Mikelly

Looks like we will be making adjustable control arms on an exchange basis. I'm trying to finalize the design before we set the "Firm" price, but here is how it will most likely work: We take an order for control arms.. If your car is already down and you can send us your arms, we will do the mod to them and just mail them back. If not, we should have one or two sets to send out.. Maybe more if we get adventurous and get to the junk yard to get some cores.. However, Price will most likely be $175 for fronts Plus shipping, and you must return a core within 5 business days so we can keep everyone happy and get everybodies parts to them when needed... Rears will probably be $300 plus shipping, and of course the shipping and sending your cores... Stay tuned... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Simon, I assume by your posts that you was less concerned with Camber and more concerned with toe adjustment. I think that is the reason Areizina Z and others have used the heim joint setup when fabing up control arms.. BTW, VERY NICE WORK!! I hope to have prices and parts sorted out by this coming week. If that happens, we should be able to start making and mailing out the control arms (Front and rear) before Xmass!! Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

I might be wrong, but I tink it is because they haven't been certified as DOT legal by the hiway safety administration.... Seems I read something about this somewhere else on the web... maybe at MAFBA.org or Zcar.com! I forget, but I believe that it had to do with safety certification. I have used them since 1992 without fail... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Yea, you really have to wonder about pieces of scum like that. Doesn't seem to matter if you live in a good neighborehood or not.. I have all kinds of traffic come through my 'hood, a nice little suburban community, but it still gets lots of traffic... I have let it be known in the 'hood that I have a carry permit, and I love shooting my LARGE CALIBER concealled hand gun... My immediate neighbores love me... everyone else leaves me alone.. Sorry to hear about that Morgan, sounds like you will be in for a new paint job... might want to invest in a garage as well... God I hate hearing this... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Called Summit Racing last night and got bad info... Centerline doesn't make the wheel I want in a 17X9.5 in my back spacing or bolt pattern... Called Centerline today... They do make the wheel I want but not in a zero offset... I'd have to get it in a 17x9.5 with a 5 inch back spacing... not an issue since I'm swapping to coil overs... Gonna be going with a 255-40-17 up front and 275-40-17 in the rear in a Bridgestone RE730... Tires are gonna run about $600 through tirerack... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

I just checked the MSA and VB catalogs and no distinction was made between them. I'd say they fit. Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Eric, Well I would like for you to take a look at the featured rides section and my car specifically. Then look at Ron's in the members photo gallary, or Myron's or Fast Frog's, or... well you get the picture. I for one would like to see some performance specs on the car, what it runs in the 1/4, what kind of laps it turns at any other events.. The one thing that got my attention was the fact that my car looks much like his in photos alone (except for the whale tail) and I love those wheels! My front clip is off the car right now, and my fuel system is being revamped, as is the rear exhaust to accomodate the larger fuel cell. I'll also be painting my bumpers black, as those in the picture added much needed contrast to my all white paint job. I'd also love to see some interior pics... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Those control arms are just like the ones Zdr. made for me. They are also just like the ones I can make. Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Mr. Oxendale I presume??? Let me be the first to welcome you to our little comfy spot on the web. Glad to have you here with us. For those of you who don't know Terry Oxendale, he has been in many Zcar/ Sport Compact Car/ Kit Car magazines, and is the ,astermind behind the AWESOME blue with white Striped Zcar powered by a small block Ford! Any chance of getting you to create another front clip like yours? Mike Kelly ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

You guys have pretty much covered this topic well, but I'll go ahead and weigh in on it.. My system is a 2.5 inch system not unlike Pete's, But mine used duals coming out each side of the Fuel Cell. Now since I'm going with a wider cell, I have a space issue. I'll be looking at those SpinTech muffleras as well as Dynomaxes for the size limit. I had flowmasters, which were fine for about an hour of driving, but with no insullation in the car, it got a little noisy in my car. Hopefully the Dynomax or the SpinTech will be quiet enough. I'll have to look into the resonator tips as well. My system was custom built with an H-pipe and only 5 flanges: Two at the header, one in the center of the Hpipe, and two back before the mufflers. The system, including two Stainless corvette tailpipes ($80 for the pair) and the two mufflers, ran me about $650. I'm real happy with the workmanship of the system, but I'll be re-engineering the back section from the final two flanges at the mufflers back. Anybody get a chance to hear thos Spintechs? Let us know what they sound like! Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Sounds like you have hit the aerodynamic wall with your current HP platform. I was able to get my other Z up to about 168mph with a high compression FI L6 motor and a bunch of aerodynamic tricks. However, I also had about 250HP at the flywheel which helped. Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Viper, Interesting that you should mention that. Chris and I were discussing it today. My car has an estimated 540+ hp and about 500Ft# of torque and I have some serious meats under the rear of the car. I also have a T56 with 2.66 1st gear and 3:7 gears in the rear. My car has no trouble getting down the road. Yes I can smoke the tires like crazy when I want to, but I can also launch pretty darned well to. My buddy has a mustang with a 426 stroker in it, has 3:55 gears, a tremec 5 speed, H rated 225 50 16 tires and way more torque than HP... He does nothing BUT spin.... Mostly because of the lack of tire and way more torque than HP... His HP numbers are lower by aboout 20% and the one thing Doug Rippie and John Lingenfelter both advised is a nice broad torque curve and a closely matched set of numbers in relation to torque and HP! Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

I also recommend the Lokar cable setup.. E-mail me offline and I'll send you a JPEG Pic of mine if you still need it! Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

