240ZBUILTBYME - Project Georgia

[ND240Z]

You can do it man, dont give up! My Z is much, much worse than yours and i'm slaving away at it. You'll get there! 

[240ZBUILTBYME]

23 hours ago, ND240Z said:

You can do it man, dont give up! My Z is much, much worse than yours and i'm slaving away at it. You'll get there! 

Yes but you’re very talented at metalwork lol 

[240ZBUILTBYME]

Another long day of drilling out spot welds on the roof skin. I can see why metal works are the most expensive part of restoring a car, it’s so time consuming. 

can anyone tell me about the joint between the rear quarter and roof skin? Mine seemed to be oxy welded or brazed together, is this factory? There was lead wiping which I burnt off, I ended up cutting the joint with a grinder but wondering if there’s a better way.

 

I also found the front corners were welded in, there was no other way so I just cut joint and part of the skin with my 5 inch, I really must get so Roloc attachments and small cutting discs for my die grinder. I managed not to damage any structures underneath. 

i found the front and rear of the roof skin easy to unpick, the LHS was just cut as there was barely anything left, I found the RHS rain rail joint extremely difficult to unpick, I came close to just cutting it with a grinder on more than one occasion, but I persevered and I’m glad I did. There is just no room to work, I tried modifying my scraper blade so I could hammer it along as I went, but that wasn’t effective. In the end I used a sharpened flathead screwdriver to break the joints after drilling.

 

there was a small amount of mangling which was unavoidable but overall very happy with how cleanly I was able to unpick the roof. I’m hoping to sell the skin to someone who needs to fill in their sunroof hole as the center of the skin is excellent.

Was surprised to find the RHS to be very clean, some pitting at the rear quarter joint but overall a good result.

the LHS is a shit show, as expected, it’s going to take a lot of work to rebuild the whole structure, rear quarter join is completely gone. 

next up rear quarters…

[C.A.R.]

I'd be quite pleased if that's all the rust I found in the roof frame!

[240ZBUILTBYME]

10 hours ago, C.A.R. said:

I'd be quite pleased if that's all the rust I found in the roof frame!

Im quite pleased with the RHS side!

the LHS will be a lot of work, all the structure is heavily pitted and holed, luckily my donor roof has what i believe to be  clean structure so i will try and not mangle when unpicking and implant into my roof

[240ZBUILTBYME]

Just a short video on my dashboard tear down. If you’ve done the job before don’t bother but may make a good reference for some who haven’t. This footage is over a year old now, finally got round to editing, amazing how much two kids and a wife can bleed you of spare time. 

I’m trying a different style of video with better editing and less talking in front of the camera (which I hate) and more narration. Similar to jethro bronner who does some very nice Alfa Romeo videos. It allows me to get more work done as I don’t have to do 100 takes trying to articulate something and I can write out a script of what I want to say in the editing process instead of trying to make it up on the spot. Any constructive criticism is welcomed.

 

[240ZBUILTBYME]

Short video on me going to build the rear rotisserie mounts but then changing plans to repairing the rear valance but then changing plans to removing all the panels. Gotta go with the flow I guess….

 

[C.A.R.]

Longest Rotisserie build everrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...

[240ZBUILTBYME]

11 minutes ago, C.A.R. said:

Longest Rotisserie build everrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr...

tell me about it.... my priority shifted to getting the car blasted asap, once all the jobs are done to prep for the blaster ill finish it off lol its just the mounts and t-bar left to do, probably a days work?

[240ZBUILTBYME]

Continuing on with panel removal I started on the LHS rear quarter panel, before starting I decided to strip the paint, Im undecided if Im going to reuse this quarter panel, I have all the necessary replacement panels to patch it (tabco rear wheel arches, KFV lower rear section and my spare roof has healthy looking pieces around the rear quarter window i could use )but would be much easier to just replace the full quarter panel. Hopefully uncle lurches procurement skills make the cost more reasonable. 

Surprisingly besides the rooted doglegs, wheel arches and rusted out quarter window sections its a very clean panel, one minor bit of dodgy patching but otherwise clean. 

check out the more than inch worth of bog in the rear arch.... some real artisans worked on this car...

The arches are pretty much non existant so i stripped until i found the rust and decided to leave the bog and cut around it, same with the dogleg. 

Ive drilled out majority of the spotwelds, only the C pillar/rear quarter window area to go. One question i have is does anyone know if there are any spotwelds in the below location onto the underlying panel that creates the curve of the rear window?

[C.A.R.]

14 hours ago, 240ZBUILTBYME said:

Ive drilled out majority of the spotwelds, only the C pillar/rear quarter window area to go. One question i have is does anyone know if there are any spotwelds in the below location onto the underlying panel that creates the curve of the rear window?

