GreenState Posted February 12, 2012 Share Posted February 12, 2012 After being on here for quite some time, I figured I should start my build thread so I can document what I'm doing and hopefully get some help along the way. So, a little about myself. As of this writing, I'm currently 30 and living in northern Vermont. I spend most of my year working on mountain bikes at my shop in Stowe, VT, called iRide. We specialize in high-end mountain bikes, Santa Cruz is our primary line and the business is run by myself and another guy who both love to ride bikes. When I'm not wrenching on bikes or riding them, I like to spend time in my garage working on cars. Until last year the object of my affection had been my '04 WRX with an STi turbo upgrade and supporting mods. I'm the original owner of the car and will own it as long as I'm around. It handles great but the engine is in need of some love. The next step for the car is probably a 2.2 stroker kit, but for some reason, instead of doing that I went out and bought a Datsun... Don't get me wrong, I love my Subaru. But I wanted something more........raw. Authentic, maybe. Sometimes driving the WRX feels like you're cheating. Not that matting the gas, watching the boost gauge spike to 18 and feeling everything hookup isn't a hell of a lot of fun. It is. That's why I'm keeping it, but I kept thinking I about something that would challenge me, something RWD, something light, coupe not convertible, something that I could tear completely apart and rebuild from the ground up how I wanted and better than how it was. Then I remembered something. I remembered the first time I saw a Z. I was 16. I grew up in rural Maine and was into 4x4 trucks and V8 domestic muscle cars. The 'import scene' at my high school consisted of two kids who owned VWs. That summer my friend's uncle hauled his non running Z up from Massachusetts and parked it in a field at their family's camp. Z cars are practically non-existant in Maine, not many made it there in the 70s and most of the one's that did were destroyed by New England weather decades ago. The car was crap brown with the D-slot mag wheels and its condition was fair at best. I'd never seen a car like it and was smitten by the long hood and slanted windshield. Sliding into the super low, laid back drivers seat and grabbing the fake wood steering wheel and shift knob I feel in love with the car. I came back later with a battery to try to see if I could get the car to start. It didn't fire, but it cranked over and lit up the interior lights from the 70's. I'm pretty sure it was a '72 because of the lights by the stick shift I still remember clearly. I told my friend I wanted to buy it, but it disappeared and I never saw it again. I started to research on the Z cars. I found this site and I began to learn what was possible. I found what I was looking for. I set out in the fall of 2010 to find a rust-free (as can be) 240, running, unmolested, and somewhere that I could reasonably go and get it. This took some time. I ended up finding one in New Jersey that had been a California car and spent its last eight years in NJ, only driven on sunny weekends in the summer and kept garaged otherwise. It had 64k miles on the original engine with newish (10 yr old) SU carbs. It had been repainted before he got it and he had a book of receipts for several thousand in work that was done on the car when it was in Cali. The interior was in good shape with the exception of the cracked dash (surprise) that had a cover on it. The frame rails, rockers and floor boards were solid. I didn't love the yellow, but the car fit the bill and I sent the guy a check to hold it. The next challenge was the weather, as it snowed almost daily last winter. During January a 48 hour window of sunshine was forecasted and I made the trip. My girlfriend was kind enough to ride with me for the 16 hours of driving, I made sure to take her to a really nice dinner in NJ when we arrived. The next morning, I met the guy at 7:30 am at his house, the Z was sitting outside running with a healthy engine sound. The first time I saw my Z in person: After signing the paperwork it was off to Uhaul get it loaded on a trailer and back home before the snow started to fall. Somewhere on the NY turnpike: After a long drive on the interstate followed by a long drive on twisty roads the Z sat in the garage. My dog checking to see if she fits in the new ride. It was like getting a bike for Christmas; all I could do is stare at it and wait for the snow to melt. I got to drive it for 15 minutes in stoplight Jersey traffic never getting above 35 mph before putting it away for 3 months. In April the roads were clear enough to take it out. I put a bit over 1000 glorious miles on the car this summer and fall, none of them interstate. I wanted to get one unmodified and running so I had a idea of what I was starting with. I decided not to do anything to the car for the first summer and just drive it how it was. The only things I did to the car were install a front air dam and remove the bumpers. The 40 year old spent bushings and shocks far past their prime made for an