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The build of a 240Z by 310z


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I found these photos and if you look closely at the lip area you can see the clearance work done. If you click on the photo it will enlarge so the clearance work is visible.

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  • 3 years later...

Reviving an old build thread. I learned something new about my car. I have never had the opportunity to open it up on the top end. Well, while on my way to the Mt. Shasta Datsun Roadster show 2014 I had a very long straight away. I started running through the gears and topped out in 4th at 118 mph and put it into 5 th. I thought it would fall on its face and just maintain speed. It kept accelerating. I hit 125 and it was still pulling. The car completely stable I backed off and coasted back to 70 mph and continued my drive to a Great car show, 30 years and going strong.

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  • 10 months later...

It has been a while since I have added anything to this post. And, well it has been a while since I have added or changed anything on the Z. I am planning a track day and possibly an auto-x in the next month, so I needed new tires. I did a lot of research on a few different tires I wanted.

 

All of the tires I was interested in were in the extreme summer tire category. Each have great performance reviews and each have areas were they out preform the other. My goal was light weight, 200 tread wear or less, with great turn-in. I have always been a fan of Yokohama Tires and the AD08R meet the criteria I was looking for. The size I run is 225-50-16 and of course not all manufactures measure the tires the same and because of that I like the Tire Racks stats on their tires that give actual measurements.

 

I looked at these figures a lot and thought it would be nice to have more tread width. Just prior to ordering I went to actually measure the clearance on the car as I knew it was very tight. The AD08Rs were not going to fit. They would touch the spring perch and the finder lip which is ground down to the spot welds. A very fat 225-50-16. On to my second choice Bridgestone RE11.

 

This tire is narrower than the Yoko AD08R but not by much. I only have 1/4 inch clearance on both sides of the Bridgestone G009 I have been running and I decided I need a tire that is the exact same measurement as they are. I only found one tire that I was interested in that was the same measurement and it is brand new, Bridgestone's RE71R. So I searched for reviews and found two, not a lot to go on. I bit the bullet and placed an order with America's Tire.

 

The tires look great. The center-line stability is much better than the G009s I had. I can actually relax now while driving down a straight road. The dartiness the car had and I thought was normal for the car is gone. This is nice, although I have not had a chance to drive any curves yet I feel turn in my be a little slower than before. Grip under hard acceleration and turning is impressive. These tire have not let go. The previous tires would lose traction and allow the rear of the car to drift nicely. The R71R just grab and hold on throwing you into the bolsters on the seat all while accelerating you down the road. I think I am going to like these tires.

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With plans of returning to the track I needed to look further into the weak point of the car the brakes. As I mentioned earlier in the post I up graded the pads to Porterfield R4-S a high performance street pad. At that time I also tried running ducting to the calipers. This attempt was unsuccessful there is no room in the wheel-wells for ducting with 16x8 wheels and 225-50- 16. So, next Idea is to use the cones I attached to the inner part of the air dam to direct air flow at the wheel and I attached scoops to the strut towers directing air to the disks and calipers. I remember reading in a post on here that someone had done a set up like this for the track and it worked well. I will find out. It should be a large improvement

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  • 1 month later...

Upon completion of the build the Z had Bridgestone G009 in a 225-50- 16 a 460 tread wear tire. Steering was annoyingly twitchy. In any corner as the tach neared 3800 RPM and the car came into the cam the rear would step out and nicely drift the tail out as long as you wanted it to. At 13000 miles the tires had 2-5000 miles left in them. I removed them due to age.

Upon my drive home with the Bridgestone RE71R in 225-50-16 here are the things I noticed. Tar strips caused a loud noise, like someone ripping paper next to your ear. My car is loud. I do not notice any tire noise unless I touch tar strips. Traction is amazing. I made a left hand turn on to a 4 lane road expecting the rear to step out as before. The tires just held on and shoved me harder into the side bolster on the seat. The next thing I noticed was the twitchy steering and too rapid of turn in was gone. The car was more stable, I could relaxed driving down the road without the car wanting to dart all over the poorly maintained mountain roads. 

At the auto-X track I was amazed at the grip, but knew these tires would not last long. Two weeks later I attended a track day at Thunder Hill Race Way, Willows Ca. I was even more impressed with the traction. Turn in is perfect. The tires hold a beautiful line through the turns. The Z likes 33 psi front and 29 psi rear with this tire.

 

While at the track I also got to test the brake pad up grades to Porterfield R4S and air ducts to channel air to the calipers and disks. This change work great. I did not have any brake fade.

 

I ran into some rain on the way home from a car show. I was concerned with the new tire related to traction and hydroplaining. I slowed to 65 MPH and I did not have any problems.

 

So, the changes I made were for the better. The brakes no longer fade at race pace. The Bridgestone RE71R tires made the steering not dart all over the road. Traction is better everywhere I tested and the tires were not scary in the rain.

 

I have read reviews of people driving light cars with R compound tires and getting 10,000-15,000 miles out of them including Z cars, claiming track and auto-x days. I think if I did another track day for a total of 2 on these tires they will need to be replaced, they look great though.

 

Photo credits to Dito Milian www.gotbluemilk.com.

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  • 5 weeks later...

In 2014 I drove the Z to Auto Week in Monertay Ca. USA. It was a great time. I met the guys from Japanese Nostalgic Car Ben Hsu and his co worker who is like a human dictionary on Japanise cars (sorry I can not remember his name). They did a photo shoot of my car while there and added it in a section titled Monterey-historics- part-05 sights-sounds. 

We hung out had snacks, dinner and went to auctions. Went to the historic races and the Italiano.

 

http://japanesenostalgiccar.com/2014/09/23/events-monterey-historics-part-05-sights-sounds/#more-34375

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