johnc

The main difference between the 240Z, 260Z, and 280Z engines is basically bore and stroke. All three engines are 90% the same and can be considered variations on a theme, just like the 283, 302, 327, and 350 Chevy small blocks. Putting a 260Z E88 open chamber head on a 240Z block will, if you're lucky, basically give you a zero horsepower gain. Inreality, it will most likely actually reduce horsepower due to the drop in compression ratio. The entire Nissan L6 Forum on this site discussed the engine. With 320hp my 240Z could reach 148mph and might have topped out at 152 but the race track turned left and I had to brake. Without aerodynamic work you would need at least 400hp to get to 160mph in a 240Z. Again, search. All this has been discussed many times over the last 8 years here.

Sounds like he put a 260Z open chamber smog E88 head on a 240Z block. Do a lot of searching on this site and you'll see what the current thinking is regarding the Nissan L-Gata 6 cylinder engine.

I think Dave at Arizona Z Car sells a 185F/200R OEM spring combination.

I missed it, but since I'm pretending to be a time traveler I can just go back in time and celebrate then. http://blog.wired.com/geekdad/2007/12/pretend-to-be-a.html

Old video, poorly narrated, and with crappy sound effects. Kid should be banned from ever getting a driving license. Cops need to be sent back for proper pursuit training.

Wow!

The diff is very tight. 100% lock under load. I've been wanting to tear it down and reduce the lock to about 80% and this may be my excuse.

Everyone's a comedian... It will be a month before I get a chance to put the car on the lift and check things out. It was on the lift after the event but all I was doing was swapping tires and brake pads. I gave everything a quick look-over but didn't check nuts, bolts, bushings, etc. I usually do that before I go out racing. I'm pretty sure the car is one wheel drive (right side). I drove it around up in La Habra Heights and can get the rear end to snap loose very easily in turns, either under power or on hard decel. Its kind of fun. It would make a great skid pad training car right now.

Offset doesn't matter, they had 5.5" of backspace. I ran 2.25" ID coilovers and ZG flares.

This is an interesting problem... After a 4 hours of track time at California Speedway a week ago my 2006 350Z now steers hard left under power. I haven't spent a lot of time figuring this out but I have some ideas. Here's the basic setup: 2006 350Z. Nismo R-Tune clutch pack LSD - 51lbs preload and 100% lock. Koni Sport Shocks. Nissan Motorsports ARBs. Rear shock settings and tire pressures are eqaul. ARB links are symetric. Noticed no problems on the track all day and something like this would have been VERY noticable. We did get the diff hot and it puked little bit of fluid out the breather, but not much. Pulled the car off the trailer, switched back to street tires, and didn't notice anything unusual driving around the shop business complex. Car sat for a week. Now it pulls to the left under power and pulls slightly right under decel with the clutch engaged. Car goes perfectly striaght coasting in neutral or cruising at neutral throttle. Your ideas and suggestions welcome.

Actually, a bad downshift will put as much or more load on the diff mount then loads from acceleration.

Can you guys tell where the crack started? I assume somewhere near the journal, but it kinda looks like it started out on the throw.

Yes.

Chassis dynos do not measure horsepower, they measure the ability of a vehicle (engine, transmisison, driveshaft, differential, halfshafts, axles, wheels, and tires) to accelerate a mass. The horsepower number comes from a conversion calculation. Anything that you do to increase the efficiency of the vehicle's ability to accelerate the mass will show up in the conversion calcualtion as an "increase" in the horsepower number, even though the engine is using no more air or fuel. Its acutally just an increase in accelerative ability of the vehicle - which does mean the vehicle will accelerate quicker. But its not making any more horsepower. Engine driven cooling fans are different because they are performing work (moving a fluid - air) at a steady state rpm so the engine must use some fuel and air to get that work accomplished. A flywheel doesn't perform any work at a steady rpm, so lightening it doesn't reduce the work (and air/fuel) requirements of the engine.

Weld the RT mount into the car and forget about a crossmember between the LCA mounts. Just make sure the LCA mounts can handle some strong lateral loads.

You forgot about gearing. 600 ft. lbs. of torque at the crank. Multiply that by a 3.00 first gear and now you're at 1,800 ft. lbs. at the driveshaft. Multiple that by a 4.11 rear gear and now you're at 4,200+ ft. lbs. at the end of the axle.

Don't poke the bear in the eye with a stick... I wish my Z did have SFCs but the class rules I built the car for (SM2) didn't allow weld in SFCs. Later, when I starting racing NASA U3 I focused my efforts elsewhere for chassis stiffening. Ultimately I would have put in a full cage before I went with SFCs because the S30 chassis really benefits from a cage - far more then what just a pair of SFCs provide. But, given that most everyone's car here is a street car and a cage isn't a good idea on the street, SFCs do a good job stiffening the chassis. An X brace in addition to SFCs, as I've said before, will just add weight. The center part of a Z chassis doesn't twist in a way that an X brace will help, once SFCs are installed. What the S30 chassis need badly is upper level reinforcement at the firewall and the strut towers. Connecting the front strut towers, upper firewall, and rear strut towers together does wonders for this 35+ year old chassis.

The big one in NASCAR was about 5 years ago. One Bush team (I forgot which one) used a hole saw and drilled out the the overlapped part of every tube junction (the part of the tube that was inside the welded joint) on their roll cages and chassis. They ended up saving about 35 lbs. per car. When they were caught, after a wreck where one of the joints failed, NASCAR confiscated every single one of their cars and crushed them - engines, seats, wheels, tires, transmissions, rear ends, springs, shocks, etc. included!

Sometimes I'm a freak about adding lightness.

Just adding weight.

Cute rotor names.

I don't have any more pics. It really wasn't something I wanted to immortalize. The rest of the car is in pretty good shape and will probably be in a magazine sometime in the future.

Wish there was a video. Glad no one got seriously hurt...

Temporarily install a calibrated, accurate temp gauge in the engine compartment and see what your actual coolant temps are. 170 to 190 degrees is fine.

Within the limits imposed by a street car, catalytic converters, and the perceived need for low rpm torque, I agree with the post above. Assuming no limits on an exhaust system, reversion can be controlled and eliminated through propery primary pipe size and length and merge collectors. Also, assuming no limits, scavaging can be tuned to occur within a specific rpm range to enhance power at mid to high rpms.