Hardwyre

Possibly. I noticed my Z also has that damn phase timing, so there is a 5º difference in timing between a cold engine and a hot engine. As far as I understand it, this means it's pretty much a CA car.

That IS with the vacuum disconnected. I was getting 22-23 degrees of mechanical advance and ANOTHER 20 with vacuum. Here is what I get right now. Initial: 15 Int+Mech: 37 @ 2600 Int+Mech+Vac: 57 @ 4600 I think I have a 610 truck distributor in mine (at least from what I'm finding on a couple sites) Think I should try running without vacuum advance for a while?

Absolutely awesome, thank you!

I think I need a proper distributor for this engine. I was thinking of doing an 82 L28 motor with maybe an P90 head modified for high compression with Singh grooves in the quelch zones... but I haven't had a chance to look for an engine locally. At the same time I want to do an LS1/T56 conversion on her so spending the money on the P90 headed engine doesn't make much sense unless I can find a decent engine/head for fairly cheap.

My dizzy is putting out about 22 degrees of mechanical advance with another 20 or so in the vacuum. From the sound of it, it's a truck distributor (620 pickup?). I'm running the traditional L28 engine with the dished (I assume) pistons and N47(?) heads which might explain the non-ping at ridiculous advanced. I need to check the actually cam timing to even make sure things are lined up properly. I did get it to 110 mph today at 15 degrees initial without even thinking about it on level ground, so I should probably check all my other sensors to make sure it's not pouring out a bunch of excess fuel.

Interesting. By what this site says, my dizzy is for a '77 datsun truck: http://www.newprotest.org/projects/510/dizzy_specs.htm "'77 620 pickup w/ manual tranny; single breaker point non-EI dizzy w/Large cap; full mech 11.5 (x2 if measured by crankshaft rpm: thus the 22-23 mech adv I'm seeing.) What's interesting is it is an electronic distributor. Wonder if it truly is a truck distributor.

Sorry, I didn't mean to sound bitchy. You're right, I did forget some information. It's the typical '76 280z set up as far as I understand; 2.8L with the EFI. N42 heads I believe. I do get into it some days, but only for brief periods that I wouldn't think would greatly impact the overall mileage (this is the first sports car I've had; before it was a camry and a suburban). Moreover what I was looking for was if my 22º of mech. advance was unusual. I have heard these cars can get upwards of 28 miles a gallon and still be a lot of fun, that's kind of what I'm striving for. Thanks JHM, as I said to Maverick, I didn't mean to sound whiny. What's confusing me with this engine is I had it up to 20 degrees BTDC with as much as 50+ total advance and I still wasn't hearing detonation (I'm used to the *ping ping ping* of a chevy V8; I'm assuming it sounds similar on these motors); but when I ran that, my mileage tanked. I've since backed it town to 15 and seem to be doing better mileage, but I'm also running premium gas this time around. I guess what I really need to do is find a guide for all the maintenance things to do before trying to adjust the car. Like checking resistances and such of all the various sensors and things that control the fuel delivery (smells really rich even after a TPS adjustment). I have a wideband A:F setup that I'm going to get into her soon.

There is no one who has any information on this? Seriously?

I was thinking one was just bent, but measured from the ground, they're the same height. The driver side sticks out nearly an inch further than the passenger. I may just replace them with an air dam, just trying to decide on one I like. Is there any way to try and bend them without destroying the paint? Heat gunning the paint first?

I was modifying an old grill to fit my Z because it didn't have a bumper or grill when I got it, and there doesn't seem to be a lot of options for buying one. So I figured why not use what I already have on hand. I was trying to make both sides equal on their contour and found there was more of a gap on the driver side than the passenger. I am curious, do I have two different fenders on my car? Did different years have different curves? Here's pictures:

Car: '1976 280z Ignition: MSD 6AL Ignition Alternator: CS-144 GM Dizzy: D6F4-02 I've been told these L engines love having their timing advanced, and will run more efficiently because of it. Here's what I was just running: Initially I started with this: Initial: 13° when warm, 7° when cold Mech: +22° all in at 2600 Vacu: +20° all in at 4600 Total: 55° at 4600 Milage: ~17.3 mi/gal Initial: 20° (No ping detectable) Mech: +22° all in @ ~2500 Vacu: +20° all in @ ~4600 Milage: ~15.2 mi/gal I've backed the timing down to 15° but I've only got about 90 miles on the trip and already I've used over a 1/3 of the tank. I've got all the parts to put in a wideband O2 and find out just what kind of fuel:air she's running (smell rich), but I'd like to hear some advice on my distributor's settings (it's stock as far as I know). I'm wondering if the MSD ignition is changing the timing requirements. Any advice?

