johnc

That question is way to general to receive an intelligent answer from anyone here at HybridZ. You need to be considerably more specific. Try answering the following questions: 1. What kind of car? 2. What kind of shape is it in? 3. What modifications are already done to it? 4. How do you drive the car (% street, % track, % drag, %autocross) 5. How good of a driver are you? 6. How mechanically inclined are you? 7. How much money can you spend? Once you've thought those through the folks here will be glad to help with some specific answers.

Some of the parts (calipers, pads, rotors) came from SCCAMike at http://www.phonebooth.com, the Tilton parts came from Tilton, and most other stuff (mounts, brackets, lines, fitting, pushrods, etc.) were fabricated.

It would most likely depend on what you did to get pulled over by a cop. Secondly, it would depend on your attitude when the cop is writing you the ticket. Thirdly, it would depend on how nice the vehicle looked in the cop's eye. For example: Big smokey burnout and street racing in the neighborhood where the cop lives, you calling him a pig and informing him that you pay his salary as he's writing you the ticket, and your car has three different colors of primer, torn up interior, oil dripping on the street, four bald tires, and a rusted out muffler - the car's going to get impounded for life and you're going to spend the night in jail with a guy the cops call "Duwayne the Reamer."

As Mike said you want the early Type B 4 speed (bellhousing and gearcase as one unit). The early, early 4 speed is generally referred to as the Type A and is weaker then the Type B. Someone who is restoring an early car might be interested in that tranny or you can just remove and keep the bellhousing for later use if you do any kind of trans conversion. For my Quaife tranny install an early bellhousing was used along with an adapter palte.

I'm running: 1. Outlaw 2800 series 4 piston calipers front and rear (1.75" pistons front, 1.25" pistons rear). 2. Coleman 11 x .81" vented front rotors. 3. Brembo 11 x .61" solid rear rotors. 4. Tilton 7/8" and 15/16" master cylinders (will probably reduce both 1/16" for a little better brake feel) on a custom mount using the stock brake pedal. 5. Tilton prop valve and balance bar. 6. Hawk Black pads. The whole system is: 1. Lighter then the stock caliper, master, booster, rotor, and drum setup. 2. Much more effective and consistent braking. 3. No fade or any brake problems during this year's OTC on 7 different race tracks. The car stops quickly and straight every time. 4. All for under $1,000.

Like any "rule of thumb" make sure you know who's thumb is being used for the measurement.

My mistake. I assumed that making such a severe change to the rear suspension was for a dedicated drag car. Ladder bars, slapper bars, overriders, etc. are all traction band-aids to a rear suspension that's not optimized for launching. Since your car is going to be, primarily, a street car (there I go assuming again) you're going to have to make compromises. With that assumption, I personally feel that the Z IRS with an R200 rear is a better choice for a compromise street rear driveline/suspension. For the 99.5% of the time when you're not doing a full throttle launch on the street, the R200 will work great with 600hp. If you're still concerned I would recommend remainming with an IRS and look what Scottie has done with a Corvette rear driveline and suspension. You'll be much better off going that route then turning the rear of your Z into an early 1960's pickup truck...

Here's and example of one way to do a deck setup: http://www.turbomagazine.com/tech/0202tur_extremeedge/ In most dry deck designs there is no head gasket. The block and head are cut for stainless o-rings around the combustion chamber and also cut for special o-rings aroung the coolant and oil passages. I have seen some drag racing applications where the coolant and oil passages on the head and block are welded up and surfaced. The coolant and oil flow is routed outside of the head/block mating surface via AN lines with holes drilled and tapped in the appropriate gallerys on both parts. Both of the ones I saw were for extreme cylinder pressure applications (over 2,500psi). I assume the setups were very expensive. Sorry, I don't have any specific information to refer you to.

An improper rear suspension design for drag racing won't let all the weight transfer or won't let the weight transfer in a smooth, predictable fashion. Just look at what Ford did with the Fox chassis Mustang. They made a number of compromises in their 4 link design because of chassis re-use (cost) and the rear roll centers do very strange things just before the inner links bind. Most folks who drag that chassis switch to a torque arm or a three link design. Most of the reasons for that switch are to get predictable, consistent launches. Its tough to cut a good light when you're not sure what the rear suspension is going to do, run to run.

All dry deck installations I've seen use AN fittings and braided lines. All are good to 600 degrees and 300psi with is more then enough for oil and coolant.