interesting ride with tons of body roll and suspension changing geometry mid-corner, but the engine pulled like a champ and all four of the gears are solid. The Datsun became my choice on days I knew (hoped) that it wouldn't rain. I loved driving it and drove it until November when the alternator died on me and I jumpstarted it to get home. This was the last day it was on the road in November '11, you can see the snow starting to fall: My first priority for this car was to address the suspension and steering departments and I figured I'd do the disc brake conversion while I was at it with everything apart. Next winter I'll work on the engine. Then I'll worry about paint. The first thing I ordered up was a full set of Ground Control camber plates. Pricy little units, but very well made. Set of four Roller bearings on the top mount. The directions however SUCK and reference off the middle of some holes or the edges of others to the .01". I ended up making several templates in Sketchup and test cutting wood before I cut into the car. The measurements they give you aren't quite right and I had to make some adjustments to get it all to work out. Once I had the template made, it was easy going. Making the templates and getting them right took some time. Here is how I ended up putting the plates in. Bolt the drill template to the car using a tophat. Drill the two 1/8" pilot holes for the holesaw cuts. One is a pain because it's on a slope on the bump on the tower. Be careful or you'll break your drill bit, don't drill though with the template in place just use it to locate the holes. Once they're started try to come in at an angle and once you're through rotate the drill to vertical. This is the hardest hole as there is very little material left to hold the pilot bit. If I did this again I'd probably start the cuts through the lip with a cutoff wheel before going to the hole saw. The hole on the outside is optional, but it removes a lot of material quickly. I then enlarged the holes to 1/4" to match the pilot bit on the hole saw. Be careful when cutting with the hole saw, come in from and angle or you'll risk snapping the bit if it grabs on the lip wrong. Yep, did that. Hole saws started, lip cut away. Finish the cuts and cut off what's left of the lip sticking up. Bolt the drill template back onto the tower and check the alignment. If you hold the template against the side of the holes near the fender it will be pretty close to start. Adjust as need be and tighten the nuts and locate all the holes with the 1/8" bit, remove the template and drill the holes with the 1/8" bit. Enlarge four of the holes to 5/16 and the others to 7/16. Using the camber plate hardware from the top, lock the cut template into place over the holes and use and awl to scribe a cut line around the holes. I colored it in with black marker to show the cut zone in the photo. I used a cordless jigsaw, air cutoff wheel, die grinder, and a few files to cut out and finish the cuts. The jigsaw is the fastest and you can do all the cuts on the rear with it, in the front the fenders get in the way on the outside cuts. Made sure to deburr your holes and you will probably have to reshape your plates and washers (banana shaped things) to fit up in the tower cleanly, more so in the front. Camber plate installed. To go along with the GC camber plates I called McKinney Motorsports and got Mack's 240z Megan Racing kit. Installed on the GC plate. Megan vs GC. Parts and pieces. GC top setup. Easy part, remove suspension from car. My beater work bench came in really handy here with it's giant vice. Beautiful maple workbenches are awesome, but build one out of pine and you abuse it and smile. Hard part, remove spindle pins from rear LCAs. The first one came out far too easily. Which made me dread other one instantly as I knew I wasn't going to be THAT lucky. I wasn't. I ended up using most of a can of PB blaster, a 6 lb sledge, and a 12" punch I inherited from my grandfather that he used on bulldozers and such. I think I used some profanity I learned from him as well to aid in the removal. Guess which one gave me trouble: Getting down to the important parts. To chop the tubes evenly at 45 mm I went to the local hardware store and had them cut a scrap piece of cast iron 2" ID pipe at 45mm. It slips on the rears perfectly, it needs a notch on the front to sit even on the casting. Sawzall action. The adapter tubes fit on the rear perfectly, but the notch on the front isn't quite big enough and it sits cockeyed on there. Grab a half round file and the die grinder. Before and after. Sittin' pretty. Whole assembly before paint. I had my friend who welds for a living do the welding for me and I smoothed out the welds a touch with a blending wheel. I punched out all the bearings and sent all the castings to the powder coater to have them blasted and coated. While waiting on the parts, I moved onto pulling the diff and engine. Quick and easy diff removal. My girlfriend noted that the diff on the jack looked a bit like Ganesh, I'd have to agree. Homer dressed up as Ganesh: Sweet mustache bar bushing. My dog loves to chew on this, it's