Bought my daughter a 280zxt

[madkaw]

Well I have a new project now. I couldn't resist when I saw the ad in craigslist. It was kind of a selfish motive-- since I wanted to get a hold of a turbo motor to have for my car later--, but I e-mailed the ad to my daughter at I.U. and asked her if she would drive something like this. I didn't know if a 19 year old would want to be seen in a car like this , but it was a nice 20 footer and it was an automatic with AC. She responded, "are you kidding me", like I was getting her a Ferrari:) It had some issues, but the car only had 90K miles on it. We took it for a drive and it it felt solid, but ran like s#*t. The kid told me that the Nissan dealer said it was the AFM, but he wasn't putting anymore money into it because he was going to college. He said he was probably going to cry when the car left because he loved the looks he got in his black t-tops.

Well I took the car home and the "project" has started. I need to get this car going and reliable in the next 2 months.

The good parts are:

New tires and nearly perfect snowflake rims

Low mileage clean not rusty eng comp.

Interior not tore up too badly-normal wear.

valve cover off -Solid Lifters-cam looks beautiful

Rust on body is managable

The Bad

The engine ran like s#*t

Bad afm 200$

Bad oil leak somewhere-I believe it was the oil pressure switch-35$

Water pump bad-the kid was close to a break down-that pump was shot

Rubber brake lines toast

Right caliper sticking-even though it's new

T-tops leaking

Rust in bad places-windshield-YUK

Frame rails beat to hell

Prior body work from collision done by hacks

 

There's more but I need to go. I only hope to make a reliable daily driver for my daughter that looks cool. I gave her a run down 95 Mercury Sable in HS, and I am trying to make up for that, because I am so proud of her. I'll post some more pics later

[madkaw]

Well I have been busting my a$$ to get this car up and going for when my daughter gets home from college for the summer. I have made significant progress, but still many unknowns since I haven't driven it since I bought it. I was waiting on an AFM so long I had to make other progress so I started on the cancer. Every golf ball size spot turned into a small patch panel worth of work, but all in all this car is in pretty good shape for a midwest Z. I had a local sheetmetal shop bend me some 18 guage to make some "caps" for the frame rails. The damage was mostly cosmetic but i wanted to prevent further cancer. This car was hit pretty hard at one time in the front and this has led to some of the corrosion in the panels-plus a leaking t-top I am sure.

 

After the cancer removal I moved onto checking the engine out. It idled very badly and it fell on its face at 4000. I removed all the connections that I could find and cleaned the all electrical connectors and coated them with electical lube. I found the wires broke to the TPs and went to the junk yard and found another one to splice on. I pulled the radiator out and to have some pin holes fixed-40$-for a flush and fix. I noticed when spinning the clutch fan that the water pump was shot-and I mean shot, I don't know how it was staying together or making noise. I also found the major oil leak which turned out to be the oil pressure switch. This was all done AFTER I spent 2 hours and a gallon of degreaser to degrease the engine compartment. I also found while looking around the original(I believe) brakes hoses on the car that were ready to break in half. This car was a ticking time bomb:shock:

I also managed to find time to install a new carpet kit in the car. Man what a difference that makes to the interior.

The right fender had huge rust holes in it so i got another one from Dannys Datsun (great guy) and had it painted up. I also found a better front bumper here on the site and I replaced the metal backer under the rear bumper. It was completely disengrated to a rusty powder. I tried doing a better job on fixing the the front enf radiator core support then the hack body guys did the first time around for the PO. I por-15 everything and i hope it lasts for a while. I would like to see my daughter and I get some fun years out of this car. I will post some pics of the progress now and then to show the car coming together.

[madkaw]

Well I have major improvements to this car since I purchased it. I got a fender on and painted and replaced both headlight buckets and painted them along with the front bumper. This car is now at great 10 footer. My daughter LOVES the looks she gets while driving this car. I believe I scored big with this car. Hell, she actually washed the car without me asking. She has driven it for a couple of days now and I think I cured all the leaks on the car:mrgreen:. Even the AC works great. I only wish I could get the car to idle better. I still have some trouble shooting to do, but I am trying to cover the basics right now.

I checked compression and all cylinders were 130+

Install NGK plugs and they show a lean burn

Temperature runs good.

Oil pressure is great

Replaced afm and O2 sensor

I am running fuel injector cleaner

Injectors all sound good

 

I believe I have a vacuum leak , but I can't seem to find it. I have been reading posts about bccd, maybe an internal leak??

