Gollum

There's also another possability I just thought of... ...if the tire has been sitting a long time it's possible that it's surroundings have taken their toll on the rubber. Are you sure the inside isn't just as eaten up? If a car is sitting in dirt the first thing to show wear from the soil is the edges of the tire. I know this from experience.

Latest update: I'll be applying for a job at a company my uncle works for. The job would be programming related, Access more specifically. I have a bit of programming experience, and I'm sure I can quickly get to a sufficiant level of skill for their requirements. Me and my uncle will be working over the next few weeks getting me up to speed in access programming, working on a project that will be a large part of my resume. They design/sell software for hospitals. Not all what they sell is their own stuff, but they're moving more and more into that market. The upside is that if I DO get the job, then it'll most likely pay a healthy starting $18/h or so, and be a work from anywhere type of job. The main office is located in concord, so even if I do have to commute, it's not bad and reverse commute still for me. Would actually be a shorter commute. The hard part will be convincing the man in charge that I'm up to the job. I interviewed before and apparently I spoke too much about my main passion, music, and that's what stuck in his mind. The other partners in the company love me already, and love my computer hardware background. So if this works out I guess i'll be staying in CA for a while Oh yea, and with this new job prospect, there's the flexability for me to possibly go to school at the same time. One of the owners sons works for the company and is also going to school full time, since he can work from anywhere (it's a virtual company for the most part).

Unless the car has been modified I'd say it's safe to bet something is wrong with that much abnormal tire wear. I'd look into what it could be first, and finding the PROBLEM, before thinking about going with an aftermarket part. To me that seems like saying "hmm, my injectors aren't firing, guess I'll install megasquirt". I'm not trying to be rude, sorry if it seems like that. I just know that a 280ZX in good condition shouldn't have abnormal tire wear.

There isn't really anybody selling turbo manifolds on a large scale basis. Most in the past have been very limited runs at best. The stock manifold will support a decent amount of HP, but limits your turbo options. If you've got time and your power goals aren't insane I'd just wait to find one via ebay or junkyard. Took me over 6 months to find a local driveshaft for my turbo car. Sourcing parts can prove difficult sometimes.

IT RUNS!!!!!!!!!!!!! Do I need to say it again? It RUNS!!!! Ok, so after me and rudypoochris fiddled with the starter for a couple of hours we got the starter working and the engine started nearly right away, no hesitation at all. Though it was running rough, on 3 cylinder. So I Changed the plugs out for my older NA ones in decent shape (they were brand new when I started all this, but they'd been left out for a while so they're probably not in the greatest shape now). After that we fired it up and noe 5 cylinders were working. We're getting signal to the plug, as it's arching just fine when the cable is unplugged, and we changed the spark plug, though i'm not sure the one I put in was in the greatest shape. Tonight I'm gonna double check all the wires to make sure they're hooked up right, and all firing. Then I'll check to see if the injector is working via 9V battery. If all checks out ok I'll be making a run to the store to get a set of new plugs. If it's the injector I'm not gonna be thrilled as they all worked fine before... grrr. Hopefully it's just water shorting the connection or something. It has been outside for the last year... At any rate IT RUNS!!! If I have time tonight I'll hook up the driveshaft and get it moved out of the backyard.

Those ZX rims seem to look a lot better on a S30 than a S130... not fair. Great to see step out and help a fellow HZ member. Brings a tear to my eye/

What he said! ^ I've had several close friends serve in iraq and other various places in the middle east. I'll never let them forget how thankful I am to them, as much as I hated saying good bye when they left.

Wow, what a STEAL!!!! Diff in that is worth half the price. Geez. Some people sure get lucky... Congrats though. I'm not sure what the missing part it, but I'll check my PDF Z31 FSM once I get a chance. Might be a while though. So what are the plans? Drive the car as a dd? Mod it? Parts car/donor car?

Stupid question... but fuel pump turning on? You really need to find someone with a pressure guage and check that fuel pressure... Too low fuel pressure is extremely common in these cars due to bad fuel pressure regulators.

Does the car have t tops? If so it's most likely NOT a 79'. If it was imported there's a good chance the years got screwed up. I'd definately check the pistons via pulling a plug. If it's got flat tops don't worry too much about it. If that's the case then the running rich is EFI related. Check fuel pressure, AFM, and vacuume lines (make sure they're connected right and not blocked).

+1 I've heard several stories of successful racecar drivers who loved the rain when they were young because of the super low tire wear, saving them money. I'm not very experienced with snow, but it seems you've got some good advice.