SCCA, I agree.. except I don't have a lot of them on hand... I have two Zcars, and Chris has one... So We'll probably use one of the ones that is apart to make the beginning set and play with them on one of the cars to make sure we get the ginds of adjustments that people want... However, everyone take note... a warning will come with these parts as they will have no warranty expressed or implied and should be used for race applications only (The lawyer in me coming out...)! Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

I'm real interested in what you find as well... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Before I get to carried away... Welcome. Now, go buy yourself a nice Griffen 19X26 2 row 1inch or 1 & 1/8inch tube radiator! It will be a much better way to cool that puppy down. Second, the only reason to build a V8 Z instead of buying one already done is the fact that so few exist, and some of us are to anal to trust anothers work, or we love to tinker, or all three! Bottom line is who cares how you got the car! Glad you got it and glad you found us! You will learn lots here! Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Yea, SCCA is in the Ball Park, plus shipping.. My front control arms leave the factory TC mount... I only have the tubing and heim joint that tun to the cross member. Those would be easier to do. Two less tubes and joints... It still wouldn't be "Easy" to adjust the rears, but you could adjust them. My question would be to put them inboard our outboard... Might have to play a bit with it. Bottom line is though that you would have to send me yours in excahnge because I don't have bunches of them laying around. I'll talk to Chris this weekend and see what we can come up with! Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

ShowCars, the Fiberglass parts place in Canada finally got back to me last night. They quoted me some prices that were average, but the shipping was costly again... $350 to ship anything out to the US East Coast/ Mid-atlantic area. They wanted $1150 canadian for a G-nose and hood....That was a bit pricey I thought... SOOOOO I think Chris and I will be working on a JIG for creating a mold this coming week. Now that both of our lives have settled down a bit we might get something done with the Fiberglass/ Carbon Fiber molding business... More to follow. ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Well honestly my intention here was not to get everyone's dander up. I know there are those that do and those that don't prefer an L6, and that is fine, if everyone were like me, life would be pretty bland. I knew that this topic had recently surfaced on this site less than a month ago, and I personally found the info of interest because I had done some research on stroker L6 motors a few years back and I found the guys data of interest to note here. Last thing I want is an US vs. THEM war with any of the ZCAR sites so if I mislead anyone, sorry for that. Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

Arizona Zcar used to sell control arms just like those you describe. Chris and I have those on our list of things to work up... Out of Curiosety, How many guys would be interested in those if we could make up enough sets? We could sell them on an excahnge policy... We'll send you the modified units and you send us your stock ones in return.. Obviously we would have to charge for the parts and shipping and beer money... Arizona Zcar was selling these things for a pretty penny... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

BZZZZTTT! Wrong answer... Issues Summer 1995 and Winter 1996 deal with the 1978 280Z with an aftermarket Switzer 3ld279 Turbo, forged pistons, Oringed block, SIDE PIPES!!! and a Gnose and headlight covers.. In their 1st attemp at the salt flats they managed 167.44 with 286 flywheel HP... Until they pulled the line for the wastegate and promptly destroyed a piston... In the next installment (1996 article) they had plumbed in an elaborate intercooler, and newer smaller turbo. And I do stand corrected.. the top of the new intercooler did blow off on Dyno test runs before heading back to the salt flats.. However, they did manage 185 miles per hour average on the 1st run and 184.3 miles per hour on the return run.. Other Zcar mag issues worth getting: Spring 1996 V8 issue Summer 1999 150mph V8 Z runs the Nevada ssc Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

1st of all Tell Z Dr. that Mike Kelly says hi and ask him about the time I beat him at the airstrip... He has a sweet Carmel colored 240 with power steering and all the trick suspension parts on it. And yes he has an E31 with a lot of time spent at Malvern Racing Machine Shop in Charlottesville... Doc hasn't spared any expenses on that machine... Through Z Dr. I learned a great deal about heads and getting the right combo of stock parts to work together to make decent HP. Detonation or Pinging is cause by a lean condition in the combusion chamber, more air than fuel... One of the most common situations with an L series motor is to much timing advance or a faulity vacuum advance unit. I was running an N42 head with 82ZX flat top pistons in a standard block once and was able to achieve good tuning with a 10:1 compression ratio and 12 degrees of initial timing... only with NGK plugs and 92 octane gas. N42 heads are OK, I'm not fond of the N47. I'd look for a P79 or P90 mechanical head and get it shaved accordingly and get the cam towers shimmed up properly. That will be a much better head that has better chambers and ports. Z Dr. can help you with all that... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk [This message has been edited by Mikelly (edited November 19, 2000).]

Andy, My rear flares are the street flare offered by motorsport auto and are 3inches wide. The wheels I have are 15x8 with 4 inches back spacing. The flares cover the wheel and tire combo easily and because I'm upgrading to wider 17s I checked for additional clearance. No problems! Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

It has nothing to do with playing in sandboxes, what I thought strange was the numbers.. Remember, for years (More than 10) I built L series motors to go as fast as possible, and I was also almost drawn into the stroker ranks... Reason I mentioned the post was strictly an FYI for those considering it an option... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk

...and some very REAL numbers a guy just posted on his new dyno'ed 3.1 stroker build... Sobering statistics really... 175 RWHP doesn't seem worth the investment and work involved with building up a stroker at this point. The way the post read, seems the owner wasn't real happy with his results or the fact that he won't see a huge gain even if he makes some changes... Check it out, it was worth reading... Mike ------------------ "I will not be a spectator in the sport of life!" mjk