JMortensen

That's just what Dennis's rotors look like.

On mine I took the bar stock and cut a 4" long section and drilled holes in it for the bumper brackets. It was a bit of a PITA to get the bolts in, but definitely stronger than what you've got there. Figure on a 280 with a bare shell you'll be hanging probably 300 lbs on the bracket there, more if you sit in the car or bolt parts to it to check for fitment, etc. I'd probably redo that one, but I might be a little conservative on this...

I disagree. They do it because it weighs less. They run a larger diameter rotor because it increases braking torque, and then they drill it to make it lighter. Less polar moment of inertia is a good thing. It's like lightening a flywheels or running lighter wheels. All of these things make a big difference. I wish I had a picture of Dennis Hale's rear brakes on his autox 510. It's pretty clear that they're drilling for weight on that set of rotors. As to the holes being drilled or cast as Jon mentioned, I'd be surprised if they were actually drilled on Porsches, since they do so many. I'd guess that they're cast like that. Regardless, they do crack pretty commonly on the Porsches. The ones that I got for the front of the Z were drilled, and those never cracked. Again, extreme usage. Like the time the pad disintegrated and I was trying to stop the car by pushing the pad backing plate directly into the rotor, and eventually the piston punched a hole right through the pad. I threw another set of pads on that rotor and ran it for another 20K miles, many more autoxes and a bunch of track days.

Be careful with the carb spacing on these airboxes. The carb spacing on my Cannon manifold was different than a Mikuni (and spacing between the first two carbs was different than the middle and rear). I can only assume that TWM is different than Mikuni is different than Nissan Comp is different than Cannon. I suppose if they have a backing plate it might not matter, as you can just make a backing plate to fit the rest of the box.

No problem! I wasn't the first either, just passing the info along. It looks like one of your stands is laid back, but you have the head leveled. I wonder if your bracket that you bolt to the car is going to hit the upright on that side. Something to look out for. Are you going to do diagonals from the sides to the mast? I'd suggest it. I guess your other piece of metal is to connect the stands in the middle. You can leave them loose on either end, but I understand why someone would want to connect them.

Cross drilled rotors reduce the weight of the rotor. If you need the mass to dissipate the heat that you generate in the brakes, then cross drilling is a bad idea. If you don't then it is a good idea. I ran the solid rotors in front with Toy 4x4 calipers and abused the crap out of them and never generated any cracks at all, perhaps because the solid rotor is a lot thicker than one side of a vented rotor. I used to work on Porsches and it was pretty common to see them cracked, but we didn't replace the rotors until the crack traveled from one hole all the way to another. If Porsche and Ferrari both cross drill their rotors, it's a good bet that the idea probably has some validity to it. All that said, moving to a vented rotor will do A LOT MORE to dissipate the heat you generate than cross drilling.

Austin, I thought your Vette setup was better than the AZC setup or the JSK setup I have. It was LIGHT! What are you going to do with those parts???

Yep. If anything I wish the FA was lighter. If it was 950 lbs and pulled 4 g's under braking that would be closer to the neighborhood of a 2500 lb car pulling 1.5g. As it is the tire is really designed for something that puts more stress on it than our cars can manage. I had that conversation with an engineer when I first started running them. He was worried that the FA only weighed 1300 lbs and thought the tire might debead or something, and I noted that it pulled 4 g's braking and 3+ lateral, and that was good enough for him.

Only factory alignment adjustment you can make is front toe. Well, you can shim in some caster too, but that's it. There is no provision to adjust front or rear camber or rear toe. Did you get a print out of the alignment? Give us the specs and we can make suggestions. A good alignment shop will tell you "We can't align your car because the ball joints/tie rods/bushings are shot." Did they say anything like that to you?

Apparently he isn't a numbskull and isn't terrifically rich either. More info on the car and it's owner here: http://www.corner-carvers.com/forums/showthread.php?p=784662#post784662 Story seems to be that he lost his brakes at the top of the corkscrew... Website about the car and owner: http://www.tamsoldracecarsite.net/DavidLove1.html Newspaper story:

That was my thought too. I guess I could cry for the rich owner who decided to put in on a race track and his hurting wallet, but I've got that thing I gotta do.

Somebody should shoot that stupid yellow ricer dashboard he's got...