The girlfriend is currently talking about making the move with me if I do move. :S There will be a long talk involved about that one... Anyways, about the school advice - Yes I agree an education is good, but certainly not needed to make a good living. In the bay area especially experience is much better than anything else, and I've run and managed my own company doing IT repairs and such. I could make much more money in that field, but finding work lately has been tough and tiring. I've known plenty of YOUNG people able to make well over 70k here in CA with nothing more than a high school diploma, it's about finding the right company to hire you, and working your way up. Hence why I'm considering this move. Yes i'm making $12 and hour now. But if I'm still with this company in 10 years I should be making very good money. If things don't work out I'm thinking I'm gonna try to find an entry level position in marketing for one of the norcal pharmaceutical companies. Hardest part there is getting the interview, after that I'm sure I'd be fine. Right now I'm about 80-90% sure I'll be making the move. Been looking into the fernley which is outside the county, so no smog. My calculated commute is about 35 minutes on google, since I'll be working in sparks, near the city center I believe. I believe that the experience will be good for me, and I have much I can learn from my boss which will be more important than what I can learn in school. (he is a harvard business school graduate after all) I hope to make a trip up there in the near future to check out the area. Maybe I'll drive the Z up there if I get it running soon.

Heehee... not around here my friend. It's a very sad day if there aren't any EFI L28 cars in my local junkyard. Vehicles don't last there for very long, so stock changes constantly, and rarely are EFI sensors pulled from L series cars there. But there's usually at least 2-3 Z cars with L28 motors there. Finding a 240Z there is a whole different story...

Yes it's 75' and older that's smog exempt in CA. In my opinion it's better to start with the 240Z. Better to start lighter and add weight where you WANT it, don't you think? If you were willing to sacrifice weight for the sake of OEM rigidity the 280ZX would be a better option than a 280Z, but that's a whole nother ball of wax (has to be smogged, diff suspension problems etc). But as stated before by cozy and others, rust and overal shape are bigger factors than the badge or year of production.

I still wanna find concrete weights on the no-option 79' S130. Something tells me 2700 might not be an unreasonable guess. I'd imagine 2775 max. At any rate thanks for posting the numbers 80LT1!

I think he could have started with a better base (like a CRX HF) but if it's what he had then it's what he had. Do I think it's ugly? Of course. Do I think his efforts were pointless or without meaning? No. What if he's on to something? For all we know we might end up seeing hundreds of college projects of people modifying their vehicle for the sake of science and better mpg. His project should inspire people to show them that it doesn't take time and money to make a difference in their car, it takes WELL THOUGHT OUT EFFORT. He's not really much different than any of us here, just a TOTALLY different goal in mind. If his car ran a 6 second 1/4 mile we wouldn't care what it looked like. You know it's still surprising to me that people here in the bay area continue to buy huge SUVs and trucks when they unquestionably don't NEED them. Who knows what the public will really buy in the future. Overall they're a mass of unpredictable and unintellegent buyers.

I've personally seen a NA VG30 swap in a S30. Very clean, makes tons TONS of sense actually. Light mod for light mod they're comparable or better than the L series and they're a very small engine package. There's also a supercharged version in the xterra, if you could lay your hands on one of those and then megasquirt it you could easily have lots of power and none of the steering clearance issues. As far as the redline most dynos I've seen peak power is around 5.5k, and they stop the dyno at 6k. I don't have enough experience to say if it the motor would rev higher with modification.

The injectors are actually a BATCH injection, not sequential, so no worries. Just go by length to make sure they all plug in and you should be fine. (the wiring comes in between 3 and 4 cylinders and branches out. My project is finally gonna be finished soon (i hope) as I've fixed the fuse issue. I just need to get the engine started again and I'll be good to go.

You're guys comments about religion might be seen as rude, but no worries everyone i'm not offended at all, and it IS a major religion, and I'm sure I can find a church up in reno. But they're FRIENDS, people that I'll have a bond with the rest of my life. The fact that I met them through church is just a side fact. No worries, I'm not part of a cult. Yesterday I got the chance to sit down with several close friends and all of them basically had the same conclusion which was reassuring. They all wished I would stay, but wanted the best for me and were encouraging me to make my own decision regardless of what that might be, and that they'd support my decision. As more time passes by I think the option will be move to reno. I have a great boss and I love my work, and with the kind of environment we have here it should allow me to also pursue other interests which is the whole point of making more money right?

