71 240z

[roastbeef]

Ive been a lurker for a while but here is my car.

I bought the z off an old hippy in marrickville back in 2001 or so(hazy memory) for about 2 grand, complete with save the whales stickers.(i have kept the 'give blood' sticker on the back for good times). It had rego and seemed to run ok but i was young and enthusiastic so I stripped it down straight away.

 

The aim for the car initially was a nice lightweight trackcar which kept things relatively simple and reliable.

To get the car from purchase to the first test day at wakefield took about 5 years with many workshops lending a hand- nixcars/hornsby quickfit/and specifically SWR.

I had started the project with a friend with grand plans of doing everything ourselves, but without a regular undercover garage, and skills to pay the bills it would usually end in us destroying something then getting the workshops to fix it.

 

As it stands now:

 

Everything was stripped down to bare metal and repainted in championship white. Replacement floors and chassis rails from allzparts. SWR custom halfcage.

 

Suspension- ground control coilovers + camber plates, bilstein shocks revalved at heasmans to be digressive at front and linear at rear. arizonazcar adjustable front control arms.

Wilwood calipers front, nixcars rear disc conversion.

 

The engine was from nixcars in wollongong an L24 stroked to 2.8 and putting out around 118kw@the wheels. I added some triple 45dcoes a few years ago and they give a nice meaty midrange and amazing noise at the expense of practicality

It is mated to a rebuilt option 5 gearbox that was lying around the back of the SWR workshops, this transformed the car even with a 3.5 open r180.

We ran into quite a few problems with overheating on the track, so the radiator was reconditioned, an oil cooler installed and it runs reliably all day now.

 

 

[roastbeef]

the fastest lap i could manage was around the 1:14 mark at the old wakefield.

One of the main problems was the rear toe in was vastly different on both sides, I havent yet got around to fixing that yet but in due time the diff will be upgraded with an lsd and adjustable rear control arms.

Amongst other things the spring rates need to be changed, and general alignment fine tuned.

I'm sure we can get down to 1:12's on street tyres once it's sorted.

 

I left australia to work in the uk about 3 years ago. In the meantime, a friend has been taking care of the car/tracking it etc

 

 

[roastbeef]

he took it to a nscc wakefield day a few weeks ago and it ran another 1:14 so it's still going ok with little use.

whilst I was away a fellow z friend emailed me asking if I was interested in buying a L series race engine from him.

He had spent many years and $$ building it up but there was no way he could finish it now.

Over the years i had drooled and repeatedly lowballed him with offers but it took the credit crunch for him to finally accept a ridiculous offer.

 

2.9 litres, custom rods/pistons, prepped crank/head, kinsler magnesium alloy throttle bodies etc- apparently good for >8000rpm!

needless to say this has reignited my interest in the Z, and although I'm still overseas i'll be returning soon and hope to give the engine a proper thrashing.

[gav240z]

Ive been a lurker for a while but here is my car.

 

Hey hey hey, good to see you onboard here. Love the car, would love to feature it on the homepage too! I won't rest till every Zed nutter in the country is a member here .

 

Can I ask what you paid for the L-series race engine? Just so I can be jealous I didn't buy it .

[RB30X]

I'm going to love seeing the 6 into 1 collector.

[ZD44TT]

where it all began.

 

pop the motor in and ship it to the UK dude..........next you'll know you'll be married with pomy kids and would have lost all these years with it.

[mossy]

Welcome mate, good to see your finally on this forum

[Scando]

Nice Z Roastbeef.  Definately looks the goods   I'll look forward to hearing how it goes with the new donk.  What did you have in mind for spring rates?  What are you currently running?  I've got the same problem with the rear toe.

[George]

mmm roastbeef.

 

welcome mate

[chris240]

haaar . Ive seen that zed going around wakefield. (For 7 years I lived 12 minutes drive from wakefield.)..

Nice vehicle..

[roastbeef]

thanks for the welcome

 

Gav240z- i'd be happy to feature it on the homepage. The engine itself cost 2k. Ideally it still needs an ecu/injectors and other details, but I may see how they go with the webers initially as converting to efi properly is going to cost major $$.

Unfortunately the current engine is refusing to show signs of blowing up so it may still be a while before we make the swap. Before that happens need to strengthen up the rear, and get the alignment sorted too.

