JMortensen

I think you're wrong there Larry, but in a weird way. The 69-71 diff was mounted 1" forward from the later cars, so the driveshaft for the 70 and 71 cars is 1" shorter. While it will plug on and probably work on a later car, the correct shaft for a later car would be the longer 72-78 shaft. I know this to be true because I moved the diff back on my 70 to correct the halfshaft angles and went and got a longer shaft for it at that time. So to answer mom'sZ's question, the 72-78 shafts are all the same as far as I know, and the length is correct for any A or B type 5 speed (including NA 280ZX). I suspect that if someone were misguided enough to put the crappy early 4 speed in a later car the later shaft would be the correct one in that case as well.

If you put a spacer UNDER the shock then you can run a shorter insert in a longer tube and not lose any travel. For example, in the case of a Z, suppose you have 4 front struts, and you want to run them in front and back. You can run the spacer underneath the strut in the back and not lose any travel. This coincidentally is how Tokico ships their Z struts. Same strut front and back, rears have a steel spacer underneath. If you put the spacer ON TOP OF the shock then you lose access to that much of the shock travel. Unless there is something about the KYB shocks that I am not aware of the valving in the shock should determine whether it feels bouncy or not, not where in the compression range it is (unless it is bottomed out). With this installed though, the top of the strut can never be pushed all the way in, so you end up losing about 2 or 3 inches of travel, however thick the spacer is. The bumpstop will hit the gland nut and the shock is still nowhere near all the way compressed. So basically what this thing does is allow you to run a shorter strut than stock, and in the process it cuts out 2 or 3" of the travel that your new shorter shocks have. IMHO this is not a good idea, and they'd be doing a service to their customers to offer a spacer that fits underneath the strut and telling their customers to use the stock gland nut.

Take a look at this: That's a different idea altogether for the inner pivot, but it would require a custom control arm because the pivots would need to be closer together than would be possible with the stock arm, unless it was hacked up pretty good. Interesting way of doing it though. I like it!

Keep it civil guys.

Looks like the wrong one to me. EDIT--Actually, maybe it is the correct one. Even if it has bolts to attach the plate to the strut top, you still have to cut to fit. Check this thread for how/where to cut: http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=102847

Grab a beer, it's a long one: http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=106974

Every time I see a Europa I have to throw this pic out there. This is the one that was really fast at the autox I used to frequent. The owner claimed that it made 275whp out of a Cosworth 2L, naturally aspirated turning 10,500 rpm. He blew it up over-revving it and was going to build another engine with a different block which supposedly was good for 11,500 rpm. I think he said weight was 1375 lbs. It is a pretty badass car...

You don't need to press out the sleeves. You can just cut through it with a hacksaw and then push it out with a screwdriver. Cut towards the meaty part of the arm so that if you do cut into the arm you don't weaken it.

One thing you might look out for is the timing on the P90 cam. I think they're 4 degrees advanced IIRC, which means you'll run out of cam at about 5000 rpm. You can advance the cam with the holes in the cam sprocket. You might consider having one or the other reground.

This has not been my experience. Here is a thread with people expressing all sides of the argument: http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=108404

The LCAs will give you a lot less camber adjustment than the plates IME. The LCAs are limited by how many threads there are on the rod end, and also by the tie rod length. I think I was pushing my luck with my old tie rods and I had only lengthened the LCAs about 5/8 to 3/4". What I would suggest is that you set the LCA's even and make the front track as wide as you can and still have the inner tie rods seated a comfortable depth into the outer tie rods. Then you should have more than enough adjustment available out of the plates.

