JMortensen

The drum just slides onto the studs and sits on the stub axle. The stub axle is 2 pieces, the outer flange piece (where the drum and wheel bolts on) and the inner companion flange (where the halfshaft bolts to). These two pieces come together thru a hole in the strut housing. The bearings sit inside the hole one on the inside and one on the outside portion of the hole, separated by a big metal spacer sleeve. The end of the outer piece is splined then threaded, and the companion flange slides onto the splines, then the big ol nut holds the 2 together. The nut is then peened onto the stub axle to keep it from backing off. That's the thing most people screw up on. They see the nut, grab a socket and an impact gun and take it off before cutting off the peened area. It will come off, but it will waste the threads. That's a fairly accurate if not terribly descriptive explanation of the stub axles. If someone had a pic for you to look at that would be better... Jon

I'll be buying some of my freedom back = paying some debts down. Jon

No. The center part of the bar does the twisting, and the length of the arms relative to each other doesn't matter because the spring acts on both arms all the time. I think.... EDIT--No, I am sure now. I remember adjusting sway bars and the next hole was too far, so we moved one side only. Jon

I've got a bunch of friends who autox 510's, and when I was 17 I was looking for a 510 for about 6 months, when I found the perfect deal. Clean, no rust, repainted, fresh L18, SSS SU's, it was sweet. My parents were going to loan me the money to buy the car, but when my mom saw it she said it was a death trap and wouldn't fork over the $$$. I went back on the prowl, this time looking for a Z. Found a 65 year old guy who had owned a '72 since the day he bought it off the showroom floor. It didn't run right because some jack@ss had messed with the needles and nozzles trying to get it to pass smog. Bought it for $2K, took it home and started fixing stuff. About a year and a half later I was rearended by a lady in a Firebird doing about 50 mph, which pushed me into oncoming traffic where I got in a head on collision. Broke my nose on the steering wheel (had the lap belt on) and had some rhinoplasty to fix. Took the insurance money and bought my current '70 and a 280ZX for parts. Still driving the '70 some 7 years later. I've owned 7 Z's, 2 to drive and 5 for parts. Every time I'm on a big track with my buddies I thank god my mom didn't like that 510!!! Jon

A sway bar IS a torsion bar. It's just connected to the control arm on both ends instead of the control arm on one end and the frame on the other. Jon

Looks great, but I would suggest that you either make your own TC rod mounts or beef up the stock ones. They are pretty flexy. Jon

My understanding of swaybars is a little different. Rather than twist on the bar making the spring rate on the outside stiffer, I think they push the inside suspension down (or keep the suspension from extending on the inside) keeping the body from rolling. Yes, lots of road racers run super stiff springs and the stock front bar and no rear. Another idea to consider is a tubular bar since it wouldn't add so much weight and could be run with a softer setup, which is more forgiving. A lot of racing parts places have generic tubular bars which could be adapted. There are LOTS of other places to cut weight before the sway bar weights come into play IMO. Jon

It's so cute! Like a little baby motor. Makes me have stupid thoughts about the 2 liter 3 rotor. Jon

The difference as I understand it between the 280 door strip and the 240 is that you have to glue the two pieces together (the welt and the seal) on the 240 kit and the 280 kit comes pre assembled. I bought the Precision kit about 5 years ago for the 240 and the door strips came apart almost immediately. I then bought factory 280 strips from Nissan, which also fell apart. Took those back, got more replacements from Nissan, THOSE fell apart. All of the above required a serious SLAM to get the doors to close. I've heard that the newer Precision kits have softer door seals to prevent that, but I don't know for sure. The rest of the kit worked great, but I suggest you figure out what JC Whitney door strips work for the Z. If you have to keep replacing them, at least they'll be cheap. Jon

