NewZed

The pictures at the bottom of this link should help - http://www.geocities.com/inlinestroker/ratio.html

One of those holes is directly behind the timing chain guide. People have been known to put a too long bolt in that hole and press the guide in to the chain. You can see it with the valve cover off if you're not sure and don't want to take it apart again.

Have you considered that you might just have a bad component or system on the board itself? The power supply maybe? Seems like you've looked at all of the external possibilities.

I have a 76 four speed, a 78 5 speed, and two ZX 5 speeds and have found that the numbers on the transmission case don't tell anything. I've read the various threads about using them to ID the type, went out and got all of the numbers from each transmission and they were meaningless. No trends or ranges to work with, just random numbers. I knew which car each came from and confirmed by the speedo gear clamp screw position (up or down) and the number of exhaust pipe hangers (two or one), plus the calculated fifth gear ratios for the ZX's.

They show up on the courtesyparts.com site at $15. The description doesn't tell the color or number of teeth by part number, probably have to call them. zspecialties.com has them for $26.95.

The oil sender is 1/8". Here's the numbers for an adapter nipple from McMaster Carr that I ordered in the past, for a similar reason (mechanical gauge on block). 2 2 Each 5832T121 BSPT-to-NPT Threaded Brass Pipe Nipple 1/8" Pipe Sz, 1-1/2" L, Threaded Both Ends, Sch 40 (Same as 5832T2) today $3.14 $6.28 If I had to guess, I'd say the water is 3/8". You could grab a 3/8" NPT nipple from any hardware store and compare. The two types look almost identical, the NPT tip is just a hair too large to get started easily, even if you wanted to try forcing it in to the BSPT hole.

I would start a new thread with Subaru Diff in the title. John C will probably see it, and probably knows the answer. "Differenital Problem Help" doesn't really get anyone's attention. If you download an FSM for the ZX's you'll see that the ZX R180's are bolt-in, re one of your questions. www.xenons130/reference . It's also described on the first page of the Differential/CV/LSD.. link. You might find more info on the "KA" swap by searching "71C" or "240SX" swap. I thnk that the details are the same. A Z/ZX bellhousing/front case swap on the later model transmission. And the later transmissions have a 3.321 first gear, so with a 3.9 you'll have a pretty low first gear.

The bolt-in/clip-in answers are here - http://forums.hybridz.org/topic/49194-differential-cv-lsd-hp-torque-r160-r180-r200-r230-diff-mount/ and here - http://forums.hybridz.org/topic/108917-subaru-wxr-sti-r180-side-axles-part-six/ The other parts, 1-5, of the story are out there too. You'll have to search.

Find out what?

You could run off the battery alone for a test to see if the charging circuit is producing the noise. Are you using the external regulator or have you modified to internal?

Bearings are the same. Collars must match pressure plate height.

My mistake. I think that for the 280ZX the axles are the same for turbo and NA, that's what was in my mind. The parts store will sell you the same axle for NA or turbo applications. I haven't figured out what the difference is. Edit - Actually, I think that only the 280ZX turbo cars were intended to have CV axles, the NA's had u-joint half-shafts. But, apparently, in 83, Nissan put CV's on some of the NA cars. So, in short, any 280ZX CV axle will be the short 6 bolt axle that the OP is looking for. I have a set of 6 bolt CV axles from an NA car in my garage. Sorry to muddy things up.

The 6 bolt CV axles are actually NA axles. Even though some parts stores show them as turbo. Turbo axles are 4 bolt. If you change your title you'll probably get more looks.

Did you keep the 77 pressure sender or make the 82's work? Lots of variation in the oil pressure senders. I "gained" 30 psi when I installed a different sender.

borini... sells a lot of used parts. He posts here and is active on zcar.com. Or look at the pictures on this page - http://www.datsunstore.com/index.php/cName/7578-280-z3-steering-and-suspension-3

Somewhere in one of jmortensen's threads I think that there's a comment about "watch out for the 6 bolt NA 300ZX CV axles" they're extra long. Maybe you got 300ZX axles. Might be in this htread but I'm not sure - - http://forums.hybridz.org/topic/49194-differential-cv-lsd-hp-torque-r160-r180-r200-r230-diff-mount/ Also out there in the internet world is information on the general fact (inferred) that the 240Z's don't seem to have as much space between the flanges as the 280Z's. U-joint half-shafts bottom out when used with the R200 differential in the 240Z, but they're fine inthe 280Z's. BUT, on the other hand, for the 280Z's there seems to be at least an extra inch of space with the 6 bolt 280ZX CV axle. People make adapters, about an inch thick, to go from 6 bolt to 4 bolt, to allow using the axles with the stock 280Z companion flanges. Seems like you might have NA 300ZX axles.

I could be wrong. He said left to rright was mismatched, which shouldn't be. Maybe just one is bad. It's easy to check, either way.

Mark the input flange and the wheel's, then turn the input flange 3.7 times. The wheels will each turn exactly one revolution, if drag is equal on both sides. Or lock one wheel, and the other will turn two revolutions. Stuff like that will give a good approximation.

Looks like torn rubber in both strut mounts. I haven't had a torn mount but I've had my car up many times and the wheel's don't hang that low. You could reach your hand up in the strut tower and feel if there's a gap. With a good light and some contortions I thnk that you can see up there, with the wheel's off. One other possibility is that you didn't put the main nut on the shock/strut rod. Three nuts for the strut mount and the big nut for the shock rod, on top. Edit - Actually, the easiest way to see if the strut mount is doing its job is to eyeball the nut on the shock rod, from inside the car, while the wheels are hanging. You'll probably find that it's not where it should be and is deep in the hole instead.

The drawings in the Body Chapter of the FSM are probably better than any picture you'll see.

Here's another link from the same site - http://atlanticz.ca/zclub/techtips/electrical.htm Click on the 74 PDF file. Pages 6 and 7 might be the most helpful. It's odd that your brake lights are out also, Ithink that they have their own separate circuit from the running lights, headlights and turn signals. Maybe not. By "flashers" loy might have been referring to the Hazard lights. It's fairly common for the Hazard switch, the one by the Defrost switch under the radio, to get corroded and screw things up. Search around and you'll find some threads on cleaning it up.

Sounds like you already know a bunch. Did the resistance come back up when the coil cooled down? You said that it dropped by 2k ohms. The tach jumping aorund is a typical sign of the module going bad. But there could be other causes , my tach stopped working right (needle just quivered at ~500 RPM) after I installed a Z31 coil with a GM HEI module. A condenser/capacitor on the negative side brought it back to life. The tach and HEI module worked fine with a 78 Nissan coil, it was switching to the Z31 coil with the module that knocked it out. But the capacitor, a typical alternator style, fixed it. Some trivia...

I just spend some time messing around with options for something similar and talking to people about it. You'll have a stress riser right at the most critical length of the axle due to the change in material properties at the weld. Read the thread on jmortensen's shortened CV axles and you'll see how critical the heat treatment is to get the steel properties right. Sounds interesting though.

What circuit does Fuse #3 protect?

You didn't mention the crank angle sensor. I think that the ECCS produces spark based on the signal from the CAS. No CAS signal, no spark (or injector operation). It comes up occasionally but there doesn't appear to be an easy way to check the CAS sensor's functions. 83 is in the distributor, I believe. You might search aorund on CAS sensor to see if there's a way to check its functioning.