 

The collectors are 6-2-1(not my foot)

 

Scando- If I recall correctly I was told by the bloke at heasmans that for the shocks I should be ideally running around 300-350lb/ft in the front and 175-225 in the rear. I have it all written down at home somewhere, but currently the car is on  275 front and 225 rear? (not sure what it is in kg/mm sorry as they came from america). What are you running?

 

I would say 95% of the time the handling is quite benign. It is quite 'sudden' oversteery on turn in which can be avoided with smooth entry and for the rest of the corner it is quite well behaved since it doesnt really have that much power to bother the 225/50/15 street tyres. Things start getting hairy at high speeds though both on the straight and through corners. In the wet the sudden oversteer becomes shit your pants sudden.

 

Out of interest:

I had it on the cornerweight scales once and it weighs around 1075kg with empty tank and no driver. 51:49 front:rear which was a surprise!

 

 

[Scando]

I'm running 220lb/ft rears but I'm not sure what the fronts are.  They were in the car when I bought it and I've never found a good reason to change them.  I don't think they're much stiffer than what's in the rear though.  Mine is the exact opposite with a slight bit of understeer but only into very tight corners.  Through flowing corners it's fine.  What sway bars are you running?  Could the oversteer be caused by the half cage stiffening the rear of the car?  When I had my cage put in (full cage) I had to go for a smaller rear bar because the cage stiffened the rear of the car and caused massive oversteer.

 

51:49 weight distribution is nice!  I've never done the corner weights on mine but I doubt it would be anywhere near that good.

[Zedman240®]

Another Welcome from here also.... with that issue of the sudden oversteer, I found myself in that same position...first turn at Sandown chasing another zed, went through the first half of the corner then before I knew it, I was facing oncoming traffic! I have a 24mm front bar and 19mm rear and disconnecting the rear bar improved it alot. I'll be trying a smaller front bar and re-connecting the rear and see what happens. I had 300lb springs all round too. My new springs are 280 fr and 300 rear; been told by quite a few people that zeds prefer lighter fronts than rears....interesting

[roastbeef]

hmm good points. one of the pics above is when i discovered the sudden oversteer at turn 2. Funnily enough it's quite hard to actually get to the point of spinning out in my car. it just seems to sudden step out and then hold a massive angle until gripping again.

 

As far as antiroll bars I cant remember the sizes, but I'm using whatever was on the car initially.

 

Each time it's gone on track we have been fiddling with reliability, hopefully there wont be too many more things left to replace .

The whole setup needs a bit of attention, I might save that for when we get the RCA's and lsd together as it will likely require a different setup.

 

Don't even get me started on brakes. Is anyone using a dual master cylinder setup without booster?

 

 

[620Z]

I had the same problem with oversteer in my Zed. But after seeing my rear wheels were out of alignment by 7deg which is common in Zeds. I got that fixed and smooth sailing around the corners. Like Zedman says, sway bars will only go so far. At the end of the day your problem sounds like a rear wheel alignment problem. get that sorted and you will be surprised with the speeds you can carry through the corners.

[NZeder]

Welcome

 

Now to answer the question about what springs people are using etc.

 

Well I can only talk about the track setups that I know of here in NZ and I don't know anyone who is quick that runs a rear swap bar.

 

My cars were road/track and had a 25mm front bar and none on the rear. 2 of the 3 road/track cars I had were 225 front and 250 rear. The suspension I have for my zed now is similar to a mates setup when his was also dual purpose (he has gone much heavier now)

 

So I will be running 400lb front and 450lb rear.

[Scando]

I reckon Dimitri and NZeder are spot on with the rear sway bar advice.  Best part about that modification is it's free    But like you said, best to wait until you get the LSD and adjustable RCA's and go from there.  LSD's normally cause a little understeer on entry, hopefully in your case it will just reduce oversteer instead 

[ZD44TT]

bar or no bar having a half cage comes into the equation as well.

 

I think Roastbeef is running a half cage also.

[NZeder]

bar or no bar having a half cage comes into the equation as well.

 

I think Roastbeef is running a half cage also.

I agree that is why I put road/track as those cars had either a full or 1/2 cage, not sure about CAMS rules but here in NZ only stock (as in original with no mods or next to none) are allowed to have no cage for real racing.

