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Mat's "Flat Black Z" Build Thread


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So, to clarify, I'm not all that dead-set on the "Flat Black" thing. I realize it sounds immature and slightly ricey, like when you ever hear the word "drift" on a car site. In all actuality I'm just incredibly unoriginal and couldn't think of a better screenname. There are benefits though, I am not worried about scratches, and I work on my car A LOT. I want to paint it someday when the car doesn't need to be worked on regularly.

 

The '78's History:

 

I got my first Z car two and a half years ago. I bought it in New Orleans, and my roommate drove it to Baton Rouge a week later [i was in New York for the summer], with a bad misfire. [Gas tank was incredibly rusty]

 

The first day I went to see it:

 

000_0017.jpg

 

I spent the first year cleaning it up and making it reliable, replacing all of the usual stuff that goes out. The PO had it painted two years before I bought it, and didn't prep it properly so it had already started to rust on the hood and passenger fender again. I have since then got a new hood and fender.

 

The car is pretty rusty, I went ahead and cut out the passenger side floor rail and fabbed a new one, and I have two square holes where my 'dogleg' metal used to be :)

 

I had a N42/N42 setup in my car, went to change the head gasket last fall, and cracked the block while changing a head gasket. I then happened upon my current motor, a Flat Top F54/P79 out of a 1981 280ZX that I parted out for a friend.

 

The new motor has a new clutch, 11 lbs flywheel made for a KA24DE [yes it bolts right on], a Fel-Pro Gasket with ARP Head studs [Probably will change to a Nissan Gasket soon], a shaved 75 intake manifold with a KA24 TB ['custom' cable linkage :)] and a pallnet fuel rail. 6-1 Headers to 2.5" exhuast to a Ansa-type dual tip resonator. There is the stock 78 5-Speed behind it.

 

I'm running the stock 3.54 R200 with a Ron Tyler Diff Mount and GM Poly bushing. The car is sitting on new ball joints, poly bushings all around and Tokico 185/200 Springs and HPs. Wheels are Rota RBs on Yoko 225/50/15 AVES 100s. The front hubs have new wheel studs and a 1/4" spacer.

 

I have a fiberglass Type 1 Airdam that needs to be swapped for a urethane one, and the rear is "shaved." No bumpers, I have a setup from an early 260Z but the bar is bent and I don't have metal working skills.

 

I've been collecting turbo parts since December, and we got Trumpet's swap done so now my car is going under the knife.

 

The Turbo Swap

The setup I will be using:

 

N/A Flat Top F54/P79 w/ 1mm gasket [8.7 CR on LEngine.exe] with 11 lbs. flywheel

MS I V3.0 Extra Code

83 ZXT CAS Dizzy

Accel Super Stack Coil

KA24DE TB

Stock J-Pipe [Temporarily]

Ford Mustang Cobra 30# [315cc] EV1 injectors

Walboro 255 fuel pump

Stock T3 on stock boost

Tapped N/A oil pan

Stainless Steel AN Oil feed Lines and Distro Block

MSA 2.5" DP [3" Stainless Steel past the DP]

Injen SES Muffler [3" Inlet 4" Outlet, hoping it doens't look or sound ricey]

A friend in Baton Rouge has a Volvo intercooler for me, I'm hoping to make a trip down in a couple weeks and I'll pick it up then. I'll install that as soon as I get back and buy piping/couplers for it.

 

Last night I went up with my roommate Nate and my other friend Zach. We got the motor from running condition to out of the car in just under one hour.

 

Here are some pictures from last night:

 

IMG_2194.jpg

 

IMG_2195.jpg

 

IMG_2197.jpg

 

IMG_0032.jpg

All is going well for now, I will be updating this as I get more done. Hoping to have two boosted Zees by the weekend :burnout:

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nice!, I've often wondered about the Flat black story, since it's not so common for people just to leave things flat black. You might want to break out the wire brush and hit some of that rust on your radiator mount while you have things out. It's a good opportunity to use more of that flat black... :)

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Haha I left this out - my car was 311 Copper before the PO re-sprayed it copper, so that's not all rust ;) *edited OP with a pic*

 

I don't drive my S30 when it rains [My Z31 is my DD] so it's not getting worse, it just looks crappy heh. I will probably re-spray it with an actual gun before school started. I was dumbfounded when I saw RS Speed's S30 in the 'Wheel Pics' Thread. It looks so mean. Eventually I want it to be charcoal/gunmetal.

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Thanks guys. Update!

 

last night I took the intake manifold home for disassembly.

 

I only have two Cobra injectors stripped down, and the 30 year old seals on my N/A injectors don't want to let the holders go on the other 5. I'm going up to the shop, hopefully I can strip down my turbo injectors or find some other N/A holders. I also need to get more fuel hose clamps, I had to run those crappy AutoZone clamps on the N/A injectors as I didn't have enough clamps at the time.