I don't have any good suggestions for your current situation, but I can tell you that I got my Z appraised at $15K, and that's what I used to get insurance on it. Maybe consider that for the next car... I guess this post means it hasn't been located yet. Jon

zguy, I pulled some MX3 seats from the JY a while back because I was sick of the bench seat in my p/u. The floor in the MX3 is really weird and one of the sliders is about 3 or 4 inches higher than the other side. I'm sure it could be fabbed to work, but I saw that and sold them to a buddy for something else I needed because I didn't want the hassle. Really comfy seats though, and you'd figure they'd fit in just about anything if they fit an MX3. Jon

Whaaaaat???? Maybe I didn't follow Evil, but here's my trick. Take off drum or remove caliper and rotor (whichever you've got) and remove halfshaft. Cut peened part of the nut on the backside of the strut off carefully, and remove the big nut that holds the stub axle in. Here's the trick: use an air hammer with a pointed tip on the backside of the stub axle. There is a little dimple in the stub axle, but the tip of the air hammer right in the dimple, lean into it, and pull the trigger. The vibration from the air hammer will slide the stub axle right out, and it is much easier IMO than using a slide hammer. Oh, and get some 280 ZXT nuts so you don't have to worry about the peened area of the nut next time around. Jon

What you are saying about unshrouding the valves is very much correct IME. When I first got my Z running I paid a machinist to put in the larger valves and do a port and polish. He did a really good job in the intake runner just below the seat (the bowl I think it's called), but that was about it. When the front of the crank got screwed up on that motor I decided to build a flat top bottom end and while it was apart I did a lot more head work. My E31 had a rough casting on the short side radius which I cleaned up with my finger and some sandpaper. The real work to be done was in the chambers though. The intake valves were, as you said, VERY CLOSE to the side of the chamber at lift, close enough that I don't think that there was any benefit at all to having a larger valve in there. There probably would have been more airflow around that side of the valve with a smaller valve in place. So I took the dowels that locate the head on the block, stuck them in the head, laid the headgasket on the head and scribed the head where the fire ring was, and took a BUNCH of metal out until I had opened it up right to the edge of the head gasket. I also notched the block as much as I could in the same area. So now there is probably 1/8" or 3/16" of clearance from the valve to the side of the head where there had been maybe 1/32" before. It was really close on my head before. In addition, the area where the seats are supposed to blend into the chamber was really poor. There was a little ring all the way around the valve seats which stuck up a few thou. I can only imagine that this seriously hurt flow at low lift. So I cleaned that up as well. The last thing I did to my head was to clean up the ridge between the valves. This ridge was completely different in every chamber. Some stuck way up, some just barely, some not at all in the area directly between the valves. So I took them all down to nothing. In the wedge shaped areas between the valves there were LARGE bumps which were irregular in shape and had some nice sharp points on them. I can see those same rings, ridges and sharp points on your E31 INTAKE picture. Those were also minimized as much as possible. During this whole process the chambers eventually got polished from all the work. Theoretically this would keep some of the heat reflecting inside the chamber and not allow as much to get into the rest of the head. I did not do as much work in the outer port area near where the manifold bolts to the head, but I feel that I accomplished some huge improvements in the chamber, and some modest improvements in the runners. I'm not a machinist or anything, but I looked long and hard at the pics in the How to Hotrod book, and tried to get my chambers as close as possible to the Gerolamy head in the book. I do not claim to have done quite that good a job, but my machinist expressed his approval of my work and was shocked that I had never done that type of work before. Anyway, it looks like you are doing a GREAT job on your head, and your helping the rest of us while your at it, so I thought I'd share my experience to try and reciprocate. EDIT--I also ground out the spark plug threads that were in the chamber and laid back the area around the plugs a little bit. Jon