Is the meter registering pressure? If it sat for two years, the oil could have possibly disassociated. I don't know enough about the OHC engine to say what exactly you can do to remedy the problem. If you're getting pressure on the gauge, it's a good chance it's clogged.

Figured it out, took more pictures:

I plan to. It would be nice is there was a 280Z-Only seat guide, as they seem to have the narrowest of seating area because of cat-converter bump and wider tranny tunnel. I can build brackets and adapter plates without issue, trying to find a seat that fits is much more difficult. I went for a drive in a 87 e30 and those seats fit me pretty comfortably. A little snug, but otherwise nice. And the snug fit would just encourage me to keep working out and slimming down

I'm looking for some seats that will fit in a '76 280z. Right now I have a pair of cheap ebay "Racing" seats that I had in my camaro for a long time, they don't fit the Z, but other than the fabric being badly sun faded, they're fine. I also have a pair of '08 (?) Eclipse seats with unblown airbags that I'm going to try and fit in, but I'm thinking they will be too wide as well, if not too tall. I think whoever had them before me slid them around on their backs because the plastic cases on the backs are scuffed up. I'm 6'2, and a stock 300#. But to give you an idea, with the stock Z seats, I fit in the car just fine... the Z seats are just all torn up from 34 years of use. I've heard e30 BMW Recaros work well, Miata seats, some Porsche seats, etc. My budget is only about $250 at this time (student), but I'm willing to trade my seats as well. The factory Eclipse seats with the air bags seem to be going for about $300-$400 right now. I'll be able to repair the scuffs and scratches by sanding the backs and spraying them with a bonding plastic dye (far better than paint). If you live in the area (Portland, Willsonville, Woodland, Washougal, maybe even as far as Salem or Longview) and you're interested in selling or trading, or trading+cashing, let me know what you have. Thank you Jason

I threw some tape over it. Do you happen to remember off hand which wire is the fuel pump wire? Id originally cut a yellow wire coming out of a rectangular connector on the door side of the passenger floor pan. Does the wire go through that connector as well?

Okay boys and girls; apparently there is a unique deal with '76 280z and this swap. Your battery will die if you don't rewire/disable the "brake warning lamp check relay". I had a dead battery this morning and have been fighting with it since I got home from work. Zed apparently ran into this problem before me and was awesome enough to point me to this thread: http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/showthread.php?p=313999#post313999 You'll know you're possibly going to have problems with this swap and need to hunt relays if you hear the relays click/throw when you reconnect the battery, even if the car is "off". After I cut the yellow wire, it was dead silent when the negative terminal was reconnected. Thank you Zed!

Zed, you are most excellent! I found that relay under the front passenger seat brace. I had originally cut "a" yellow wire near the door and found nothing happened; I was still getting the relay click. Eventually found it and when I cut THAT yellow wire, it stopped throwing the relay. My "Brake" light on the dash stays on, but the relay is no longer heating up (it was warm-hot before) which makes me assume there's no longer current through it. A picture for prosperity!

I charged it up, started the car, with nothing on, it charges at 13.6 or so, if I have the cooling fan, AC, radio and headlights on, it charges at 13.9-14.2. I let it run for a bit, disconnected the negative from the battery and noticed it fell to 12.7'ish. I'm going to check in about a half hour or so and see if it's continuing to fall. If so, I need a new battery. If it doesn't drop, I'm going to reconnect the negative and then check it again later to see if it starts dropping there. If it does... then I'm SOL as I don't know what I could have messed up since it seems like everything is correct. That red CHG light is a bulb and not an LED? Okay, I'll removed the resistor then.

