Hugh

I'll give you $2.50 for the extra one. Hahaha... Just kidding. What do you have going on with your shift knob there?

I have to deeply disagree with you on that. At least the S13 was built with the inspiration of the 240Z. TA on a 240SX? Egad. That's different, alright. I don't condone any of the conversions done in this thread so far.

How much are those going for?

Yeah, those seats look great. Quick scan of ebay - Ouch! I'll pass on that until luck falls my way like it did for you. Holy cow.

First off - Everything has been done already. Everything. You will not do anything to your car that cannot be shown to have been done first elsewhere. There's just only so many options, but there are so many people using them. Now if you were to make a dead-on copy of someone else, that would be weak... but there's nothing wrong with taking cues from others. There's really no other option. (unless you go wild like Darius - but that's beyond most of our grasps)

Yeah, that particular kits messes with the lines of the Z, I think. It gives it more of an 80's look, rather than the 70's it was intended for. We saw a 240Z the other day with that kit on it, and my wife asked "What kind of car is that?" I said it was the same as mine... she didn't believe me until I explained the kit. This was literally this past weekend.

Wow, digging in deep. Be careful to get seats that fit against the B-pillars. Sometimes those seats with the wide wings don't make it in.

Well the difference is I don't have the time, space, or tools... or skills to do any body work. That's one art form I'm not talented at. I make it go fast, that's enough for me. I let the body guy do his job.

Yup, that's what I was thinking. It looks better in that lighting, but is likely the same as the 350Z color. That's common practice in Japan.

Your motor is in 'limp mode' when it doesn't sense the MAF. It's just enough to drive it around, but it sure sucks. Be extremely careful when wiring up a MAF that doesn't belong on the engine. If you wire it wrong, you can burn the wires out and most likely will burn up the ECU. I've seen it happen not once, but twice over the years. I strongly urge you not to run a KA MAF on the SR. Get the proper MAF and save yourself the trouble of destroying your engine, or your ECU and harness. At best, you will have a power robbing bottleneck in front of your turbo. You can run different MAF's with an SAFC installed. If you can get your hands on the Z32TT MAF, that one is ideal. You just need to adjust the input and output settings on the SAFC, and it works like a charm.

Wicked! I wasn't trying to spark a discussion about weight savings, but the point you guys didn't catch is this - Every 40 pounds add up. If you build your car saying, "Oh, its only 40 pounds." and then you do that 10 times throughout the build, thats 400 pounds. 400 is very significant to performance. My point was I build with weight in mind all the time, and always consider the total outcome. I agree, comfort is great. I would like to make my ride super comfy, but I don't take it on long trips. It's a round the town car and occasional racer. Oh, and by the way - Gas weighs about 6 pounds per gallon. If I run my tank half empty, I save only 24-30 pounds. It's still less than this material. (just informing you to how light gas is - noticeably lighter than water)

Saw a Porsche Cayman the other day done like that. Ohhh man did it look great. Completely blacked out, and sinister looking.

Looks sharp!

Thanks guys! Funny, now that its two different colors, I've been getting compliments on it everywhere I go. I suppose the "work in progress" appearance is much better than the "beater" appearance. At least it looks like I'm trying.

They list body parts for the 240z... but no pics anywhere. Anyone know anything about the company?

New doors on - had the body shop remove all the little dings and the little bit of surface rust they had on them. And the new license plate frame is in place. The only issue is the gap on the passenger door. I need to adjust it a little, it seems. Maybe just the strike plate needs to go in a little.

35lbs ain't so bad. If the effect is really noticeable, I could almost justify that. That looks like a killer job you did there! I have to agree, though, covering the holes in the doors should quiet them down even more. As a lighter and easier alternative, can't you just put pieces in strategic places - like on the larger flat surfaces, etc.. to take the ring out of the metal and stop some of the noise? This method would use much less material/work and keep the weight way down. I know I saw a test once in a stereo shop where you could tap a little hammer on a piece of metal, and then one next to it had like a 1"x1" piece of this material. The difference in sound was incredible. It's just when you're considering every piece of your car and its weight... fighting to drop 5 pounds here, 5 pounds there... and then you add 35-40lbs all at once? Ouch. That's a decent sized step back. Not a huge deal... but every 40lbs adds up.

I really like the work here. The problem with mounting speakers in that location is the variance in sound from left to right. I saw a study done by a car stereo magazine once that explained how dash mounted speakers place either the left or the right far too close to you. They said the ideal location with the kick panel, because the distance to either passenger was more equal. The second best is the door panel, right down there by the kick panel where most people put them. Here's an article I found on it just googling really quick. http://www.caraudiobook.com/car_audio_kickpanels/car_audio_kickpanels.htm This might not be an issue for most people, though. Just throwing it out there for people who are considering what would be best for them. The location looks prime for speakers the way you did it. I'm also liking the 6x9's location. I wonder if you could fit two 8" subs there and get decent sound from it? Might be nice having them right behind the seats. The dash came out fantastic! That's some inspiration to get to work on mine.

Haha, I was referring to the front end shot with no fenders. Looks like you're taking it to Baja.

Wouldn't welding them on possibly show through the panel to the front side? I think you could glue them on with epoxy or something... or just wedge them in when you screw it down. Shouldn't cost too much to have this made by any machine shop with a CNC machine/laser cutter/etc....

And here's the files zipped up so you don't have to use Rapidshare to download them. gaugepanels.zip

Oh, and now the other one worked!

Just spent 30 minutes on the elliptical machine this morning! Need to get back down to racing weight. Some OEM power window assemblies are pretty heavy. I just wanted to avoid that. The motors look really small, so I'm guessing this one isn't so bad. Anyway, this is an awesome write-up. Great job.

Oh, that's too bad. At least you've got a plan for it. I'd like to wrap mine, too. For now its the plastic dash cover.

Here's a preview of the 2 gauge design. I couldn't download the 3 gauge design due to Rapidshare being too busy. The files are only 39Kb. If you have trouble hosting them, please email them to me and I will serve them off my website. If you put them in a zip file, you can attach it to a post here, just like you attach images.