Jump to content
HybridZ

seattlejester's 1971 240Z


Recommended Posts

  • 2 weeks later...

Psh, you have been trolling me too much lately. Can't tell when you are serious or not.

 

Things left to do before the car undergoes surgery.

LSD differential

Replace ignition and door locks

Adjust doors, windows, and locks

Install hydraulic e-brake

Trunk lock

Edited by seattlejester
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 5 weeks later...

No, I think I am just going to tweak it cosmetically. The inner seat and the glass fit so no water gets in, the little gaps would pose a problem as a location for water to pool and eventually rust, so I think I'll just fill the gaps with undersealer and call it a day.

 

So the thailand locks on ebay for 29.77 or whatnot have a small problem in that the throw is not enough to engage the lock. Adding a little bit of material on the lock throw fixes the problem, so now I have working door locks :).

 

I think I will be using an aero catch for my hatch lock, and I will stick with the R200 as downgrading to an R160 to get the LSD may not work with the power I plan to put down. The plan is to swap the new driveline in and see if I am still unhappy, then replace axles and eventually the differential as needed. My only real gripe is the odd vibrations at certain speeds and the understeer. Hopefully new found power will rid me of this problem.

 

I have tried adjusting the manual parking brake and something is still off, either in geometry or force application. For now I will install the hydraulic brake and brainstorm how to fix the parking brake. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Oh you little sneek! I kinda figured that was what you hinted to in that text you sent. Ya, so um, idk much about Toyota, but I do turn a mean wrench, and you darn well call me up for some help!! cant wait to see that :wink:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Hah, will do, we still have a bit of wrenching ahead of us.

 

Current plan:

Clean up the outside of the block and run some evapo rust through the water jacket and flush it all out.

Pop the mounts off, make a jig, copy the mounts and reinforce.

Decide on a plan for the tranny mount and brush up on wiring harness literature.

Clean off all the accessories, put the block back together with my upgrades, get the car wired and running.

 

Currently I think we have about 5 hours so far on engine removal, tranny and engine seperation, and pulling off the head and such. 

F2B0A099-5267-4186-A279-4162FCBA6C07-120

 

Upcoming plans:

I bought a spare set of suspension, so I have decide on a coilover route and make a jig for some home made control arms similar to the ones you can find on our forum.

I got a call back from a local shop for some body work, so when funds are available that will be next on the list as well.

Edited by seattlejester
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Started to clean up the engine a little bit.

Engine before any work done above.

Some light scraping with wire brushes.

438FD4E8-6E1E-4D42-8705-6AA6DDC10D15-373

Some vigorous attack with brushes on drills.

6BDF93D4-74BD-44FB-88C7-E756787244B5-373

EAF9ED13-2102-48F5-8A0C-ADE1A805789D-373

And finally some etch primer followed by high heat paint.

7EF59583-DDD1-48D1-AF7F-325BA19F74B5-373

A pic of the other side to show the color, topped it off with some engine clear coat to keep the oil, grease, and gasoline from working it's way down the layers.

FAD08BDA-5BCE-436F-93F1-660D7FFD1B30-373

 

Total time spent, 12 hours. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Put the head on, realized I missed a sealing spot, for some reason toyota wants you to use a little silicone on top of the head gasket towards the front timing cover O.o, so had to take it off again.

C3FE5D3E-8961-4922-B979-BCCDB675C925-105

After thinking for a while and coming to the conclusion that I would not be running a heater on this motor as well, although a second radiator did come to mind, I decided I was going to remove the water fitting. On the 7mgte the fitting is on the back and uses an absolutely massive banjo fitting.

12408915-25C1-46FA-B587-F82D86B5E454-105

I took the banjo bolt with me thinking about how irritating it was going to be to try and find a fine metric threaded bolt that was that massive, when I stumbled upon the bolt for the rear lower control arm (I had extras from my junkyard trip to find myself an R200). Low and behold the correct size :).