No, I did all the disconnecting today. What happened was last Thursday I did the 280Z Alt swap to the CS144 GM swap. It sat for about 8 hours (I finished at 3am Friday morning) and started up for lunch just fine. Went out Friday, and parked it from about 2am Saturday morning until 10am'ish (another 8 hours or so). Then after getting home about 10:30am saturday, it sat until 5:30am this morning (Monday; ~43 hours). The headlights were barely able to turn on and the car didn't bother trying to start. I'm pretty certain I didn't leave the running lights on or anything. I have it charging now; it seems to be taking the charge. The lights are all coming back on, etc. I'm going to try starting it in a couple minutes. I hooked up the old T connector from the F and N wires from the old alternator to the S and L leads on the CS144 alternator. The S lead now has a constant 12v and the L is on a switched 12v which is what it should be AFAIK. I did not connect the old battery wire (white'ish) because I ran a new 4 awg wire from the battery post directly to the battery. I also did not connect the old "E" black wire and instead grounded the battery to the engine block with another 4awg wire. The external regulator was bypassed per the instructions from the link in the first post (5 to 1, 3 to 2, 4 and 5 not used). I have a 100 ohm resistor inline on the "L" wire per some instructions from another guide, but now I've noticed that the little red light on the dash doesn't light up or does just faintly. Is that an actually light bulb or is it just an LED? Nigel, should I leave the resistor in? I put it in because there was one in the harness KTM used in this post (http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=135557&highlight=cs144) but I just went to the scrap yard and cut out the connector instead of buying one from NAPA for $20. The other thing may be that the battery has just reached it's limit. It was in the car when I bought it (Duralast Gold; no date of install on the battery ). I did die on me Thursday before I started everything, but I'd contributed that to leaving the running lights on for a couple hours.

Thank you sir! That eliminates all that worrying. I'm going to install a diode in the "L" wire to the alternator as there seems to be some census that this allows for some leakage otherwise.

I performed the CS144 GM alternator conversion on my 1976 280Z. I eliminated the external regulator by wiring together two pairs from the ER per this guide: http://www.atlanticz.ca/zclub/techtips/alternatorswap/index.html What I am not sure about is that even when the key is removed, the voltage gauge on the car is always showing the battery voltage even if the car is off. I came out this morning and the battery was nearly dead, like it's been slowly drained. I didn't notice any of the lights or anything having been left on. The thing is, I have disconnected the alternator from the battery (I ran a 4ga wire directly from the alt to the battery), the wiring harness from the alternator, and short of disconnecting the ground from the alternator, it is effectively out of the electrical look (at least positive-wise, it is still bolted in, thus grounded). I'm about to pull my hair out over this. Please help. :/

The swap was successful except my charge light on my volt meter doesn't seem to light up anymore. I used a 100ohm resistor off the alternator. Headlights don't dim anymore when I have the radio, radiator fan, and heating going anymore.

'76 280Z. First Datsun ever. Previous owner said the head was rebuilt; sweetness. I added an MSD 6AL ignition with Blaster II coil. Seems to have helped flatten out the torque curve. I adjusted the timing to the factory 7 degrees cold, which seems to crawl to about 12 degrees when warm. What is the deal with the dual-timing dizzy? Is it the CA type? I'll pull numbers off of it today. Braap gave me some awesome advice for initial timing, setting it around 15 to 20. Here's the rest of his post to me: I've been trying to find information via the search button for setting the mechanical and vacuum advances, and while mech.adv seems to be controlled by bushings and weights, I can't find anything instructions for adjusting the vacuum advance. Also, do I set the timing cold or warm as it differs. I'm assuming let the engine warm up first. I am thinking are starting with this profile: 20 initial 36 mechanical ## vacuum at part throttle. Am I correct in understanding that vacuum advance will take the timing beyond the 36 "all in"? Does vacuum advance work like this: At partial throttle, manifold vacuum is high, raising the advance(~50BTDC) to allow for better mileage, but as you open the throttle, vacuum drops, leaving only the mech.adv (~36BTDC) and creating more power? I noticed something else; when I changed the cap and rotor, the contacts inside the cap looked like they'd been gouged or sliced. I was initially thinking it was spark decay, but is it more likely this is a sign the dizzy is wobbling? Oh, does anyone have information of adjusting and fine tuning the EFI? I keep finding information for tuning MegaSquirts.

I have a fairly stock '76 280Z. I understand newer injectors have finer spay patterns, etc. I'm curious what kind of injectors I can drop in as replacements for the stocks. I was looking at the 5.0 injectors that can be used as barbed ones, but I think the flow rate is far too high for my setup. Could anyone PM me the info?