[Zedman240®]

Yer I did not say that I have a half cage with side intrusion bars and front and rear strut braces with semi slicks..

[roastbeef]

the wheels are in motion again..

 

Cleaning up the electrics by rewiring the whole car with racecar switches/connectors etc

OS Giken r180 lsd ordered(otomoto), adjustable RCA's on their way from techno toy tuning(seems to be a quality product at a relatively affordable price!).

I also gave up looking for decent street tyres in 225/50/15 and it's getting a set of r888's now.

 

Hopefully will have the springs/alignment sorted for Wakefield in November/December.

 

[roastbeef]

The last trackday (2009 december) was a bit of a disaster.

in short:

* new rear control arms combined with fresh r888's = fantastic stability and traction out of corners. No more nervous oversteery moments. I'm sure a lot of time was made up here just due to confidence in the car.

* lsd was not installed in time but was not missed due to more grip than power at the moment. Am in two minds as to whether or not the new engine may diminish the 'chuckability' of the car.

- The brakes had epic failure on the back straight. lost all pressure and a red warning 'BRAKE' light appeared on the dash(never even knew this existed but I thought if a car from the 70's tells you the brakes are failing, I best prepare myself for pain). We suspect a master cylinder failure, the car had been sitting around for a while and when we flushed they system through for the trackday, something may have damage the seals or become corroded over time. Anyway it has been sent off and reconditioned with stainless bits so it wont happen again.

 

Fastforward to this year:

* I'm returning back to OZ for a week and will try and squeeze in 1 or 2 trackdays in that time.

* the OS Giken LSD is finally installed (along with RT style diff mount)- can't wait to see how it goes.

* We have most of the bits ready for the new engine: (adaptronic, injectors, new fuel system,airbox, airhorns)

- What we do not have is time, will have to work day and night to hopefully get the engine in and tuned within 5 days (LOL)

Worst comes to worst we will run 1 trackday with just the diff and standard engine, and try for the 2nd trackday with new engine.

 

New injectors and their boots

not my engine bay, but the same airbox. It is a modified TWM fibreglass( carbon outer) airbox (deletes any inbound fasteners that may get sucked into the engine) from MJP auto in the UK.

 

 

[Riceburner]

Those headers look nice! Beware of the TWM cold air box it's backyard at best and paper thin. Also it will only clear the strut tower if you run a short manifold like Mikuni/Cannon.... I bought one when I ran Dellorto's and with the redline(long) manifold it would not fit in any way. Hopefully carbon is much better 

[roastbeef]

Thanks Gareth, just checked out your Z diary and count me as a big fan. (I looked into fitting some keihin bike carbs a while back but didn't have the know how to do so!).

I'm pretty sure we will run into problems fitting the airbox- for starters my throttle bodies are not of typical design and are angled up(thankfully they are quite short).  Might have to fashion up some curved extensions on the intake side to fit the box.

 

I attended a private trackday with almost unlimited laptime, ended up doing around 45 laps in blistering heat and no reliability problems.

This was the first time out with the OS Giken r180 lsd(Otomoto sourced) and it was very impressive. No wear in period was necessary and driving around town it is incredibly smooth for a clutch type lsd. I would go so far as to say I didn't even remember we had installed it until we got on track.

 

The alignment hasn't been touched since last year. Previously, the car was fairly neutral with oversteer if you got a bit enthusiastic on turn in. 

With the lsd, there were a few moments of mild understeer on turn in, but I could basically start putting the power down at the apex. Once the tail did come out, it was very adjustable and predictable.

 

The fastest time I could manage on the day was a 1:12.2 but I'm sure there is at least 2-3 seconds left in finetuning the driver and alignment . That particular lap was quite oversteery and I still don't have 100% confidence in the brakes yet.

 

Unfortunately I probably won't be able to improve on this until next year. Ideally speaking I would like to get everything sorted before we get more power.

 

 

Having only 118-120 rwkw is quite noticeable on the straights so we are still working hard on installing the mega engine.

This week we have wired up most of the adaptronic, bought a whole bunch of fittings($$) and oil cooler, hopefully will fire it up on the engine stand later in the week.

Some parts of the engine are causing a bit of headscratching but it is interesting to see the previous engine builder try something new.