103C8907-EA11-42BD-A944-0DF9C42C6BCB-105

Using the 1/2 moly 1/2 motor oil mix we lubed up the cam cap bolts and slipped the valve covers on for the time being. Had to also see how the engine would look with my snazzy intake manifold. 

F8448E77-EA14-4E8B-99F8-46B7F64C9622-105

 

Ordered a clutch bolt kit, bolt lock ring, and a transmission clutch hub, as my transmission came naked.

 

Plan is to piece the rest of the motor together, paint/clean as necessary, weld up the new mounts, and mate the transmission and engine next week. Figure out the driveshaft to differential connection and head off to spitfireEFI to have them install megasquirt with a wiring harness. I have a bit of vacation time coming up, so I plan to use that the week after next to get as far as I can. Hell or high water the driveline from my datsun will be out and the new driveline should be in place by week after next week, very unrealistically it might even be running (a  pipe dream).

 

Total time spent 16 hours.

Edited by seattlejester
Link to comment
Share on other sites

So the benefit of this install was that it came with mounts, but anal as I am regarding stuff, I just wanted it to be a a little more rigid and friendlier to install the bolts and such.

 

I definitely plan on copying ARZ's mount design. It's simple, much smaller and substantially prettier.

 

Since I liked how the mounts centered the car, and I didn't want to dick around with trying to weld mounts on the car with the engine in the air, I built a jig off of the previous mounts.

AD7A6B77-30DB-4010-9A44-3E67C5600C03-178

 

Here's the jig without the piece.

8C5A6CC7-E279-4F7B-A2F6-B2BEF7030B89-178

 

Plan is to finish up the final pieces tomorrow.

4745799E-FA59-48BA-B28B-E424B2092CF4-178

 

Total time spent 18 hours.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To continue from yesterday.

 

Bolt on the plates, and weld in the cross pieces knowing the spacing is exact :D.

15D154E9-C895-4649-A833-5389899E62BD-236

 

And pop the mount out, now you have a perfectly spaced mount.

8D426AA1-8200-486A-8731-4D34259812F8-236

 

Substantially less material than the original mount, and the ability to use more readily available large head bolts (doesn't sit as close to the cross brace)

2BF05080-C040-48BA-A6F9-43E2CAF755F6-236

 

Tomorrow will be buttoning up the engine and finishing the driver side mount.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

So finished the motor up. The essentials torqued to spec, still need to double check the water outlet etc.

C8D17B1B-5971-4B1D-AC39-C5231F834335-577

7F439B35-B3FB-4710-A404-49F935818BA0-577

 

I think it looks a lot better than before :D

 

Took the Z up for the start of the transplant, finally found out the source of all my problems (motor wise), a poorly crimped spade connector! With that remedied, the car absolutely flies, I even had a moment of regret about taking out a perfectly healthy transplant, but I suppose that is progress.

 

And I think I figured out some essential things in life (at least car life). When putting an engine and transmission together, I found that hugging the two pieces, grabbing the out put shaft and the motor (roughly lined up) and twisting a little bit helps line up the input shaft in a breeze, compared to turning the input shaft after lining up the bell housing bolts.

Second, making sure the adjustable leveler has the handle facing toward the front of the motor makes the whole task substantially easier, as does lubing the threads.

 

So after a few moments of sorrowful goodbyes we moved on to the task at hand.

 

Wait if this is out here....

3FA91AA4-6A2A-4EEB-9A53-E48AB9D545AB-577

then that means, this is empty...

BFD18607-3A24-4485-9AA2-79A4A4331383-577

means that this can go in...

926CB56D-8F39-4944-B935-12564DA81742-577

and hey look it does!

1017C440-208E-486F-8247-46727C26973A-577

 

Still have a bit of work ahead of us, transmission mount, fuel line routing, hydraulic brake install, drive shaft, and electrical. The electrical will be handled by a local megasquirt specialty shop, a friend's shop is nearby there so I may just drop the car off there for the tune and final tweaking when the time comes. As long as finances hold steady and timelines are roughly met, we are looking at a first drive in early October :D

 

Total hours spent 60 hours.