 

Anyhow,here are some pics

[madkaw]

Well I'm sure I found the exhaust smell getting inside the car. I was installing the antenna and I realized that I could see my garage floor from the INSIDE of my rear quarter. It is time to jump on the bodywork. So the other day i got out the cut-off wheel and welder and started to hack away. The rust isn't really to bad for an Indiana car and I will be able to just fab up the lower quarters pretty easy. I need th get this exhaust issue sorted out . I also noticed the muffler was shot and holes in several places that made the fume issue even worse. Then I started looking at the pipe from the cat to the muffler and thought-crap-I'll have to replace that too. I guess I will order some pieces from summit and weld together a set up to duplicate the factory, except with mandrel bent stuff. It looks like magnaflow has a SS muffler for about 80-$ that should fit in there just right.

As far as the idling issues I got all excited the other day because I thought I found the source of a vacuum leak , the crank hose to the pcv was cracked badly. I replaced the hose and the car seems to idle even worse now. I had taken the car for a spin early(I have to pry the keys from my daughters hands), and the car excellerates very hard in my opinion. The car is very quick comparing it to what I drive, which is a turbo Baja Subaru. I say that because I can't imagine it is anything too bad or it would run worse. If you are in park(automatic) and slowly raise the rpms it sounds like ther is a miss or something because the rpms are not very smooth-regardless of rpm speed. I haven't replaced the wires and cap, but they both look good and new. I am going to try some seafoam or something to see if it might clean up any injector issues. I know I need to get my OHM meter out and do some more diagnostic work AFTER I get the exhaust issue dealt with.

[madkaw]

Well I woke up today determined to find out what ups with the crazy idle on the car. I started it up cold, and she idles pretty decent, pretty smoooth, but gets worse as she gets hotter. I pulled the ems and started ohm testing everything. My chts wouldn't test good by wire, but the component check showed that it reacted to temperature in a proper fashion. It seems that the chts is working , but the signal is not getting to the EMS. I'm not sure what to do now, do I chase the wiring? ( I did clean the connector)

As I let the car idle outside it hovers around 700rpm , but surges and sounds like it's missing. I swear it's a vacuum leak, but I take the valve cover cap off and she dies. I finally start disconnecting crap, and the EGR is the first to go-wow -what a difference. Then I just take the whole VCM out of the system-pull the wires and all-and it runs better then it has since I bought it. Any comments??

Then I moved on to body work, and about finished up the metal work on the drivers rear quarter-pictures to come.

After that, the daughter had to go on an errand, so I quit on the bodywork and moved on to the interior stuff.

I decided to try and recover the rear panels since that was the the one bad point left in the interior. I already installed the new carpet and the panels would really make the inside look great. I am proud of the way they came out-for an amateur. Tomorrow I will tie it all together and get some pics of the whole interior

[madkaw]

Well I got the car back long enough to do some work on the interior and bodywork. I finally got a chance to see the interior all together with the new panels and carpet and my great find on some original seats. I think when I get some of the more important issues dealt with I will repaint all the plastic in the car.

The body work is also coming along. I was able to finish off the drivers lower rear quarter and I started with the back panel and passenger quarter. The passenger rear quarter was much more of a challenge because of the spare tire panel. I spent a lot of time making patterns for the sheetmetal for the inside panels. As you can see the spare tire area really ballooned out when I started looking for good metal to weld too. I only gave myself a day and a half to do all this and really had to rush to get it done. After getting all kinds of sh%t in my eyes(yes I do wear protective eye wear) and mig burn I was able to weld close all the holes before the daughter had to take the car to work again. This is a tough way to do a partial resto-I feel for you daily drivers trying to do this.

The next major hurdle is the front windshield. I ordered the clips for the moldings and I have my por15 ready, but still debating whether or not to have someone else do the removal and installation. I think I have the skills and it would cut down on the logistical stradegy of getting someone there when you need them for the install.

[madkaw]

I haven't done a whole lot to the car lately, but have made some progress. I have hit some stumbling blocks related to having an old car , like not finding oem parts. I found out the hard way that some parts for the rear brakes are not available anymore, so I will have to try and find used stuff somewhere. I was able to fabricate something that would work on the rear caliper brackets to replace the plastic shims that are supposed to be there, but I hope to find the proper parts soon. Anyway, I got rid of the clunk that the caliper makes when these pieces are not on there. The brakes work great on this car and I hope to have the parking brake working again as soon as I get some real time to work on the car.

