JMortensen

Haven't met him in person, but I have talked to him pretty extensively here, and he is very knowledgeable. If I can get the damn car done you'll see me. I was supposed to get it done last summer, and I think I have more projects on the slate now than I did last winter. While I'm at it...

Is that Cary's old car? He was saying he sold his FP car in a recent thread, and he's about the only guy I've ever heard of who runs 13's (something I always wanted to do). Regardless, looks like hell on wheels in a good way!!! You run track days with no brake lights?!? Brave man...

Actually the last time I had the car out was 4 years ago. I moved to Seattle and haven't raced since. I am in the middle of a hardcore revamp of the car. Before it was about as serious as you'd want to get and still drive on the street. When it eventually gets done it will be closer to a real FP car. Still not fully built to the extent of the rules, but a lot closer. Should be trailer only, and will lose probably 250 lbs vs last time it was on the street. I'd love to come down to central Oregon and do some autoxing with you guys when I eventually get the thing done. There are some fast guys down there for sure, and I'm sure I could learn a lot from you all.

I'm sure you meant that the other way. Driver's top to passenger bottom.

Oh man is that sexy. Please keep the reports coming...

Thank you for that explanation BRAAP. That makes sense to me. Just like a semi-trailing arm moves in an arc determined by the pivots, the control arm and TC rod would do the same if they weren't directly in line. I still couldn't say quantitatively how much affect that has though. You've convinced me to change that aspect of the front suspension when I redesign it though. This much I can say: having used stock, then poly, then G Machine, then a clevis mounted setup like the one we're talking about in this thread in autoxes for the last 10 years, the additional caster gained from the adjustability far outweighed the effect of the increased anti-dive. My car got MUCH faster when I added the caster. I don't think it's a show part. I think its a go fast part. I'm sure everyone who uses the any of the setups that change the pivot point would agree with me.

Pretty much any aftermarket TC rod setup available, AZC, the techtoytuning one, Mike Kelly's old one, even yours, moves the pivot point. The center of the ball in that tie rod end you used is probably 1" forward of where the TC bucket is (estimating from the picture). The vertical plane of the tc bucket is where the pivot is when using stock bushings, so you moved the pivot forward in yours as well, although to a lesser degree. Depending on how big the clevis is that is used to attach the rod end on the AZC/Techtoytuning/Mikelly style you'll have varying degrees of change vs the stock setup. The only way to completely eliminate ANY change is to cut the TC bucket off the car and relocate the pivot of the new arm so that it's center point is where the bushings were originally. As far as anti dive I thought the goal there was to get the TC pivot as HIGH as possible. In the same way that roll center affects body roll, I had understood that the TC rod angle had the same effect on dive. So if the arm pointed up from the pivot to the LCA, then as you applied braking pressure this gives the suspension mechanical leverage to force the suspension to compress more, hence more dive. If the TC rod points down then this problem goes away. I don't understand how moving the pivot outboard affects the dive, but if you've got some insight into that I'd love to hear it before I make any changes to my front suspension.

I agree with what John said, and I know it to be true from personal experience. I had my TC rods made before my control arms, and the poly bushings in the control arms were really tweaked when I got the amount of caster I wanted. That was the reason why I got the control arms with the rod end made. BRAAP, I don't agree with what you said. What the shorter TC rod does is make the caster curve different. You can still dial in a hell of a lot more caster with this rod than with a stock one, so regardless of the less desireable curve, you can still get the vastly more desireable increased caster. I like some of the other designs for TC rods better than this one, but increasing caster has a HUUUUUUUUUUUGE effect on the front end, and this TC rod will get you that.

Weak springs will float at high rpms, not tick at low rpms. I would expect the cam wearing should be visible if it's really an issue, but regardless if the valves are adjusted then there shouldn't be any additional noise because the rocker should still follow the cam. I have heard of the lash pads getting worn and causing a tick, but I haven't seen it myself. Think I read that here, so you might be able to search and find info, or you could pull a lash pad and see if it looks OK. Just remember the old adage "Quiet valves burn." When the valve closes the heat goes out of the valve head into the valve seat. If you adjust them with too little clearance to try and make them quieter you can get to the point where they can't transfer the heat, then burn a valve. If the noise is really abnormal take care of it. If it's just annoying to hear the valves then learn to love your OLD car.

http://forums.hybridz.org/search.php?searchid=266838 If that one doesn't work, Click on search and tyep 05L then hit search.