 

Also, if anyone knows someone or themselves needs a rebuilt motor and a 5-speed transmission please send them my way via PM!

Edited by seattlejester
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Some more progress, had a brand new driveshaft made for ~300, fitting it was a breeze with the loose motor mounts and no transmission mount

 

Finished the transmission mount, I wanted to copy someone else's mount (the name escapes me), but my welder doesn't like laying the best beads out of position. For now it is a 3/8 steel plate welded onto the transmission tunnel with a 3/8th plate sticking out of it. Unfortunately it will be something to visit at a later date.

 

01911AC6-AA6C-478E-94DB-D4B8107815B3-434

Routed the intercooler, I would have like to route it in the middle holes so to keep the fresh air scoops, but it just makes it so much easier to route them through the top vents. I will have to figure out someway to keep positive pressure for the fresh air scoops. After routing the intercooler I realized that I should sort the wiring and the ecu before I block access to the harness.

 

Megasquirt 2 pcb 3.57 with 3 ignition drivers and boost controller is on my way.

 

For gauges (speedo, tach, boost, etc), I'm hoping to save some money by running an android tablet displaying tunerstudio gauges via shadow dash via bluetooth to replace my now defunct gauges. Should be a fun little project. 

 

In addition, now comes the fun part of matching up the existing harness to the new harness. I have to wire the gm 1 wire alternator and 7m starter to the stock harness as well as start laying out the wiring for megasquirt itself. Wish me luck!

 

Total hours spent 80 hours

 

And if anyone has experience with the 1 wire alternator let me know :D.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Was talked out of the 1 wire alternator, one because I did not want to try and fabricate and line up a belt driven accessory and two if it needed replacement on the fly, that could prove to be difficult.

 

Ordered a relocation bracket and a 140amp alternator, that should be the last of the main components I need.

 

Completely removed my cable parking brake. It never worked quite as well (discovered a missing clamp yesterday), but never held the car even when in tip top shape when first installed. Maybe I will revisit it at another time, but for the time being hydro it is.

Still having a bit of trouble with the brake line routing, found that the driver wheel was touching the flexible brake hose when lifted in the air, I think the combination of wider wheels, lower car, and aftermarket brakes needs a bit more massaging to be sorted out. Definitely going to add a bit of shielding with how close it rides to the wheels, after moving everything over a bit.

 

Other than the hydro brake, the car is sorted all the way up to the dash. New fuel pump is installed, plumbed, and wired. New fuel lines front to back are routed and clamped. Pulled the radiator and intercooler to help route the wiring, planning on ditching the fan controller and having megasquirt control the fans by itself.

 

Still need to spend an hour or so installing the clutch fork/trans shields/tranny brace/clutch line/shifter/shift knob, and the driveline will be 100% complete.

 

Pretty excited, a few good days on wiring, mounting electronics, and filling fluids and we might see a startup.

 

Total hours spent 85 hours.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Thanks! I really am hoping that it is worth all the trouble. 

 

Wired up the alternator with the relocation bracket to communicate with the datsun harness, seems to be pretty happy. Car has power now. 

 

Moved the fan controller to one side, and kind of tucking/relocating wires as I go. I have power going to the secondary fuse box to power the megasquirt/spark/injectors/fuel pump/extra accessories. I am thinking that I will wire everything up/make sure everything works, and then go about hard mounting everything.

 

Right now I am stuck on welding some bungs to my intercooler pipe for the BOV and the IAT sensor. I have a friend who had 3 ways of bonding aluminum, (spool gun, TIG, and oxy acetylene) but on the day I went over, the TIG died, the spool gun could not be found, and the proper adapter for the oxy was missing. 

 

Anyone local know where I can get a few bungs welded? Right now the alternative is using the alumiweld rods if I can't find a shop that does aluminum welding.

 

It's dipped into below freezing this past week. So probably no progress till this weekend. Goal is to have this squared away by the end of the year, and it doesn't seem too hard of a goal to meet.

 

Total hours spent 90 hours.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...