Yes there is.
Have fun finding them

[240ZBUILTBYME]

3 hours ago, C.A.R. said:

Yes there is.
Have fun finding them

YAY......

[240ZBUILTBYME]

Its been a while...

Silly season was of course silly, with two time vampires as gav calls them we had our hands full preparing for their birthdays and for Christmas, throw in preparing my mums house for sale and I had no spare time. 

I did have time to take advantage of the Black Friday sales

Got myself some new brake lights and OEM rubbers, really beautiful units, rubbers fit perfectly

 

I recently got a new job based in Perth, no more FIFO! so I celebrated by treating myself to some beautiful parts from Lonely Drivers Club, I'm a huge fan of his parts and the quality is excellent. 

Beautiful set of pedals 

cup holder, spark plug wire holders, engine plates, door lock pulls and valve caps, also got a t-shirt and poster for the garage 

Got a Full 240z kit from vintage connections to replace all the pins and terminals on my wiring harness

excited to try this one out, a shrinker stretcher for when i sink my teeth into the rust repair 

Edited January 22, 2023 by 240ZBUILTBYME

[C.A.R.]

26 minutes ago, 240ZBUILTBYME said:

excited to try this one out, a shrinker stretcher for when i sink my teeth into the rust repair 

 

 

 

Buy a second housing - you'll get sick of changing jaws pretty quickly...

[240ZBUILTBYME]

So my wife ended up letting me keep the fiesta so i never had to drive my 280zx as my daily, I've owned the ST for nearly 5 years and decided id go back to my japanese car roots and give myself an early xmas present. 

If you know, you know......

Lexus ISF 5.0L V8 what an engine! What a sound! It has many flaws including the lack of a manual gearbox but wow is it a special car. got it cheap as its been a little neglected in terms of paint and the front leather seats are cooked. First up paint correction and ceramic coat then ill see about getting the seats redone. 

[240ZBUILTBYME]

Last little update, i spent a few hours with the car last week installing the castor wheels onto the chassis frame in preparation for getting it to the blaster. Stupid me forgot to drill the holes for the wheels before i mounted everything to the car.

Contacted the blaster and he has locked me in for 7th March, not long to go! 

Just need to finish pulling the quarters! 

[AndBir]

On 1/23/2023 at 7:14 PM, 240ZBUILTBYME said:

First up paint correction and ceramic coat then ill see about getting the seats redone. 

You may need to get a shade sail, otherwise the WA sun will cook the car again.

[240ZBUILTBYME]

2 hours ago, AndBir said:

You may need to get a shade sail, otherwise the WA sun will cook the car again.

Sitting pretty in the garage now! 

[240ZBUILTBYME]

I ran out of time to get the  RHS rear quarter off, just so time poor since my son started Kindy, his hours are half a day now instead of a full day at daycare, so Im no longer able to spend an entire day in the shed. 

Managed to remove the LHS quarter panel the morning the car was being collected, talk about cutting it close.... This side is much rustier that the RHS so im stoked i got it removed.

I gave up trying to locate the spot welds as time was not going to permit it, I ended up cutting the area i knew the spot welds were in, I can patch the hole later. 

I ended up cutting where the rear quarter joins the rain rail due to time constraints and that section being completely rusted anyway

found some crust behind the rear wheel arch which i knew would have some rot

Car was loaded onto the truck and off at the blasters with no issues, Im both excited and nervous to see what comes back. Couple of weeks and it should be ready 

[240ZBUILTBYME]

forgot a couple of pics, ended up cutting out the dog leg on the RHS and the front of the outer rocker as there was a huge hole anyway, this way the blaster will have better access 

[daretobedifferent]

I'm excited to see what it looks like when it comes back from the blasters! I think you'll be surprised at how good it will be when it comes back. 

[gav240z]

1 hour ago, daretobedifferent said:

I think you'll be surprised at how good it will be when it comes back. 

That's not usually how it works.

[gav240z]

On 1/23/2023 at 10:14 PM, 240ZBUILTBYME said:

Lexus ISF 5.0L V8 what an engine!

Japanese Commodore or BMW M3. :). I actually was looking at these too recently. Seem like good value for money and a bit under the radar.

[gav240z]

On 1/23/2023 at 8:25 AM, 240ZBUILTBYME said:

Got a Full 240z kit from vintage connections to replace all the pins and terminals on my wiring harness

Oh nice, they do a 240z kit?

[daretobedifferent]

2 hours ago, gav240z said:

That's not usually how it works.

Haha I've gotten a few cars blasted before. The car coming back in one colour and all the rust removed, in my opinion is always a great feeling.