her new favorite toy. Getting ready to pull the engine. Remember to disconnect the shift lever...it makes it much easier. On a piece of plywood with casters bolted to the bottom. It's great for moving the thing around while it's out of the car. Crossmember and steering rack removed. Empty bay. An engine mount far past its prime. I removed the engine mounts and steering rack and sent the crossmemeber to the powder coater. Car as of January '12: As I've been taking the car apart, the parts to put it back together are starting to fill up my garage shelves. I was greeted by a stack of Rota boxes when I came home one day. The UPS guy made sure not to put them in the snow. Thank you Mr. Bong! (Great name, BTW) Rota RB-R, 17 x 9.5 all around. After I took these photos I put the wheel back in the box and sent them to the powder coater to have be blasted and repainted. They should look slick when they get back. Gabe and Gia at Techno Toy Tuning have been great to deal with and I was able to get my LCA/TC kit from them all painted black to match before they shipped it. You guys rock! Front. Rear. Brakes from Dave at AZC. The rear brackets are for the AZC parking brake calipers that supposedly will exist sometime this year. I'm one the list for a set of those when they're ready. Wilwood 1" Master. I ordered the 10" 280 booster by mistake and had to send it back for the 8". Bunch of bushings. R180 STi 3.9 differential waiting on axles from John. Suspension Techniques sway bars from Beta Motorsports Some inexpensive lug nuts I got on eBay to start with. They'll fit my g/f's Subaru too when/if I get nicer ones. Well, that's where I'm at as of today. I'm on hold waiting for parts. Still to come: - Get the castings and other parts back from paint and press in new bearings, seals and wheel studs. - Side axles from John C - Install the brakes - Get the wheels mounted and balanced - Put the engine back in the car - Put the drivetrain back in the car - Install new suspension parts - Cut flares My goal is to have the car back on the road by the end of April. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
78zstyle Posted February 12, 2012 Share Posted February 12, 2012 ! That is an awesome car to be working on.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrCleburn Posted February 12, 2012 Share Posted February 12, 2012 Sweet project! That Z is in really good shape great find and I can't wait to see it when its done. Are you gonna keep the original yellow color or respray? Any color ideas if you respray? -Pat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1 tuff z Posted February 12, 2012 Share Posted February 12, 2012 Subscribed! What color are the rota's getting powdercoated? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
emeraldlion Posted February 12, 2012 Share Posted February 12, 2012 Don't know how you managed to find that clean of a Z up in your area, but congrats on the score. Please, please, please keep the stock color. For some reason that yellow is my favorite early z color next to orange. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nelsonian Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 Man that's a great start to what will be a very nice ride. Also curious as to the wheel color change. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenState Posted February 13, 2012 Author Share Posted February 13, 2012 The wheels are being painted gloss black, including the inner lips. With some paint sealant and wax on them and they should look really deep. When I eventually paint the car, I'd like to go from the current 919 Yellow to the 112 "Yellow" or Chartreuse as my artist g/f describes it. My plan is to get the car all built how I want, engine and all, then strip the whole thing and do the paint right. In the meantime I don't have to worry about dinging it up a little while I'm working. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neotech84 Posted February 13, 2012 Share Posted February 13, 2012 Love it. Great work! So why go for adjustable lca if this is just a weekend car? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenState Posted February 14, 2012 Author Share Posted February 14, 2012 So why go for adjustable lca if this is just a weekend car? Ease of alignment and stance adjustment. I didn't want to have to play with spacers to get things how I wanted them. On the front I wanted to remove the binding of the bushings as well. On the rear, removing the outer bushings and shoe-horning the casting into the new poly bushings doesn't look like much fun either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nismodealer Posted February 22, 2012 Share Posted February 22, 2012 Nice work. Im curious as to how noisy a suspension setup like that will be. Thinking about the same setup. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
