, when the MSD box goes back to a single-fire on the plug (they don't etell you it does that, but it does....) For that box to work, you have to use the "Tach" output wire, and either a 260/280 tach, or an aftermarket unit. I found the Autometer Silv-o-Lite gauge to be about $45 cheaper than a STOCK tach on my wifes' 260, so I used that! Wrapped it six or seven times with some electrical tape around the outer diameter, and stuffed it into the hole in the dash---everyone seems impressed.... LOL I'm not sure about any of the tach adapters they sell...

The TEC2 Electromotive units sold through "Direct Connection" for offroad use in Competition Trucks were designed to bolt on the side of the engine block! Such extreme engineering was hallmark of their efforts early on. Such is NOT the case with the MS. The components are mostly consumer grade, meaning no heat over what you normally would expose your laptop computer. I recall my laptop getting plugged with fuzz in the fan port, and the ECU blanking on me when the surface temperature reached 140, so goes it with the Motorola Processor used in the MS. Currently mine is mounted where the radio should be, simply for ease of hookup to the 9-pin. The relay box is out where the underhood dataplate normally is mounted (perfect mounting place sizewise!) Were I to do it again, I would do like I have seen on some of the aftermarket assembled MS units out there: Made my own endplates out of a piece of "L" bent aluminium so there was a built-in mounting point, and used some little rubber shock mounts up behind the glovebox. My RHD car has SCADS of room up there, even more than on the LHD model, and it allows an easy place to run a short pigtail from the 9-pin so you can just open up the glovebox and hook up whatever you want to the thing for datalogging and programming. Megaview also mounts nicely with velcro to the top of the glovebox, and there is plenty of coiled cord storage room available in there! Electronics like COOL, and my old GM Van (Moby, he he he!) actually had an A/C duct connected to the air ventilation pickup of the blower fan motor. I thought this would be a nice thought for an ECU if you were out in the desert like me, as long as you could duct it for cooling only, and not when the heat is on...

Sims is correct. The way the tachometer was ORIGINALLY connected in the Z will be UNCHANGED. If the car is a 240, the original tach wire went to the positive terminal on the coil, and if it's a 260, 280, or 280ZX, the wire goes on the negative terminal of the coil. It is totally separate from anything you did to the car, the coil connection is what determines the tach operation, and it remains unchanged after any of the installs/conversions.

The first issue you will run into is that the manifold off a later vehicle will not fit on your E31 head without some machine work. Namely, the four large bolts on the top of the manifold that bolt the intake manifold to the head. Those holes will need to be drilled and tapped, as well as your intake ports machined to accept the stock injector positions. Others have constructed their own manifold, that is compatible with the stock carburetted manifold bolt pattern, and put the injectors up further on the intake runner (the only reason they are there stock is for emmissions). But the easiest method to make something work on an early L24, is to find hte head off of a latemodel EFI L24. You will loose some compression, but not a lot. Before worrying about your injectors (they are a standard Bosch Style, almost anything will fit), read the sticky that Moby has above about resistors on the stock injectors. The stock resistor block in any of the Nissan Z's from 75 to 81 will work to drop the power for the injection circuit. But like I said, before worrying about injectors, you have to decide how you will attack the manifold issue. Once that is taken care of, THEN start worrying about injector compatibility. I am in the process of converting some SU's over to a TBI setup for the stock 260 Manifold so it won't look "updated" (stealth conversion) but that project is on hold till I get some power back into the shop for the welder and Bridgeport now...