 

I'd like to have the injectors/rail and megasquirt harness done tonight, but a 'lady friend' is coming into town so I'll need to take a Z-work break for a bit.

 

I need to:

* Rewire the MS harness, connect 83 CAS dizzy to the relay board

* Make quick disconnects for the TPS and dizzy wires

* Get MS located in the car, and run it to 12V and switched 12V

* Get oil pan back on the block

* Finish prepping Cobra injectors for the intake

* Put the motor back in, mount the turbo and such

* Install Walboro pump

 

Ambitiously I would like to have the car started by Sunday. I don't work at all this weekend so if the MegaSquirt and injector projects go as planned I can have the motor back in the car Friday night.

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That sounds like it'll be a sweet project when finished.

 

Extra kudo's to whoever was wearing the Beat USC shirt though.

 

That's my roommate Nate. Go Razorbacks!! :cool:

 

The long block is back in the car, I bought all new bolts for the oil pan, we got the new gasket and all of the bolts in there and when I turned around from the motor after getting all 30 bolts on, and saw the oil pick up sitting in a box behind me. :icon53: That was annoying, but the second time was much faster haha.

 

Otherwise, the motor went in quite smoothly. Also, the exhaust manifold and turbo is sitting in the car. I hooked up the oil retun line to the tapped N/A pan as well.

 

**If you don't know where to get a metal T3 gasket, do not buy one at AutoZone. They did not have one in the computer for a 280ZXT and tried to sell me a Edelbrock T3 gasket for $25. I went to O'Reilly's and bought the turbo gasket kit for a 86 Ford Merkur [My buddy owns about 8 XRTis and suggested that]. It was $8 for the entire T3 gasket kit.**

 

I need to re-wire my Megasquirt harness, install my Walboro and injectors, otherwise the car is ready to go back together.

 

I would really like to have it running tonight, so I can take it home and do some tuning all day tomorrow.

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These are crappy cell phone pics taken by my roommate :)

 

2.jpg

 

3.jpg

 

4.jpg

 

So, the MSA pipe I had welded [Out of the car :/ ]with a 2.5" > 3" SS coupler hits my tranny mount. I am going to have to add a couple of inches of 2.5" pipe to clear it. I'm going to have to drive it with an open DP about 6 miles to the muffler shop I'm going to.

 

Megasquirt is wired up, but my ECU has the 029y3 code and my MegaTune has 029y4 on it. I couldn't find the 029y3 .ini after searching for over an hour, so I am going to reflash the board with 029y4. Chris' and my laptop wouldn't reflash it, but Chris' roommate Dan's laptop worked on his, so I'm going to try that tomorrow. The TPS and Dizzy were not showing any data on the y4 code so either they are hooked up wrong or the code wouldn't read it properly [hopefully the later].

 

Hopefully after work tomorrow I can get Mikeatrpi's map [Thanks Mike!] uploaded and get the car to idle, then adjust it so I can make it to the muffler shop.

 

Everything else is done besides covering the harness so hopefully it's just a matter of tuning.

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Thanks Mike, I'm a bit frustrated at this point. I got the ECU to communicate with my laptop with no error codes, but the TPS and Dizzy are not giving the board any signal. The TPS harness wires have 5 volts from Megasquirt, but when I put the multimeter on the TPS wires I got nothing. I also didn't get any response from the Dizzy and I din't get any spark, so I have to figure out how I wired that wrong as well. Other than that all that's left is calibrating the sensors and adjusting tables.

 

I have loads to figure out and I'm growing tired of it already. :/ Hopefully taking a break from the car tonight will help morale.

 

I'm having a friend come out Wednesday with me, he's an audio tech and hopefully we can figure out how to get this thing wired up properly. He also owns several S14s so he's got an extra KA24 TB and a WBO2.

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What are minilites?

 

Had to open up the MS board and wire in some circuits the PO wasn't using. I installed the Flyback circuit for the low impedence injectors I am running, as well as jumpering the board to use MS to fire the coil off of the 83 Dizzy.

 

I am waiting on the BIP 373 from DIYAutoTune, it should be here Monday. After that, I just need to solder that to the board and see if she'll fire.

 

I took a cruise with TrumpetRhapsody yesterday after he got his car running with the Holset, man does it sound great. I can't wait to drive my S30 with a turbo...

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So...

 

I got some time after work today to sit down and troubleshoot why I wasn't getting a Tach or TPS signal.

 

Chris and I figured out the Tach issue and now the ECU is reading the stim board. Very glad to have that figured out. D2 was soldered on backwards and the megamanual said to jumper it if not necessary so I just clipped it out and jumpered it.

 

I still haven't figured out the TPS circuit, but C9 and C10 were not showing any resistance. I'm going to replace those and see if I get anything out of the TPS on the stim board.

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