itzgoten Posted April 25, 2012 Share Posted April 25, 2012 OMG! Great build so far! I love it! I was randomly searching for someone who did the GC Z camber plates on their car and found this thread. You have my attention, I'm subscribed! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenState Posted April 28, 2012 Author Share Posted April 28, 2012 (edited) Well, this spring hasn't quite gone as expected.... The heatwave in March got my business going early and I've been doing six day, sixty hour weeks since. Little time/energy to work on the Z but I got back in the garage this week and I've made some progress. Fortunately the paychecks from those weeks are paying for parts. I bought an Eastwood Pro Brake Flaring Tool so I could get my Wilwood parts installed. I really can't say enough good things about it. It allows you to do a OEM quality flare in under 30 seconds. Every time. I cut the metric fittings off the stock lines to the MC and replaced them with 3/8 fittings needed for the Wilwood MC. I thought for a long time about where to put the prop. valve. After searching on here, it seems that once it's set you don't have to fiddle with it much and mounting it in the engine bay keeps passengers from spinning the knob. I ended up getting a couple of elevator bolts and welding them to one of the brake line mounting brackets on the firewall. I used the flaring tool to add the 3/8 fittings to the stock line. The 280z booster was a bit more of a PITA that I had anticipated. After realizing just how tight the fit was going to be, I ended up making a drill template out of scrap to make sure I got the new holes in the firewall in right places on the first try. That worked out well and i knew I was going to have to do that. However, the ridge/seem on the firewall prevented the large booster from sitting flush. I was able to hammer the ridges flat and after several minutes with a die grinder the seem was ground flush. All set now? No... What took some extra time was the fact that the threaded rod on the 280 booster was larger than the 240. So the piece that connects the booster to the brake pedal didn't fit. I drilled out the threaded part on the 240 connector to clearance the threads on the 280 booster and welded a nut of right size to the end of it. Problem solved. The 240 dust boot fit better on the new booster as it didn't interfere with the hole in the firewall like the new one did. Getting the nuts on the booster tight is also a challenge, there is very little room for your fingers and wrench. The final step was setting the pushrod depth. The sticky on the Wilwood MC covers how to to do this in detail. Not to difficult in concept, but the tolerance is .3mm so it's a lot of adjust/measure/repeat. I got this digital multi-gague for $20 and it made this procedure rather painless. 5 stars for that thing. Anyway, they're in: Next step for me is to bench bleed my MC so I can get that installed. Edited April 28, 2012 by GreenState Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenState Posted June 1, 2012 Author Share Posted June 1, 2012 Well, I wish the car was back on the road, I'm only a month off my goal, but actual work has been really busy. Good for paying for parts, bad for having enough energy after wrenching on bikes all day to come home and pick up another wrench and crawl underneath the Datsun. I'm motivated to get this thing back on the road soon and have been in the garage quite a bit. Here's my current update. The interior is back together minus a few plastic rivets. Looks mostly the same except for the camber plates sticking out of the rear towers. I've decided to try to fit these wheels without flares, hopefully I can make that happen with the adjustability I've got in the front end. All the parts are back from the powdercoater and look much better then when I removed them from the car. The wheels didn't get done because the guy was afraid of messing them up. This worked out 'cause later I talked to a guy who had a moto wheel done by the guy and it didn't look so great. We agreed that the guy was great for brackets and undercar parts, but for showy wheels he may not be the best option. I decided to mount up the tires and make sure they fit and I like them before finding someone else to make my wheels a custom color. These tires should be pretty darn fun. No expecting high miles, more like miles of smiles. The last part of my brake system to plumb was removing the residual pressure valve from the rear and the supposed prop valve/t-fitting. The T fitting had no valve in it, despite what other people have said on here. It mush depend on year. The pressure valve I opened up and once you pull a rubber seal you can get the snap ring out and gut the thing easily. Like pretty much every bolt and part that I took off the car, these got wire wheeled before being reinstalled. Installed: The STI/Datsun side axles from John C arrived perfect as can be so I was able to get the diff installed will all fresh bushings as well as the TTT control arms/TC Rods I pressed new bearings into the front hubs and packed them with fresh grease after mounting up the AZC rotors. All the original wheel studs were removed and replaced with the Nissan Quest studs from Napa. Since I won't be running spacers I decided not to use the extended ARP studs I had here. As I slid the first hub on for the initial test fit, it went smoothly and then stopped with a clunk before bottoming out. Somethings not right...yup. The LCA hits the rotor. It's mentioned on the AZC site so I'm not the first to encounter it. I got out the open grinder and a used blending wheel and changed the radius on the arms so the disc clears in all positions of the turning arc and also under load. Yes, that's plastic wrap on the rotor to keep my greasy paws off it as much as possible. Now it fits. Calipers installed: Holy crap, there's a wheel on the car! My next goal is to get the rear hub assemblies together and mounted up. Lots of work to do still, but it's awesome to be putting things together! