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280Z Restomod Progress


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Drained the coolant, flushed the radiator and changed my old hoses for silicone replacements. Also installed the trim plate around the heater hoses at the firewall. Still have a bunch of more fasteners and brackets to refinish but I'll do that a bit at a time so I can continue to drive and enjoy the car. 

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Changed the front turn signal lenses to a set of "light smoked" set and put in the LED "switchback" bulbs. These bulbs provide dual functions: a very bright white driving light AND amber turn signals/ hazard lights when activated. There is a momentary (0.25 seconds) pause in between functions which is normal for these bulbs.

I really like the look of the white driving lights in the stock turn signal location. Together with the LED headlights it gives the front of the car an updated appearance, increased visibility and more lighting.

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Changed the front turn signal lenses to a set of "light smoked" ones from Klearz and put in the LED "switchback" bulbs. These bulbs provide dual functions: a very bright white driving light AND amber turn signals/ hazard lights when activated. There is a momentary (0.25 seconds) pause in between functions which is normal for these bulbs.

I really like the look of the white driving lights in the stock turn signal location. Together with the LED headlights it gives the front of the car an updated appearance, increased visibility and more lighting.

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Took my center instrument cluster out once again. Wanted to put in my recently acquired calendar clock and decided (while I was at it ;) ) to do something else I've been wanting to do for a while: paint the needles fluorescent orange to match the second hand on the calendar clock. Here are the pictures although I couldn't get rid of the reflection coming off the buffed lenses. I'll have them back in the dash by the end of the weekend along with the LED conversion for the map light.

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Edited by dmoralesbello
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  • 2 weeks later...

I have to say I love all the work you did. You can tell a lot of thought went into this and then came all the hard work. It is truly a great car and I enjoyed reading your posts. If you have some time could you please post some more info regarding the led turn signals and tailights? Thanks

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I have to say I love all the work you did. You can tell a lot of thought went into this and then came all the hard work. It is truly a great car and I enjoyed reading your posts. If you have some time could you please post some more info regarding the led turn signals and tailights? Thanks

Thanks Gotham. There's been lots written in this and other Z forums regarding the LED conversions. As soon as I get a chance I'll pm you with some details. It's pretty simple and gives the car a whole new look but keeps the retro coolness.

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So I wasn't very happy with the unfinished look of the front air dam vent inlets (brake cooling ports) although I very much like the overall shape of the air dam. I decided to make a couple of grill plates that would tidy up those vents and perhaps keep a few pebbles away from my discs. Bought some black powder coated aluminum grill plate in a diamond pattern (0.5 inch) and cut them to shape using a couple of templates taken from inside the air dam. Surprise: they are not very symmetrical! Wrapped the edges with vulcanizing rubber electrical tape, heated with a heat gun to seal the edges of the tape, and glued them onto the back of the air dam. Really simple and now I'm really satisfied with the way those vents look.

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I had gotten a set of JDM tail lights from a Classic Z Car forum member a couple of months ago and finally got around to installing them.

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Unfortunately when I closely inspected them I noticed several rusted studs that I couldn't change out.

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My OEM tail lights, in contrast, were in perfect shape so I took the jump and decided to remove the amber lens from the JDM set, remove the lower red lens from my stock set and swap them. Used the oven method, heating to 150 degrees F for 10 minutes which liquifys the glue and allows the careful removal of the lens. Sounds and is simple but scary nonetheless!

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To re-install you heat the glue again and set in the new lens. To restore the brilliance of the lenses I buffed them with a red Scotch wool and then applied 2 coats of clear. 

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Cleaned up all the wiring as well.

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Edited by dmoralesbello
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Finally decided to pull the speedo and tach for a refresh (polish lenses again and paint the needles fluo orange) to match the work I had previously done on the center cluster instruments. Usually pulling these instruments is pretty easy but in my case (since I have the Power Z steering kit installed) I had to drop the steering column and power steering motor to be able to access the bolts that hold the tach and speedo from beneath. A bit more work but it went quite well once the electric power steering motor was out of the way.

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Should have them back in the car tomorrow.

Edited by dmoralesbello
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Since I have the dash apart to work on the instruments, I decided to change the simple LED bulb in the HVAC control panel for a strip of LEDs. The single bulb gave me very little illumination compared to that in the rest of the instruments so something had to be done  :) .

I used a couple of 3" LED strips and adapted the correct base so it's just plug 'n play. I used aluminum tape to cover the sides of the inside of the case to increase reflection and disperse light a little more so as to avoid hot spots of light. I really like the results and it should look great with the rest of the instrumentation.  I'll put it back in the car tomorrow along with the speedo and tach and post finished pics.

Here are pics of the process:

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  • 2 weeks later...

Took the Z out to it's first meet post restoration at Cars and Coffee in Palm Beach today. It was a perfect 150 mile ride with great weather, excellent music, my 14 year old son and lots of great cars. The reaction to the car was fantastic and got to meet a couple of the guys from the South Florida Z Car Group. Doesn't get much better than that. :rolleyes:

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Edited by dmoralesbello
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