My family goes on vacation to Orlando shortly(I'm not going-tired of Mickey), so I will get 5 days of Datsun in on her car. I plan on redoing her windshield and fabricating a 3" exhaust for the car. I am putting my shopping list together for the pipe and muffler. Looks like I will have almost 400$ just in the exhaust. That would include making my own downpipe and 3" all the way back to the Magnaflow muffler. This will be a big job for me-hope it goes well. I think the catalytic converter is clogged on her car, so this needs to be done soon.

The windshield will also be a stress maker. My plan is to remove all the SS moldings and tape off the windshield and then sandblast the windshield panel. With the car all closed up it will be easier to keep the sand out of where it doesn't need to be. This will be easier then trying to tape off that big opening with the windshield out. After that I will take the windshield out and assess the rest of the windshield flange area. I will use Por-15 patch to fill any pitholes and to rust proof the area. I will spray por-15 along the rusted areas outside the window channel area(the roof basically), After letting everything cure I will reinstall the windshield and toucch up paint-sounds easy doesn't it:eek:

I will try and document everything with pics

[madkaw]

It is kind of funny to call this windshield repair since I broke the windshield taking it out:icon56: I was doing well until the tool I was using hit a snag and I leaned a little too much and next thing I know-crack! I had already researched prices for new ones and found someone to install a new one for 165$, so I could live with the loss.

Let me backtrack for a second and say that I did follow my previous plan and sandblasted the area around the windshield before trying to remove it. It actually worked out well to keep the sand out of the inside of the car-even though sand still got in, so maybe that's how the water got in. I really only found one hole where it rusted thru, and that wouldn't have let water inside the car. I think the fact that the rust was so bad that the seal was no longer effective and that seemed to be proven by how easy it was to cut around the glass. The pitting was substantial and must have led to the leaks.

I decided on por-15 patch for the repair. It would stop the rust, plus the putty like substance would fill the voids and small holes left by the pitting. I took care to only apply it in the molding area and not on any exterior surfaces that need paint. The exterior stuff I sprayed on por-15 paint to be later top coated with tie coat primer -then finish color.

I haven't finished yet, so here are some pics of what I did do.

[madkaw]

....because it could have been ugly!

My daughter was home for the holidays and I try and take the oppurtunity to check on her 81 280zxt and make sure it's okay. I put some new speakers in the car for her Christmas present and I also had some maintenance items I wanted to take care of. Due to the extreme cold here in Indianapolis the 30 year old oil seals were starting to give out. The Crank pulley or front main seal started leaking and the power steering pump started spewing too. I happened to have an extra crank seal and I was actually able to order a shaft seal for the pump from Napa(6$). I never had messed with the PS pump before but thought it couldn't be too bad. I was actually guessing the seal was bad on the shaft since I hadn't taken it apart yet.

Both jobs went pretty well and I was bale to replace the crank seal without disconnecting my condenser and moving it. The hardest part was getting the keyway to line up when reinstalling the pulley-I couldn'y really see it and had to feel my way around. I was really nervous about dropping it into the timing cover. The PS pump was a learning curve but not too bad, but I did booger up the first seal when i tapped it into place, so I had to order another one from Napa(last one they had). I was doing this job without removing the PS pump, because I didn't have a wrench big enough to hold the HP line nut to get the line off. I got in a hurry the first time installing the seal but came up with a better paln of attack the second time.

Since I had to wait another day for the new PS pump seal I was putting my schedule in a bind. I told my daughter I would get the car to her that day that the seal came in, so I had to move effeciently to get everything done and checked out. The second seal went on great and I finished putting the car back together and test drove it-no noises, no leaks-i'm cool

Well I hop in the car and drive it 50 miles to her school and drop it off and everyone is happy A busy day and I was done Z-ing and I would clean up the garage tomorrow.

Tomorrow came and I cleaned up the aftermath on my work bench of the pile of tools rags and stuff. Then suddenly I locked up looking at my bench--------there sat a C-clip-a C-clip to hold the PS shaft in place--OH Sh%t, I said about a million times. I called my daughter right then and told her to not drive the car until I get down there. Then I had this scary image of being on the highway at 70mph when the shaft came out of the PS pump and how much damage that would have done

 

I really got lucky this time-thankyou Z Gods

__________________

 

[zxtoy]

Great story! I read it from start to last post. I feel as if I actually know your daughters 280zxt as a friend! Thanks for the write up.