Older Porsche 911 synchros from the "915" transaxle IIRC are EXACTLY the same size. You can get them from Porsche ($$$), but there are lots of aftermarket suppliers too. http://www.gprparts.com used to carry them, I'm sure they still do. The 1st thru 4th gear synchros are the same, those I've measured myself. I don't remember specifically measuring the 5th gear synchro ring, but I'd bet it is the same as the Porsche 5th gear synchro too. If you aren't familiar, find a good Porsche shop in your area. The synchros are a PITA to get on and off, there is one huge snap ring on each synchro holding it on. Porsche mechanics usually have a special tool, or a gigantic set of snap ring pliers to get them off. Take the trans to them and they'll probably be really surprised when they open it up. Nissan doesn't sell just the synchro rings, which tend to break if abused. They only sell the gear cluster with the ring, and they are several hundred dollars IIRC. One last thing. Run SWEPCO in that transmission. That's what all the 911 guys run, and they've been dealing with steel synchros for decades. GPR has SWEPCO or you can buy it direct from the manufacturer, http://www.swepco.com I think... EDIT--Bearings are the same as a normal 5 speed Jon

I always wanted and someday will have 2 dogs named Caster and Camber, but I don't think I'd wish that on a kid... Jon

Make sure you feed it straight natural milk injection for the first few months at least. Proper break in with milk injection will ensure that it remains resistant to mechanical failures. As to the exhaust, I think your model already comes with a fart pipe from the factory. Congrats! Jon

The official prison sentence is too easy for this guy, I agree. For whatever reason, though, armed robbers and rapists and murderers and drug dealers tend to REALLY not like child molesters. I think denny's hope will soon be reality, which is as it should be. I guess now I should make the obligatory "if an 8 year old liked his schlong how tiny would it have to be" joke and try to keep myself from thinking how f'ed up the world is. Jon

I'm betting that test was done at stock ride height too. I think you'd get a better result if the area ground clearance area below the air dam was smaller allowing less air under the front of the car and did some simple stuff like sealing the hole between the valance and the radiator support. Jon

Have you considered what class you'll be put in with a motor swap? You'll get your butt handed to you in a Mod class, but it might still be a fun car to drive. Jon

The ZX has a closer ratio than the 280Z 5 speed. It could be that they mean "relatively" close ratio. Then again it could be a full on Nissan Comp tranny. Jon

Because they sell. $$$ The idea sounds great to someone who doesn't know better. Jon

OK, my $.02 now: If you're driving a street car and you want a comfortable ride on small road imperfections, but you want to push the car a little harder than the average driver, progressives or dual rate springs will work. For anyone even 1/2 way serious about handling, autox, road racing, track days, hard street driving, etc, progressives are a bad idea IMO. The reason being that the suspension has to blow thru the soft spring rate to get to the "real" rate, causing excessive body roll when turning and excessive nose dive when braking hard. Also, if you're in a nice steady state sweeper and you hit a bump, the car will probably bounce into the softer rate, then have to settle back into the real rate again. This situation of loading/unloading/loading the suspension is hard enough for the suspension to control when you have a good single rate spring, but progressives will make it worse. Someone posted a few months ago that Susp Tech was offering a setup for a ZX IIRC with progressive springs in front and linears in back. That is, AFAIC, the worst setup possible. If you're the "princess and the pea" type, or you don't really care about handling that much, then consider the progressive springs. Otherwise just get a good linear spring. Jon

Just realize that it could be the gauge too... Jon

A lot of guys put a quart of diesel fuel in the oil and run it for a few minutes then change it out, or add a quart of ATF. ATF has LOTS of detergents in it. I wouldn't trust the stock sender. Might be worth getting a cheapo auto parts store mechanical gauge (~$20) just to check it. You don't even need to mount the gauge, just use it under the hood, then disconnect and reconnect your stock gauge if the gauge is not the problem. If the stock gauge is bad, then run the hose inside the car and mount the gauge. Jon

I think you can get a decent amount of power out of a simple cleanup job on the head, and unshrouding the valves. On my head there was a LOT of work to be done in the combustion chamber, which I think is something most people overlook. This has all been discussed before, so search the archives, but I think Turbo's assessment that there is no benefit to be had without welding on the head is a little harsh. You won't get huge hp gains, but its a little bit here, a little bit there... I can't wait to see Turbo's DOHC head though. Jon