Be careful about preconceptions regarding iron block motors. Yes iron is heavier, but it's significantly stronger, and thus iron blocks can be manufactured with a lot less mass. Aluminium blocks are reinforced quite a bit, and thicker all around, meaning more mass. All in all the block is only a SMALL portion of the weight of an engine. Cyinnder heads, crankshafts, rods, and manifolds can all have a significant impact on weight. All that said the numbers might be way off. There's been lots of discussion on this board about the inaccuracy of weights listed online, and how there's so little comparable data out there.

Well no worries, even the people that might hate you here will still try to support you in some way. We're all about the concept in the hybridZ, make the Z your own, that's what matters. Sure the majority here is about stuffing big V8 engines in the Z, but that doesn't mean it's the only option and most people here realize that. Though... there IS a race prepped rolling chassis datsun roadster in the bay area on craigslist.... might be an even better option than the Z if you're not too tall of a guy. EDIT: You might want to PM 240Hoke, I don't think he spent more on his VQ motor than he would have for an LS1. Although he found his motor locally from a case of somebody wreaking a Z on a test drive.

I'm definately considering lots of visits back to the bay during the summer, so I'll still get chances to see family and friends often. The girlfriend has already said (within an hour of me telling her) that she shouldn't be what stops me from moving to reno, which is calming. In the end it's not THAT far of a move, but during the winter the mountain pass is blocked making trips back home relegated to flying, which isn't really feasible. I'm really looking forward to the possabilities if I DO move though. The extra cash every week could be very meaningful. I could actually have enough money to get serious about my recording projects, have enough cash to get a small loan for a newer car (thinking about a wrx wagon) and of course the money for a car project would be nice. I know it might seem like I'm getting ahead of myself, don't worry I'm not an idiot and I know how to budget. With the initial raise money won't be flowing out of my pockets most likely, but down the road in the near future that might be the case. All in all music is what I care most about in life, and it'd be nice to have the extra income to help that along.

Realistically it should easily grow into a 40k/year job within the first 5 years. They have great benefits, and the two other employees under my boss that have already confirmed that they're gonna move to reno are close friends of mine. My boss is a very cool and laid back guy that's very easy to work for. He's also the type of boss that will look out for his friends, and only hires people he could view has his friends. As an example he and the other two employees under him play WoW nearly every night, and he even talked about buying me an account if that would convince me to play. I'm sure I "could" make a lot more money somewhere else. But the fact is I've only got a high school education on paper, and very little work history. With how stale the market has been lately in california I doubt I could find something that pays well that was in an environment like this.

Yea, that's like the 3rd listing I think. I thought I'd posted a thread about it before. It was at one of the previous international auto shows in SF and I reconised the car in the add immediately. It's a deal if you got the money and want a race car.

Well, got in to work today and my boss calls me into his office to tell me he's moving back to reno, where the rest of his family lives. He then offered me to continue working for him up there, and it would include a pay raise (not sure how much, I currently make a BASELINE $12 which is standard for the company) and compensation for moving costs. If I don't go up with him, they can most likely find me another job here at the company, but because it will be branch instead of corperate it'd be hard to make a career out of it. Currently I'm corperate, just not located there. This move to reno would make me 100% officially part of corperate and means my work would not go unseen, and thus my efforts in marketing would be noticed and more likely I'd be compensated for those efforts. For those that don't know I now work for a company called Jesen Precast and my boss is the owners son and he's head of marketing. We're currently trying to implement a mass marketing effort so we're not so reliant on our salespeople to do all of our marketing for us. So far this is my list of pros/cons Pros: Lower Income Tax Lower Housing Costs Cheaper Living costs (gas, electric, etc) NO SMOG TESTING!!!!!! (if I find a place outside of the washoe county, which isn't hard I think) Cons: Farther away from my family Would have to leave my current church Seems like the boondocks compared to where I've lived all my life Have to start up all new band efforts Not as many Z people Seems like the boondocks.... The church deal is a big thing keeping me back thus far. I know a lot of you guys won't understand it, but those people are like family to me and I'll be keeping in contact with many of them on a weekly basis. Reno/Sparks isn't THAT far, but trips during the winter is hard with the mountain pass the way it is, but during the winter making a trip once a month should be easy. Take off work a little early on friday and drive back sunday night (or even get up early on monday, since my boss usually doesn't get in till around 9 or later) Right now it's just such an extreme change to consider so lightly, but at the same time everything in me says do it. It'd be a good life experience and I'd get to strech my wings a bit. I'm always occupied with a million different things when I'm not busy around here, and I'm sure if I moved things would calm down a bit and I'd have more time to do other things like learn to weld, work on a car, record a cd, etc. So just some general life advice or opinions on the reno/sparks area would be appreicated. BTW, I started this thread because you people kinda are family too.