bjhines

It is usually related to the connections in front of the radiator or in the headlight housings. There are also splices on the right side that are about 6" back from the right connector. You will find them if you unwrap a little. The splices are not well insulated, so do this with the fuses removed.

You should not have to pay much more. Figure ~$200 for color and $100 for clear, plus shop materials ~$100. The intensive labor is done. You will have to pay ~8 hours for sanding and masking. You really need them to sand off most of the existing paint. It will be prone to chipping in large chunks if it gets too thick.

The real trick would be to design the mounts for stiffness against engine torque and forward aft movement; while allowing more freedom of movement in all other directions. This means you would have left and right mounts or one design that can be flipped. The later 280Z mounts were moving in this direction. It would also be nice to allow mounting the engine lower in the chassis and further back using slots or multiple bolt patterns.

That is a nice paint job for sure!!!! I have been doing the same thing to mine. I did mine in my garage though and put up with hairs and bugs galore. Mine is a track car and will suffer rubs, chips, and handling damage at events. I did the inside and cage and door jambs, Then I assembled the car to test run, Then I painted the outside of all parts. That was a major job by any standards. I am just guessing that you have paid more than $6k for that paint job and body work. Yours looks bug free and really shows off what the pros can do in their shops.

The tips are from Autozone or Advance Auto. They are reasonably priced and they are stainless.

Cutting off airflow under the vehicle under hard braking at high speeds can cause a sudden change in airflow that can lift the rear end. Dis no good. We should not get too low with the splitter work on these cars.

Thanks a lot guys. I love the way the exhaust sounds. It is mellow until you wind it up and then it has a kind of "Euro" sound to it. I'll get some road going video up soon.

Aluminum galls and sticks to everything. You need a bottle of cutting/tapping fluid, gear oil, or other high surfectant oil. Wipe the oil on blades with a disposable bristle brush. Drip oil on drills and hole saws(inside and out) several times a minute and before each cut. Make sure to pick the aluminum boogers off the teeth regularly. A good hole saw from Lowes or another home store will do fine. You need to use the drill-press. Clamp the piece in at least 2 places and use plenty of cutting fluid. It will chatter but you will find the right speed and pressure with some experimentation. You will be "wearing away" at the metal, expect to take 90-120 seconds to cut through. I usually cut the holes first and then cut the piece out of the stock. The hole saw will cut slightly oversize but will work out fine once you get the hang of it. Loosen the belt and be ready to hit the kill switch. If the hole saw binds too hard it will bend. Wobbly hole saws are even harder to use. You don't need much torque for this operation so ANY drill press can do it. For the 5" and larger cutouts you need a jigsaw with a "hollow ground" toothed blade. These are blades with no tooth set(kerf) they are thicker than usual and the teeth are ground into the blade. The blades have medium teeth size and are intended for cutting wood. If you attempt to use a metal cutting blade on aluminum it will clog quickly. Ohh BTW, High-tooth-count, carbide-toothed saws are fantastic for cutting aluminum(circular saws, chop saws, etc). The trick is not to use a lot of pressure on the blade. Any heat buildup will cause the aluminum to stick to the teeth(resulting in even more force/heat on the teeth and galling). Just let the blade walk through and it will cut a neat edge. Wear tight-fitting, protective gear because the saw will throw millions of hot, crescent-shaped needles at you. Galling will also put a lot of force on the blade and it will chuck and kickback. You can clean the teeth with a utility knife by prying the chunks off the teeth. Do not scrape the teeth or you will dull them. Whenever you make a cut be sure to de-burr the edge so it does not hang up the saw(or prevent sliding the piece) on the next cut. I use a handheld deburring tool that uses a swiveling, sharpened hook to carve a curly-cue off the edge. You shoould also do some gunsmithing to your jigsaw and circular saws. The baseplates should be free of burrs or deep scratches. Use a file or sandpaper to grind them down, then use fine grit paper to polish the surface. This will prevent scratches and ensure smooth steady feed rates and manuvering(critical to preventing galling and buildup). I cover the sheet metal surface with wide masking tape(edge joined with no overlap) and layout on that surface. This will protect the piece and make cutting smooth and accurrate. When cutting with the drill-press this is not needed.

For the rear diffuser you can locate the fuel tank and mufflers to completely fill in the rear valence area like on the stock car.

That is pretty standard stuff. You can get short aircleaners and side inlet air-horns that will provide enough clearance for even taller setups.

I had that problem. I cut the spring-cup off and rewelded the pieces back together(shorter of course). I actually got a set of 280ZXT shafts off a parts car that had the shorter(correct) grease caps. Then I sent them off to be rebuilt and got back 300ZX shafts that look identical but are 2" too long in the center section. When I finally got the right shafts back together I could not find any of the shorter original caps so I modded the newer ones.

I totally agree with the AZC ultimate upgrade. The cost of the AZC kit is close to the other options. I own a BMW M3 E36 and it has ~slightly~ larger brakes than the AZC/Wilwood kit. I have always been impressed with how well the M3 performs on track with nothing more than a track pad swap. The M3 is a lot heavier than the 240Z and it stops consistently at the limits of traction during 30 minute sessions. The 240sx rear calipers are overly complex and too flexible. The Toyota front calipers are overweight for a car(they were for trucks). The front 300ZX disks are notorious for shimmying until they are turned while mounted on the hubs. The Wilwood calipers are simple, light, and VERY easy to maintain. The Wilwood Ultralight disks are cheaper than the 300ZX disks. The Wilwood pads are cheaper than performance pads to fit factory calipers. The aluminum hats make the entire assembly lighter than stock. Bonus; the Wilwoods will easily stop a car that is 1000# heavier than the 240Z.