Specs on my truck shifter are as follows: 2" long from the center of the pivot to the bottom of the ball 7" tall from the center of the pivot to the top of the threads for the knob, probably 7.5" to the top of the knob. Throw is 2" from gear to neutral or 4" from first to 2nd. EDIT- that "notch" in the shifter that Darrel pointed out is MUCH larger and more pronounced on my shifter. Don't know if that wore in that way or if it was always that way. EDIT 2- If it makes a difference I'm using an 80 ZX 5 speed.

Just for the record those pics came from tec280zx.

http://www.metalsdepot.com/products/alum2.phtml?page=rndtube&LimAcc=$LimAcc Part #T3R2375 would make a good starting point I think. 2" OD, 1.25" ID aluminum tube. The price on that website looks high @ $27.12 per foot and no price break until 6' of material though. I pulled my G machine bushings out of the garage. The ends are 2" OD on the tips of the hex part, would need to be turned down to 1.580 in the middle to fit the bushing cups. Then turned on the inside to accept the 1.4375" OD of a 3/4" bearing, and need a snap ring groove in there as well. That's pretty much it. The ID of the tube is 1.25" so it would have enough wall thickness to take all of this machining pretty well I think. On the outboard end I was thinking why not just get some 1 3/16" OD tubing, which is our 1.1875" that we need. Cut two spacers, one for either side of the monoball. Hone the end of the control arm to press fit the monoball. Press the monoball and a spacer on either side. Tack weld the spacers at the end of the control arm. Cut the sleeves to the correct length. That's pretty much it. The trick seems to be finding a machinist who would want to do the lathe work on the inners for cheap.

Two different stock manifolds, FWIW. The early one that came on the 240 and maybe 260 is MUCH lighter than the 280 manifold. I have a friend with a L28 mild cam and SU's and she put 2 1/4" exhaust on the stock manifold first, then put the header on. I was there for both installations. We didn't dyno, but there was a very big seat of the pants difference between the two. Of course that was an L28 using the L24 manifold, so maybe that's the reason...

That was exactly my thought. There are at least 3 baffles, and I figured one hose to vent out of each compartment. Maybe they're leaky enough at the top that it doesn't matter if you plug them off, but why would Nissan have put a hose there then? What works works, but it just seems weird to me that Nissan would have added all that plumbing for nothing.

Oooh, you're BUSTED!!! Yeah that $$$ amount sounds about right. Looks like these other guys are saying you don't need to connect ALL the hoses though, just the one on the top. All I know is when I pinched all the hose connectors shut and welded them up (filled the tank with water after rinsing it several times and then welded in case anyone was wondering) on my tank I couldn't get more than 8 gallons of gas in the tank, which is why we did yours the way we did Mat. What we did may have been overkill, but I have no doubt that it will work and last for a long time.

Searched 05L and found the answers you're looking for in the first thread: http://forums.hybridz.org/search.php?searchid=265335

Let me see:

Last time I was in traffic court (about 10 years ago) I sat next to this pretty girl in a nice dress and she told me that she was fighting her 8th ticket in 2 years. She told me that she hadn't had a point on her record yet. When they called her she told the judge that the rise in insurance would be a financial burden on her. The judge removed the whole thing entirely. Her advice was similar to 2003z's: Dress nice, be courteous. Ask for leniency. It works for cute girls and 2003z anyway.

I did some checking with Wilwood and their most rigid Dynalite caliper for the rear was the cast Dynalite. Everyone carries the billet one, I even had to special order the cast caliper, but that's what Wilwood's own tech line said was the most rigid. This is the one in particular that I bought: http://www.wilwood.com/Products/001-Calipers/016-NDL/index.asp On the superlites, they do say that this billet Superlite is the best: http://www.wilwood.com/Products/001-Calipers/011-SL4/index.asp

Yes, that is a much better option.

It's really a 510 brake kit. It has 10" rotors IIRC. Lots of 510 guys swap in 280ZX struts because the strut length is shorter so it's like sectioning the strut. If you look at the questions the guy selling says they fit a 13 x 7 wheel over the brakes. It's a good system for a 510 or maybe an autox 280ZX, but I'd expect that it's too small for a road racing ZX.

I don't know what a PCD is but the 280ZX strut tower has a much larger flatter top on it like a 510. Shock diameter is bushed , either with a shouldered nut that has 12mm threads and 5/8" OD, or with a spacer that slides down the shock inside the monoball that then uses a regular nut on top.

N47 would be essentially the same as the N42 you have now, but with the exhaust liners that reduce emissions. That is definitely the way to go IMO if you aren't going to change pistons or do something else to get that compression up for the P90.

You should be able to run 87 on the P90 with flat tops at 8.3:1 or whatever it ends up being. You will lose some bottom end for the lack of compression, and you'd probably lose some mileage too.