Build a complete subframe that puts the 4 link in the correct geometry. Then work on attaching that subframe to the 240Z chassis. Don't try to adapt the 4 link to fit the 240Z chassis or you'll end up with a car that won't hook up.

You're compromising suspension performance for looks and style? Shame on you Mr. Intelligent Suspension...

Control arms are generally the same length although production tolerances sometimes build up and you'll occaisionally find one arm that's, maybe, .125" longer then another. When you're measuring track width for each side measure from the lower control arm mounting bolt center. Don't measure from any body panels - they are most likely off to some degree.

Actually, the 240Z dash is not very heavy once you remove the guages, controls, wiring, HVAC ducting, etc. The one out of my 1970 weighed 14 lbs including the glovebox door.

You are the first that I'm aware of swapping an Olds V8 into a Z. I'm sure someone has done it somewhere but that information may not be on this site. Do a search on Olds or Oldsmobile.

There's also the dry deck option when trying to mate different cylinder heads. You'll have to drill and tap the head and the block and run separate lines for oil and coolant.

The rebound in the shock would (and does) control droop whether the spring is there or not. Usually the weight of the wheel and tire (35 lbs or more) will bring the suspension into full droop, it just doesn't droop at the same rate as when the spring is involved. Happens all the time in race cars - that's why lots of guys run the little helper springs with 8" regular springs. The bump in the shock would also add some measure of control until the spring was re-engaged although this is not an ideal situation. BTW... I'm not disagreeing with you or Keith regarding the choice of spring height for a street car.

I'm confused by this statement. How does spring length limit droop? Are your springs attached to the spring perches? BTW... I assume the spring travel discussion includes shortened struts.

But he didn't get it Animal Style! What a loser!

I was away from this thread for a while, I'm back now. Personally I prefer a triple carb setup (Mikuni or Solex) over any kind of fuel injection for the sound, looks, and performance. Next to that I like the individual throttle bodies sold by TWM, again for sound, looks, and performance. I was going with the TWM option until Jim Thompson at Sunbelt talked me out of it. From the development work he has done on the Mazda Protege' and Nissan QR25 motors run in SCCA World Challenge Touring (over 130hp per liter NA with restrictors) he feels a single throttle body with a tuned plenum is worth seconds per lap over individual throttle bodies. Its all about the area under the torque and horsepower curves when it comes to going fast around a racetrack. FYI... my 305hp 3.0L breathes through a single 65mm TWM 2805 throttle body. Its all about velocity, not ultimate flow.

Whatever Dan Baldwin ran for his street/track combo. I think 175 front and 200 rear.

I've purchased a couple Quiafe diffs and a Qauife Sierra Rocketbox from Craig. Good guy and a good company to work with. Much more knowledgeable then Quaife America.

Actually, in the SCCA SOlo2 Prepared category you get a weight penalty of 10% (if I remember correctly) for upgrading to FI from carbs. Steve and I were talking about that at the MSA show. If its done right, I feel the torque and drivability benefits of FI outweight the weight penalty. I don't think Steve was planning on running a L28 in Prepared. If he is running a 240Z chassis he is limited to a 2.4L engine. A 260 can run a 2.6L and a 280 can use the L28. At least that's what is in stored in my brain cells, although I'm starting to have storage problems.

According to Jim Thompson at Sunbelt the N42 block has the highest nickel content of all the L6 blocks Nissan produced and is the most dimensionally stable at operating temperature. The N42 block weighs about the same as the other separate cylinder block castings. The F54 block is ultimately stronger but heavier then the N42 (and others) because of the siamesed design of the cylinders. The siamesed cylinder design also distorts the cylinder at operating temperature and adversly affects ring seal. This can be reduced by boring and honing the block while its heated as close to operating temperature as possible. Nissan L6 crankshaft weights are almost identical with the diesel crank being the heaviest at 52 lbs and the L24 crank coming in at 48 lbs. Pistons, rings, rods, etc. are somewhat heavier for a L28 vs. a L24. A FI manifold with injectors and the fuel rail weighs more then SUs, the two intake manifolds, and the fuel lines. The FI fuel pump weighs more then the mechanical fuel pump. I'm not sure if all of this adds up to a 100 lb difference but I would expect a FI L28 to weigh more then a carburated L24.

The radiator core support in any 240/260/280 flexes. If you solidly mount any radiator to the core support it will slowly be torn apart. Fabricate a bottom tray that the radiator sits in (padded) and a couple top clamps that bolt to the core support and hold the radiator in place (again, padded).