You need to use a bit of finesse when welding it all together. Since I had the luxury of a rotisserie, the angle was obviously a lot easier for me than it will be for you. What I did though was to start the weld on the SFC, and then drag the puddle into the floor. Worked great. I did start out stitch welding from the bottom and got fed up with that really quickly (metal dripping off and popping on the floor right next to my face, crappy welds, etc) and that's why I built the rotisserie.

I reposted a bunch of pics at the end of the thread. They might be one page from then end now...

Really? You didn't see my sticky post about installing these (along with modifying the TC rods and some other crap)? I have pictures in there showing how I pulled the floor down to the frame rail with large self tapping sheet metal bolts, then welded the rails on and filled in the holes. I did remove the stock rails, but I think the same procedure will work. You might need closer spacing on the sheet metal bolts.

I understand the theory just fine, and I think there might be some shocks that have this issue, apparently the Koni is one of them. I think there are also shocks that are "open" to the surrounding air. It's been a long time since I've dealt with a stock Z shock, but I seem to remember that if you turned one of those over it will spill ALL of the oil out of the shock. The top seal was just to keep the shaft clean and wasn't air tight. What I didn't like was the previous statement in this thread that if you flip a shock over it WILL have a dead spot in it, and that flipping a shock and compressing it is not a good test of the shock. With the shocks that I've used neither of those statements is true. The statement is just too absolute, and I think I've clearly proven it not true as an absolute statement. On the other hand, I was wrong when I told srgunz his Koni was dead when he flipped it and compressed it. I guess the moral of the story is that not all shocks are the same.

I'd be shocked if an R180 yoke fit an R200. One of the things they do to make bigger diffs stronger is to make the pinion shaft thicker. I think some 280Z's had 10mm driveshaft bolts, then I think they went back to 8mm bolts a couple years later. If you have a 10mm yoke you might be able to drill out the flange on the driveshaft and use 10mm bolts, or you could sleeve the bolts like people do on the ring gear, or you could run the 8mm bolts in the 10mm holes, just like guys do on the ring gear when they don't bother with the spacers. I think the 300ZX flange doesn't work with the Z driveshafts. If you're not sure if that is a 300ZX flange, check the bolt pattern against the 10mm flange. If the bolt pattern is the same it will work.

Congrats. That is about as close as I could come to defining a dream job.

Gotta love that CNC notched tubing. Man would that save time and effort...

I think Pop N Wood did this conversion before he was banned. I seem to recall that there were dyno numbers showing slightly higher hp than with factory FI, but I don't think they were his, I think they came from Hot Rod magazine.

Yes. Just a little triangular box that sits on the floor. Mine came out a bit tighter and I attached it to the rockers and did a similar triangular box underneath the tubes as a result of people on another forum telling me it wouldn't pass tech with the bottom of the tubes left open:

Dan, aka 74_5.0L_Z, is the guy who made the drawing. As you can tell by his screen name, it should fit a 260. Maybe this will help to show where he installed it:

The one thing that jumps out at me looking at the Subaru manual is the bit that says "If it is laid down, check for entry of air in the strut" this again tells me that the Subaru struts, like the factory Z struts, are not sealed pressurized units. They have the oil seal at the top, but if they were sealed air tight, then no air could get in. That's the only explanation I've got for you. If anyone has another sealed pressurized unit and can make it have a dead spot by flipping it over, I'd like to see that. Until I see that, I'll remain convinced that the experience I've had with the Illuminas and Bilsteins is generally correct.

I guess the 13th time is the charm. I did this test twice. Once just to be sure I was right, and the second time to prove it. So the shock was compressed 3 times upright, then flipped and compressed 3 times upside down. Then I took the same shock and did the video. That shock was compressed 3 times upright, 3 times upside down, another 3 times upright, and another 3 times upside down. I've done the same with Tokico Illuminas many many times. I can't say that I've dealt with Boge, or Koni, or Controlle shocks. But for Illuminas and Bilsteins, you're wrong. I did put a nice dent in that railroad tie testing it out though. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y21RpHo9e5c EDIT--Video is available now.

Of course the damper isn't filled with oil. My point was that you aren't PURGING (getting rid of) air by cycling a shock. The gas can't LEAVE the shock, because most shocks are sealed and pressurized. I got my Bilsteins revalved and when I got them first thing I did was flip them over and compress the shock on the ground upside down. Guess what? There are NO dead spots in the strut when you flip it and compress it.