need advice

[Guest Anonymous]

I just bought a VERRRRRY nice 76 280Z that has not been street driven since 93. It has been sitting in a garage on stands for that entire time. The previous owner started working on a restore, but his wife jumped in and made him stop.

 

So, I bought this car for DIRT cheap!! Several body panels have already been primered, inside floor pans have already been taken care of. There is also VERY little rust on this car.

 

Where do I start? That is my main question. I have already ordered a $150 car cover from California Car Covers to keep stuff off of it. I plan on getting under the car and taking some of the undercoating off to see if there is any hidden rust. Is there a particular process that will make this easy? I also want to redo all of the primer that the previous owner has done. Luckily, everything appears to be in excelent condition, and the previous owner gave me a factory manual, Datsun Z car restore book, as well as pictures of the work he did and a few other manuals.

 

I'm not really concerned about a ground up restore job, but I want to make sure that rust will not have a chance to start anywhere on this car before I even start thinking about the motor.

 

So, basicly, my main question is where do I start?

[jeromio]

As I stated in a different post, I have found that engines that sit for a long while tend to have dried out, toasted valve seals. Just something to be aware of. If they are toast, it'll just mean fouled plugs and blue exhaust - ie, no irreparable damage or anything.

 

And obviously primer soaks up moisture so, yeah, you'll want to do something about that prior to actual paint.

 

Everything else depends on your long term and short term plans for the car.

 

Personally, I wouldn't remove the undercoating to look for rust. I mean, it may be a worthwhile thing to do as part of the restoration, but it's <b>alot</b> of work, and if you just want to scout for rust (and if there's a chance that it's not infected with the cancer) then just poke around with a scratch awl instead. IOWs, if it's not rusty, then that undercoating is some good stuff and you might want to keep it there. On my car, I poked it (before grudgingly agreeing to buy it - Z's are scarce in my area) and the rust was pretty easy to find - battery area, passenger frame rail, floor pan and floor brace. The metal is thin to start with, so if it's got rust, it shouldn't take much poking to find it.

 

If you do want to just strip off all that UC to revitalize things, I recommend first of all getting a copy of that "How to restore your Datsun Z Car" book (lost my copy ). Some good tips in there as I recall. I used a torch at high heat and had some luck sort of glazing it into a hard, brittle-ness that was chip-off-able - I only did this on certain spots though, not the whole car. Otherwise it's kind of a mess. It seems to just be tar. Can't imagine what an ordeal it would be to remove it all.

 

Take the battery out and poke around there, and both interior and exterior of the floor.

[Guest Anonymous]

Well, the whole interior has already been taken care of. All of the floor pans have already been stripped down and coated with a rust inhibiter. Same goes for the spare tire well and battery tray.

 

That's a good idea about the undercarriage. I'll check into getting one of those little poker things!!

 

The "How to restore your Datsun Z" book is one of the manuals that he gave me.

 

As far as the motor, I'm not concerned about it at all. Once the body is in good shape is when I will start thinkin about what I want to do for a power plant.

 

I'm in the process of helping a friend drop an LT-1 from an Impala SS into his 93 Jeep Wrangler, so I might look at one of those to drop into it!!!

[Lone Star 1]

Hey David 280Z

I see you are in Dallas, I'm in Mesquite and have the LS1 in my 73 Z. Feel free to E-mail me if I can answer any question you might have.

 

[ August 14, 2001: Message edited by: Lone Star 1 ]