blue72 Posted March 4, 2009 Share Posted March 4, 2009 I spent all day today at a local junkyard. They've got a couple of ZX's, and I had previously spotted a 1977 280Z with a single carb on it. I returned to grab the early N42 block from the 280 and some other miscellaneous parts both for my L31 project and my 510 project, but when I started to disassemble the the '77 I spotted some odd quirks. I was expecting a Clifford or Edelbrock manifold and a Holley 4bbl, but the single carb wasn't an aftermarket piece. Every piece in the conversion was official Nissan, from the carb and intake to the exhaust manifold to the special fuel rail and heat shields. Unfortunately I haven't had enough time to separate the intake and exhaust manifolds from the N42 head. They are sealed together really well, as in me jumping up and down on the carb throat and nothing budging. The intake manifold is cast with a Y41 and looks like a P53, but without any provision for a water pass-through. The A.I.R. exhaust manifold is a Y40. The carb itself has Nissan cast into it, but it'll be a day or two before get around to inspecting the 2bbl and measuring the runners on the intake. I'm off to the yard again tomorrow to hoist that block out. I haven't heard of any of these pieces in all of my research, but I was hoping someone like TonyD or one of the Aussies or New Zealanders who've seen more of this oddball JDM stuff might be able to help identify what vehicle these pieces came from. The only clue so far was a sticker found on the rad support that read: Z Experty Datsun/Nissan Specialists HUNTINGTON BEACH, CA followed by a phone number I figure they must have been the ones who did this conversion back in the day. The did a good job too, because each of the fittings that you'd normally dread removing screwed out easily like they had once been coated in anti-sieze. A quick Google search shows that there is a place 40 miles away in Venice called Z Expert Automotive, so maybe I'll call them and see if they're related at all. Here are some more pictures to satiate curiosity until later: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ezzzzzzz Posted March 4, 2009 Share Posted March 4, 2009 I saw one of these a year or more back on eBay. The seller had brought it over from Japan. Other than the unique qualities I don't see any value in it. With a single barrel (or small two-barrel?) it would produce high intake velocity and good low rpm performance much like the L6's found in many early trucks. Cool find. I'd pick it up and keep it around for conversation, if nothing else. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ozconnection Posted March 4, 2009 Share Posted March 4, 2009 If you lived in Australia and visited any number of junkyards, you'd find setups like this on Skylines (C210's) 260 and 280C's (Cedrics). Nothing new to us down here. Performance wise, nothing special at all really. Cheers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JelmerPatrol Posted March 4, 2009 Share Posted March 4, 2009 I had the exactly same setup in my Patrol. Still have some of those laying around. Just a small carb and intake. I've changed to SU's and gained 20HP on my L28. So, not worth putting on anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tony D Posted March 4, 2009 Share Posted March 4, 2009 Liked they said above, Skyline, Cedric, etc.... That one is odd in that it's a late-model with EGR and an actual AIR setup. Normally they do not have those on the run of the mill early JDM items out there. My 77 Cedric had a similar setup. I trashed it. Now, you find that HA30 4 Barrel setup from the 67 model....let me know! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blue72 Posted March 5, 2009 Author Share Posted March 5, 2009 Ha ha, Tony and his mysterious E32. The more I've dug into this motor the more it looks like this was a complete JDM engine swap. The N42 head doesn't have a spray bar, but instead its internally oiled. The cam is stamped "B" on the rear and what I can see of the valve seats lead me to believe they're the hardened kind and not bronze. I suspect the head is probably one of the home market N42s without injector notches. The remaining piece, the block I retrieved today looks to be the "early style" with no provisions for an oil filter adapter. Kind of an odd combo to come across at a junkyard on the outskirts of a city where reside 817 people in rural Southern Utah. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ozconnection Posted March 5, 2009 Share Posted March 5, 2009 Now, you find that HA30 4 Barrel setup from the 67 model....let me know! I came 'this' close to getting one .........from a 69 model! The car looks like this... The engine from that car looks like that.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kolonelklink87 Posted March 6, 2009 Share Posted March 6, 2009 I came 'this' close to getting one .........from a 69 model! The car looks like this... The engine from that car looks like that.... Was that on import monster? I remember drooling over somehting simular a week ago... also there was a wild one with triples... I wish I were a weathy man with poor mans' tastes and not a indigent with poor mans aspirations... *sigh* Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blue72 Posted March 13, 2009 Author Share Posted March 13, 2009 I found out what was tripping me up as far as removing the intake from the head. The intake and exhaust manifolds bolt together and I still had one stud holding the exhaust manifold on. To prove my prowess at cleaning otherwise worthless parts and just because I was curious, I disassembled, cleaned, and then reassembled the whole mess. It is an odd arrangement of parts though. The carburetor is a two barrel with a vacuum actuated secondary. The EGR pieces are on an adapter which is bolted to the intake manifold and there is a large tube that runs from the adapter to a flapper valve inside the exhaust manifold. Fuel and air are pulled down through the carb and it looks like they impact direcly onto the hot exhaust manifold before being pulled into their individual runners. Tough to explain, but here are the pictures. Here's the whole mess still bolted together. The carburetor removed And here you can see the underside of the intake manifold where it fits over a cast boss on the exhaust just below the twin 35mm butterflys of the carb. Maybe it's just me, but it doesn't seem productive to bounce your air/fuel mixture off of a hot exhaust manifold before combustion. Some engineer's bright idea I guess. This intake manifold will not work with any other exhaust (well, unless you want to dump fuel all over it or fab a blockoff plate). It'd almost be tempting to flip the intake upside down and try bolting a 4bbl to it, but it'd be way too much fab work to get it anywhere close to working. The fuel rail with dual feeds and a tertiary vacuum line built in. Partially disassembled and thoroughly scrubbed carburetor Mostly back together If anyone was wondering, the intake runners average an ID of 31.8mm where they meet the head, almost exactly the same as any Z EFI manifold. Sorry if this kind of stuff is old hat to anyone overseas, but I thought it was interesting to try an decipher what was going through the minds of the people who made these crazy emissions era contraptions. It's certainly not something performance oriented, but I don't think I'll ever see another one like it floating around over here. Anyone want to buy a nice, big clean JDM paperweight from me? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ozconnection Posted March 13, 2009 Share Posted March 13, 2009 If you look carefully, all that 'crap' on that induction setup is the same as what you've got on some of the twin Su setups. Emissions!! The intake and exhaust are mated together like that to avoid having to run water coolant throught the intake manifolds. The 'stove' setup is much quicker at warming up the engine and therefore the engine runs cleaner more quickly. Emissions!! The big problem is that, like Blue 72 has found, you can't run the intake manifold easily by itself unless you plug that big hole at the bottom of the plenum. This is when you need something like a 'P53' intake. See the picture attached. With some adapter plates I ran 2 and 4 barrel carbs on my engines. They're not bad when adapted this way and could also be the basis for a simple draw through turbo setup perhaps! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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