[dernikmatute2008]

nice find

[ArchetypeDatsun]

BEAUTIFUL FIND I CAN'T IMAGINE THE HOURS OF WORK IT TOOK TO TAKE ALL THAT RUST OFF, MAN YOU JUST DON'T SEE THOSE 81 TURBOS TO OFTEN I HAVE ONE BUT NOT A REAL TURBO BUT SWAPPED IN THE MOTOR AND TRANNY OFF A 83. YOU ARE RIGHT ABOUT THAT CARPET IT MAKES A HUGE DIFFERENCE I HAVE THE SAME COLOR SO THANKS FOR THE SNEAK PEEK AT WHAT IT WILL LOOK LIKE.

[timestep]

BEAUTIFUL FIND I CAN'T IMAGINE THE HOURS OF WORK IT TOOK TO TAKE ALL THAT RUST OFF, MAN YOU JUST DON'T SEE THOSE 81 TURBOS TO OFTEN I HAVE ONE BUT NOT A REAL TURBO BUT SWAPPED IN THE MOTOR AND TRANNY OFF A 83. YOU ARE RIGHT ABOUT THAT CARPET IT MAKES A HUGE DIFFERENCE I HAVE THE SAME COLOR SO THANKS FOR THE SNEAK PEEK AT WHAT IT WILL LOOK LIKE.

 

There's an FAQ about the Shift key that you should read.

http://forums.hybridz.org/index.php?/topic/86700-the-shiftkey-faq-version-0001/

[stretchnuts]

Nice looking Z!!!

i love that thread

"Q. Why are there are no "shift" keys on my keyboard, but there are two keys labeled "hif"?

A. Again, you may want to consider cleaning your keyboard, and washing your hands more frequently for that matter." Is my favorite.

 

And any girl that loves old zcars gets up in my book!

[madkaw]

Well I thought I would share this family picture, and you can see it involves two families.

I can't tell you how much my daughter loves this car-----still! She has been very patient dealing with the quirks of an older car, but it has been a good car, better then expected for her. Sarah is always riding the wave of attention the Z gives her. Most guys she knows are jealous and in awe of the car.

 

Now that I have painted my car she is wanting her car to look as pretty! I went to visit her the other day on campus and we thought that the pictures would be cool in front of her sorority.

 

My wife and I have discussed giving her our Subaru Forestor as a daily driver next year, but the first thing she cared about was what was going to happen to her Z.

I don't know if there is anything else I could have given her that she would have enjoyed as long as she has enjoyed the Z. I told her that the Z will always stay in the family, and it will always be her car----and dad's to play with.

[wolfalp1592]

Great picture. What a proud Dad. Nice work on the car and the parenting as well.

[aplyedmind]

Very nice car only. Now up the boost for her and she'll never let it go

[Ernest Harmon]

That could pass for a twin to mine. I have some of the same problems you had.I hope mine turns out as nice.

[madkaw]

Well I might have a dilemma on my hands. I bought my daughter another car and I think the ZX might be put on the back burner-or maybe worse-gone. Let's face it, the ZX is a great college summer car, but not practical for anything else. I don't trust the car on a long trip , because of it's age and it doesn't have air bags for safety. After seeing my wife escape death in her Forester, I knew I had to get something else for Sarah.

 

Of course I couldn't just get any car for my SUPER KID daughter, so I got her a 2007 Subby WRX wagon. I am driving right now to make sure it is a good car(yeh right!). I bought this car sight unseen and had it shipped and never drove it before buying-----dam it is quick----maybe too quick! My daughter says never, but I told her that this car will demand respect. The ZX is pretty fast for what a stocker is, but this WRX just flat out GETS IT.

 

So the dilemma is that i am getting overloaded with cars. Don't know if i could sell this car for enough to make me happy nad I still want to play with it more. My daughter says she wants to drive it during the summer, but I think she will forget about the ZXT after driving the Subby----maybe I will be wrong.

 

I think I better just keep the WRX

[michaelp]

Sounds cool...but I take it you've never driven a Z31 Turbo, let alone a Z32 or a Z31T running as much boost as a stock WRX does? WRXs are as slow as a stationary brick. STIs are impressive, but WRXs certainly aren't stock. lol