Ohhh yeaaa, Shoot...

That is the same internals that my NISMO R-200 CLSD has. If you don't find a case then I might buy it as spares. This is HALF of the clutches in my unit. You should have a total of 12 disks(driven and drive). There is also an end spacer and shim for each side gear. ...

Thats a great example of what kinds of things you learn at a High Performance Driver's Education Event. Running your car at a few events will shed new light on to the careful considerations the factory made for all the systems on the car. BTW, I still think the stock brakes are too scary for me.

One of the Z-Car related websites used to have yearly numbers but not where they were shipped. IIRC there were over 100,000 produced for the 240Z alone.

See...^^^^ I never did that because what happens when they cool down. You click a few clicks on the adjusters and the brakes will drag badly when they cool off. There is no easy adjustment for when they cool off again, Not without removing the wheel and turning the adjuster with a screwdriver.

I have a friend who runs stock brakes in ITS class. He has the skillz to manage the heat on track. It is still his main handicap, even with the stock L24 engine. I don't like the way the pedal drops when the drums heat up. The main disadvantage of the drums is not heat dissapation. The drums grow in diameter which causes the slave cyl to displace much more fluid when the drums peak in temps. This causes the pedal to drop whenever the drums are really hot. I find that I had good pedal after a long straight, but a series of turns would cause the pedal to drop further and further as the heat built up after 2 or 3 consecutive braking zones. Rear disks are much more consistent. The pedal stays the same height until you crack a front rotor. I have found that modern race friction compounds can stop the car no matter how hot they get. The front stock disks will crack with abuse on track. You can also boil the grease out of the hubs. I pulled in missing my front grease caps a few times from heat and pressure.

Street, AutoX, and drag are certainly not all uses for these cars. Track-days and Road racing make great use of the upgrades. I can tell you from experience in a variety of cars that the Datsun S30 stock brakes are a handicap on a race track. They just suck in SOOO many ways. The 1984 300ZX rotors(front and rear) with appropriate hydraulics and brackets are a FANTASTIC upgrade for track duty.

I can do a smokey burnout in my grandmother's Hoveround Wheelchair with tire shine. Back in the 1970s(before the days of shiney tires), I used Crisco Lard. In fact I put it on friends' tires as a joke in the school parking lot just to watch them loop leaving the parking lot. I am not seeing a monster high HP car in ANY of these videos. I see lubricant on tires with ~50HP to turn them on the lubricant.

I have the Beta Motorsports rear hatch. It is freaking LIGHT. The IMSA rear spoiler has a center section that weighs more than the entire hatch with lexan and fittings. The IMSA spoiler is a great example of OVERWEIGHT fiberglass parts. The resin used with various layups also goes a long way towards strength and durability. Most CF parts use epoxy. If it is cured properly it can be much more durable than the typical polyester resin used for most FG pieces. The type of layup also has a lot to do with the end result. 1. Many mass produced FG parts used short strand FG applied with a spray gun. This "chopper glass" is not very strong and requires thick layups. These are always crack prone, overweight junk. 2. A better method is "wet layup" using woven cloth. This is typical of the MSA ZG flares. The pieces are fairly strong and light. They suffer from lack of flexibility and are prone to cracking. 3. Vacuum bagging is one of the most sophisticated methods. It requires slow curing resins and is typically used with epoxy. The parts are layed up with a minimal coating of resin. The vacuum pump and bag layers will apply even pressure to the layup and remove most of the excess resin in the process. The result is a very light and very thin flexible part. The layers of cloth are compacted far thinner than any wet layup could ever produce. Aircraft parts are usually made with vacuum bagging using pre-impregnated cloth and require a huge oven to cure the resin. The parts are further heated and cooled to temper and final cure the resin. That is aerospace $$$ and beyond the little Z-car's budget.

You are building a race car. Simple is best. The whole argument about switches over relays can go on and on. The fact is many folks just don't know how to use EITHER. Relays are magnetic devices which can produce considerable bucking voltage from the coil. For the switches and relays; inductive loads must be damped and suppressed or they will foul the contacts. Relays are switches similar to the old points in the ignition system. The contacts build up deposits and will fail to connect. Switches use a scraping motion on the contacts that is self-cleaning. Bad experiences with relays are due to lack of knowledge and improper circuit design. Diodes, Resistors, Capacitors are all used to supress arcing across contacts. Capacitors will not suit the current and votage spikes produced by a large fan. A diode is best for fans. The alternator is a strong consideration with such a small battery. I would use the modern style CS130D. It will produce plenty of current under a wide range of conditions. I would not use a "1-wire" alternator with such a small, rear-mounted battery.

Dual 2.5" with shorty headers, X-pipe, Flow-Pro mufflers, and plenty of heat shielding. It is entirely streetable. ...

You really only want to go 500-1000 RPM past your torque peak. That way when you shift, You end up 500-1000 RPMs below the torque peak in the next gear. Torque is what makes you go faster, Don't push it out of the torque range.

I must say... The guy is a great welder. The sheet metal work is NICE! There is a lot of effort spent on cleaning and preparation. The frame connectors look great. They will go a long way toward stiffening the chassis. The rollbar could be setback more and set into the front of the wheelwells. You must look at the rules regarding proper height of the rollbar. You must imagine a line from the top of the rollbar to the top of the front radiator support. Your head must be BELOW that line. I really think you can get it to fit you. Your real problems would come from the front half of a full cage. There are cars you simply won't fit into with a full cage. The 240Z and most Corvettes have the same issues.