True, but IME having the TC on a clevis like that and being able to run a larger amount of caster was a big improvement over stock, poly, or GMachine setups I ran previously. When you're talking about 1" difference in the length of the arm (guessing since the tie rod end end also moves the pivot forward from stock probably an inch) I don't know that the difference in the caster sweep is going to be that huge an issue. I can say that the clevis type worked very well for me. My lastest setup moves the TC bucket back and strengthened it to run a rod end with the stock length arm, but that was a big project and is above and beyond "necessary" IMO, although it does truly fix the problem you describe. I don't like the way you worded this part. I know what you mean, but I don't think the argument you make is really true here. The bolt through the clevis gets locked down once the caster is adjusted, so there is no pivoting of the clevis "as the caster changes with movement". The impression I get from reading your post is that the clevis can change its angle because it is left loose at all times. With the TTT, AZC, and Mike Kelly's old TC rods, one simply needs to loosen the J bar where it connects to the control arm when the caster is set, then lock it down again. I had mine made for me but they were similar to the clevis type that AZC sells, and I was able to run 5.5 degrees without any binding of the J bar to the control arm. If there was binding, I already had a plan to deal with it. It involved drilling out the holes in the control arm or the TC rod to make them larger and allow for more angularity. Not hard to do, and accomplishes the same thing as the clevis. The important bit is to loosen the bolts that attach the J bar to the control arm when the caster is adjusted, or the clevis bolt in this case. If that is done I don't really see an advantage to either design.

Widening the track will give more grip. So widening the track and then adjusting the camber is a good option. The rule of thumb that I've always used is that you want 1.5x the diameter of the rod end to be inside the threads, so that means you want at least 15/16" of threads inside the control arm, so don't just keep unscrewing the arm without regards to how much of the rod end is inside the arm.

It is possible and has been done and discussed here before, but its a lot easier just to section the tube. If it's properly welded the strength isn't an issue, and it isn't hard to properly weld the tube. The tube gets really thin at the top to allow for the threads, so if you were to cut new threads I think they would have to turn the tube to a larger ID before cutting the threads. That's a lot of machining vs a relatively quick cut and weld. I think it was Dr Sideways that had his struts cut and had the threads cut in the end of the tube so if you want to search you might find that old post.

You want to test the car where it is going to be driven. If it has 4" of droop that you're not going to be using, don't test there. So yes, test from ride height then down a couple inches.

That's why you pull the springs. You want to check at the useful height. I would go from ride height down a couple inches at least. Cary, I had something TOTALLY different in mind before I saw that picture. That actually does look pretty easy to make and easier to use.

Porsche 944 uses an A arm. Might look at one to see how they change caster. Seems easier with the TC rod to me. You can get more tire clearance or a tighter turning radius out of the A arm because it doesn't need to connect directly from the TC mount to the end of the control arm.

Eh, not something I mess with very often, and I already have the dial indicators and bases.

Thanks. If you had seen it in person it was really a 100/100 paint job (looks good at 100 feet as it passes at 100 mph), but I appreciate the compliment nonetheless.

Those CBs are really amazing. I've used the 22 shorts and I was halfway shocked that that a cartridge with such a tiny noise could even propel the bullet out the end of the barrel. It's been a while, do they still have the popcorn kernel on the box? I guess the idea is that corn popping makes more noise than the bullet.

EXACTLY!!!

Like I said I was running it 7/16" higher than stock and that stopped the bumpsteer. I originally slotted it as far as I could and I only needed to go up that far. This time I'm going to run it all the way up and use a bumpsteer spacer setup on the tie rod to space the outside end down to compensate. That will give me a higher roll center and better camber gain. That's the plan anyway.

I used some 12 ga .105" thick plate. I also went to 5/8" rod ends for the control arm so what I did was to strip the paint first. I used a cutoff wheel to cut through the spot welds as I haven't had any luck at all trying to chisel spot welds off, then I opened the stock hole up to 5/8. Then I set it on my workbench and used a square to mark the high end of the slot. Then I drilled that out progressively to 5/8", then I used a dremel with a cutoff wheel to connect the holes. I did the same thing on the plates, then welded the plates to the outsides of the crossmember. I ran my old crossmember without any reinforcement at all, just washers on each side of the slot, but in retrospect that was pretty dumb and I wouldn't recommend it, even though I never had any trouble with it like that.