JMortensen

I believe the P79 valves will be very close to the L24 bore. You might need to eyebrow the block. Not hard, but might be necessary to prevent contact.

Dan has his front "hoop" setup welded rather then bent, but it isn't the end of the cage, there are more connections to the front suspension and frame rails, etc. I would be wary about welding the corners if it didn't tie into a larger structure. Maybe if you added a knee bar 1/2 way down... It shouldn't be that hard to find a shop to do the work.

The original brake backing plates had scoops facing front. They stopped this sometime in 71 I think. If you had those, there is more of a potential for the vents to have an effect. If the wheels were had too much backspace though, it would be a moot point.

Or you can cut a bunch of holes for access, then patch them when you're done.

I would do a front hoop (single tube bent like the main hoop, but maybe just 2 bends instead of 4) as high as possible, then attach the door bars to it. I'd run it through the firewall to the strut towers too or at least to the firewall with a big plate top and bottom, but that's me. In your picture you have the driver's side going all the way to the firewall and the passenger's side going to the door opening. Welding around the tubes at the firewall isn't going to be easy. It's a lot easier to weld them near the door opening, then do another bar forward to the firewall, or maybe two, one on top and one on bottom. Would give a little foot protection too. Running to the strut tower would be better for foot protection, but it's kind of a pain in the butt.

Do some searching on LSDs. There are a few different options and I don't want to take the time to write out again here what others have written elsewhere. Search R180 STi, OBX, OS Giken to start. Yes, 87-89 300ZX turbo is where to get the factory diff from. I would weld the diff on a Chump car.

$8K Chump car?

Dan's cage is basically like an older convertible cage, or an open wheel car cage. It's great because you don't have bars where your head is likely to hit them. If you look at open wheel/convertible cages, the idea really is that if the car flipped, the car should sit on the main hoop and the front cage structure and the driver's head should be clear. I don't know if that is technically possible with a Z because the roofline is so low. There's no doubt that it's better than not having a roll bar or cage at all, but if you took a really bad hit right to the roof at the windshield area, there is the possibility that it could still get you. Again though, with a street car I think this is a much better risk to take than putting in a halo and possibly smacking your head on that in a minor fender bender.

+2 on buying someone else's car. Put it back together and drive it on the street or sell it, use the rest of the budget to buy someone else's racecar. For $8500 you can buy a pretty nice old ITS car or someone's autox car. Building a racecar will nickle and dime you to death, $8500 is not a lot to work with. Just as an example, if you did the engine, you've factored in $1500. I had that in my head alone, but assuming that you could get it done for that price, you're just putting all the old crap back on it. Is that really what you want for your racecar? Are you going to reuse the old carbs with no rebuild? New balancer? Light flywheel? Clutch and pp? Exhaust? For the LSD you say $750 and I don't doubt that you can find a good used LSD for that price, but what about the mustache bar? RT diff mount or new stock front mount? Poly bushings? Suspension upgrade for $500? I have $500 in shocks, not to mention coilovers, camber plates, adjustable TC rods and front control arms, bushings, sway bars, etc. To answer your question though as to what is the hardest part of building a racecar, I'd have to say the cage without a doubt. Paying a shop to build a good cage is expensive, and doing it right is difficult. It requires many man hours ($$$) and to do it yourself you need a welder and a tubing bender and saw, and tools to notch the tubes ($$$). There is no cheap way out of the cage part of the build. If you want a warmed up street car, you can do that within your budget, but you would be WAAAY better off taking on someone else's running racecar and going from there. Take it from a guy who has been working on his racecar for 8 years. It's going to be REALLY cool when it's done, but I should have started with a caged race car and gone from there.

Just got a call, they're shipping my order today.

Today is the 42nd day since I placed my order for the prototypes. I've emailed the manufacturer, no response. I'm sorry for the delays. I was told 7-10 days originally. Just left another message for them as well.

Pillow ball is a monoball. Pillow ball seems to be the popular terminology with the JDM crowd. Spherical bearing, heims joint, uni-ball, and rose joint are other names for the same thing too.

Not all that impressed by them out of the box. The 944 always felt like it drove heavier than it actually was to me. The turbo S models have 928 brakes and trans coolers. Timing belts require a special tool to set tension correctly. About 15 years ago that tool cost something like $350, there might be aftermarket replacements now, but if the belt goes you're hosed, so make sure you factor the cost of replacing the belt if it hasn't been done recently. Front ball joints are supposed to be non-replaceable, but they can be swapped out if you find the right size joint from a different application and experiment with getting it installed. We used to swap them out, but I can't remember what that application was. Local German parts store had it on the shelf though. PS leaks are a constant problem and the fluid leaks right onto the RF sway bar bushing which then swells and falls apart. If you can find Delrin bushings, that's what we used to use to replace them. Back then chip and higher octane fuel was supposed to net 275 hp if I recall. My boss's chipped S was quick but not fast. Other than that, back in the 993 days the air cooled guys would not take a water cooled Porsche seriously. I imagine now that they're all water cooled they ***** about the motor being in the wrong end of the car. Now that there has been a Spec 944 racing series (with NA cars) there might be some less expensive options for suspension upgrades. Used to be pretty expensive to modify them.