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rturbo 930 Posted June 1, 2012 Share Posted June 1, 2012 Nice work man. Don't believe you mentioned it, so what's the plan for the motor? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenState Posted June 1, 2012 Author Share Posted June 1, 2012 Nice work man. Don't believe you mentioned it, so what's the plan for the motor? Ah, the motor plan. I had originally wanted to go with a RB25DET, then I found out how much they weigh. Then I was thinking about doing a built SR20, but realized that the powerband of that motor wasn't going to be what I wanted. So currently I'm planning on using a Rebello 3.2 with triple Webers. Great torque, great hp, great sound. No computers or electronics to mess with either. I still reserve the right to change my mind, but it won't be a domestic V8. For this summer I just removed all the CA smog equipment and got some air horns for the SU carbs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
310z Posted June 2, 2012 Share Posted June 2, 2012 Excellent choice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Git-y-up Posted June 4, 2012 Share Posted June 4, 2012 Great thread. Congratulations on your zed and work you have done so far. Ever thought of a Turbo l28? Or you rather stay away from electronics? Haha Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenState Posted June 6, 2012 Author Share Posted June 6, 2012 Moving forward... The rear strut assemblies are together with new bearings, studs, and brake adapters. As I was tightening up the bolts on my coilovers I noticed that the top nut wasn't bottoming out on the bearing, it was several mm shy of being tight. Before: Well, either I needed to find some spacers that were just right size or find a different set of nuts that perfectly fit the GC plates. Right... After some thinking over a PBR and starring at what was in front of me I had my moment of clarity. I grabbed a stock front brake caliper bolt and stuck it in my vice and stacked some nuts and washers over it and snugged the top nut down on the bolt upside down. I measured the strut shaft, it was 11.9 mm found a 12 mm drill bit, it happened to be a 31/64". With some care I drilled out the threads from the end of the nuts, the stack of nuts kept me from going too deep and the bolt protected the threads. Result: Win: One of my hopes of going with the GC plates was that in front the top of the COs would clear the hood. We'll see when I put it back on. Rear brakes Swaybar installed Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenState Posted June 8, 2012 Author Share Posted June 8, 2012 (edited) Great thread. Congratulations on your zed and work you have done so far. Ever thought of a Turbo l28? Or you rather stay away from electronics? Haha Yes, I should add that to the list of engines that I considered. I remembered this morning that I'd also spent a great deal of time researching the VQ35 swap as well as VQ engine building before shelving that idea. I really want to keep this one non-electronic, normally-aspirated. Not that I don't love turbos and electronics, but my WRX has plenty of both to deal with. More progress... Needed to mount the Odyssey battery and since I had to remove the battery tray to get to the one bad rust spot on the car, the stock option no longer existed. I got a 7" deep U-bolt from the hardware store for $4 and used my vice, a piece of pipe, and a MAP torch to bend it so it fit around my battery and trimmed a bit off the threads. It's now bolted to the firewall, doesn't budge. Bent U bolt: Installed: Before the transmission went back in, I needed to do something to address the shifter bushings that had the durometer of a marshmallow. Best part of this mod is that it was free and took about a minute once I figured out how I was going to do it. I found two washers that fit inside the bushing bore of the transmission and reamed out the inner diameter until the shifter just cleared. Using the stock washers everything snugs up tight and the shifter feels much better. Washer stack: Installed, no more bushing slop: Best part though, is the car is now sitting on its new wheels. Rota RB-R 17 x 9.5" all around with 235/40 Nitto NT01 tires. Edited June 8, 2012 by GreenState Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
neotech84 Posted June 8, 2012 Share Posted June 8, 2012 Yay for you! Looks great. Top notch work with great discriptions. Keep it up! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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