Usually if the master cylinder is not retracting the problem is easily identifiable because the problem gets worse and worse as you drive and the fluid gets hotter and hotter. If you let the car sit for a couple hours or overnight, the brake fluid cools and then you would have normal brakes again. Same thing would happen again the next time you drove. You could also crack a bleeder when the brakes are seized and it should squirt out like someone is pushing on the brakes. You should have about 1/8" of pedal travel before the pedal engages the booster, and I don't know the spec of the rod inside the booster, but what you really need is COMPLETE retraction of the master cylinder pistons.

Way too big for 10.5" wheels. Fits 14" wide in the back without a problem.

Couple issues I have with what you wrote there. Only the outer CV shaft can move on the 300ZXT CV. The inner can pivot but cannot move in and out to change the length of the shaft. I listed the travel spec earlier in the thread at 1 11/16" inches. If you shortened the shaft as much as you suggested, it would be way too short to bolt up. Mine do not have enough meat in the area where you would need to respline according to my measurements. I posted a picture earlier in the thread of that as well. You also mention tripod bearings, but the 300ZXT has CV, not tripod bearings. Maybe you're talking about a 300ZX NA shaft which has the tripod bearings, and they are different. I don't know, but I'd hate for someone to go have their ZXT axles shortened to the point of uselessness though. EDIT--Did you use a much thicker adapter to bolt the CV shaft to, possibly?

The examples listed in this thread are for R200s. For R180s the only thing out there right now is the 930 CV adapter kits, where you have an aluminum adapter that bolts to the stub axle on the wheel and the stub axle on the diff and uses the Porsche 930 CV joint. I really doubt that any damage could be done to that joint by an EP car under any "normal" racing condition. I would expect that if there was a failure that it came from the adapter. I have heard of one instance of the adapters loosening up. Most of the problems that you hear about with road racers are with the stub axles failing. I would think the CV system would be heavier than the stock halfshaft, but don't recall anyone actually weighing one vs the other. CV's should be much less likely to bind, and that is one of the selling points that Todd @ Wolf Creek Racing is pushing. The U-joints on a really low 510 will actually start to "knuckle" and create a vibration just due to the angularity. The adapter/930 joint setup fixes that and he's actually seen dyno results showing a 3hp increase on a 510. I don't know if that would be the same on a Z, I suspect that there wouldn't be as much gain, but that's what he's shown for the 510. Just to update I am still waiting on my prototype order to be shipped.

Camber bushings, slot the uprights and move them to the right, "poor man's toe adjuster", adjustable control arms. Those are your options. There is nothing that can be shimmed to fix.

There is no synchro for reverse. Might also be a master or slave just beginning to go bad (even though one of them was just replaced, this is still possible). Pull the boots back on both and see if fluid leaks out. A 280 should have the self adjusting slave cylinder, so it's not likely that you have an adjustment problem now if you didn't before.

Slide hammer the floor away from the header, or remove the header and persuade the floor away from it a little with a BFH.

Factory shims you would have to get from Nissan. A shim is just a placeholder though, so they really don't have to be factory to work. I know MikeC has posted about the possibility of using 12 bolt truck shims in the past, but I can't remember if he said he actually used them or that it might be possible to use them. If the shop does differentials regularly, they probably have these on the wall. If it's a Nissan LSD, you probably won't need to shim it. Might check in the OBX thread and see what those guys are using, as I know their manufacturing tolerances aren't as close and people do need to shim those.

Parts shipment delayed, now they're talking about shipping on 8/4 or 8/5.

Does anyone recall a thread about ordering ebay MOMO wheels through a vendor in Singapore? I seem to recall the guy had good prices and was selling the real thing, but I can't find the thread and I've got some money burning a hole in my pocket...

The ball joint taper is wrong and the steer knuckles are too long. After that gets straightened out, he'll still have to see what the camber and caster look like and possibly make some adjustments there too. He is a member here, but there are a lot of BMW guys on that other forum, and I guess that's why he's doing it over there. I suppose if you did it the opposite way and used the BMW LCA and the Datsun strut, you'd have to worry about the taper of the ball joint and that's really it. I might be missing something, but I can't think of it.

http://www.corner-carvers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=45161