A very rusty z.

[Scoota G]

I thought that was in my avatar a while ago, must have changed.

Ahhh so it has. Just chopped the hell out of a 2+2 roof i had laying around if any of the structual bits are any good to you.

[thriller]

At a bit of a standstill regarding the body. Since we've only got a carport, it makes sense that the body will get some slight surface rust underneath the primer layer by the time the bodywork is finished... Which makes me want to wait until I can store in a nice dry garage.

 

On the up side of that though; I have an entire interior to get looking pristine again, as well as an engine to rebuild. And Equip 01's to save for. So I won't be too short on things to do. And I guess that means once the body is done and painted I'll be able to throw all this nice minty fresh interior and engine stuff into her rather than have an awesome looking body and have a ratty as hell interior for however long it all takes.

 

So.

 

Dashboard before:

 

Those cracks reach the whole way through the foam!

 

Some expanding foam sprayed in there:

 

Now its time for a few sheets of fiberglass and texture paint yes? As per that dash resto guide somewhere on these forums.

[curtis 240z]

How's this project going Ryan?

[thriller]

Chugging away haha. Seen a shell on eBay, if luck is on my side I'll win the bid for not too much...

 

Been collecting parts anyway, few things in the mail now too which I'll get looking good soon.

[chris240]

Im hoping you win the auction 

Like Jamo and myself said 4 months you should have left the shell alone, put enthusiam aside, and

Use the grey matter to make a good long term decision. Bid to win, your on the right track.

[Retro Z]

Did you win?? $765 is crazy cheap for whoever won it.. One also sold in Melb for $255...

[thriller]

Did you win?? $765 is crazy cheap for whoever won it.. One also sold in Melb for $255...

 

-10 seconds to go

-type in 800

-hit bid

-login screen comes up

 

  :'(

 

Such a rookie mistake haha. I was logged in, but only that weird sort of half-login state that ebay does. Devastated.

 

More fish in the sea...

[mossy]

Even if you were logged in and your bid went through the person who won most likely would have had a max bid higher than $800 so there bid would have outbid yours straight away, just keep searching for another one.

[gav240z]

-10 seconds to go

-type in 800

-hit bid

-login screen comes up

 

  :'(

 

Such a rookie mistake haha. I was logged in, but only that weird sort of half-login state that ebay does. Devastated.

 

More fish in the sea...

 

Don't let this happen to you... (in infomercial voice over type voice)...

 

Use www.auctionsniper.com, I've used it a few times and works wonders for that last minute snipe

[d3c0y]

ssshhhh dont tell everyone or we'll never be able to low ball the ebay zed parts 

[thriller]

Been a while... S13 has been diverting my attention, but now that she has coilovers, R32 front brakes, Nardi wheel, new tires and a whoooole bunch of other goodies I'm happy enough with it not to spend any more money.

 

So attention back on the Z.

 

Some kind of animal made a nest in the air duct here haha:

 

So I pulled it all out:

 

Decided to rip the gauges apart:

 

Before and after:

 

Nice and shiny:

 

Happy with how the tacho and speedo turned out! Can see the numbers reflecting off of the black surround. Will look pretty cool when I'm driving it one day hahah.

 

 

Anyway on to other things. I want to get all the underside components (driveshafts, tailshaft, xmembers, whishbones, blah blah) done black. What is the most durable/cost effective/whatever way to do it? Is blasting then powdercoating going to be the most durable? I realize I won't be able to do it near the UV joints or any splines, so maybe hit those (and other fine detail) areas which chassis black paint? Or just hit it all with chassis black?

 

Any personal experience, tips, etc would be appreciated. Needs to be durable, I do actually want to spend enough time driving it to justify building it.

[MaygZ]

Looking good mate.

 

Be careful - some greenie somewhere is now after you for destroying the native habitat of the very rare Indian Mina!!!

[d3c0y]

you put the tacho glass on upsidedown didnt you?

Also while you've got the clock appart, dont forget to clean the insides and oil teh clock motor.

[gav240z]

I was going to use powdercoating myself for suspension components since I think it's the most durable / cheap option but others may have better suggestions / experience than I.

 

Looks like a rat was living in that Z at some stage..

[thriller]

you put the tacho glass on upsidedown didnt you?

Also while you've got the clock appart, dont forget to clean the insides and oil teh clock motor.

 

 

Hmmm, I don't reckon so... It's a perfect seal all around? Not sure it would even fit upside down? Maybe the front on pic is a bit deceiving

 

And yup, done the clock too!

 

Wouldn't powdercoating be a nono for bits like the driveshafts and anything with a UV joint? Thinking maybe a combination of that + chassis paint.

 

 

 

Also, mine's not the worst... I heard an early VIN (like double digits) Z was being used as a chicken coop at one point hahah

[nizm0zed]

Powdercoating is a good solid covering for components that are capable of handling it.

it cant be on anything that flexes and it cant be on anything that will suffer under heat, the powdercoating process requires the components to be baked in a big oven.

it depends on the brand of powder coating, but temps generally can be anywhere from 180 to 250 degrees Celsius.

So no, its no good for the CV (Constant Velocity) shafts (later model driveshafts, like in FWD cars), or the Uni joint shafts (standard driveshafts)

 

An alternative to powder coating if its out of your price range is Hammer finish Epoxy paint.

You can paint it on with a brush and you get a very nice finish and it comes in a lot of colours, including black.

 

[Corsa224]

Hi, have a look at my project thread, I had everything blasted and powder coated looks great and quite cheap considering the cost of paint or por15

[PeterAllen]

Powdercoating is a good solid covering for components that are capable of handling it.

it cant be on anything that flexes...

 

While I may disagree with Alan on one issue, I agree here. Powder coating can have durability concerns - the problem is that it can chip and when it does usually a big chunk falls off. The coating is nice but any coating is only as strong as its bond to the material under it. With the stones and junk flying round under the car it will get chipped and leave an area of bare metal exposed to the elements.

 

Many of the new paints out there like POR15 will have a better bond with the surface than powder coating. While I haven't done it as yet I'm planning on the Black Oxide surface treatment on the CV adaptors I have made for my Holden diff installation - it can be applied to surfaces like threads with no change to the dimensions.

 

[luvemfast]

Looks like a rat was living in that Z at some stage..

Ratsun 

[Rat1314]

Looks like a rat was living in that Z at some stage..

 

It wasn't me, I swear 

[Brabham]

Some components you could bead blast and paint epoxy black - obviously no threads or shafts - I may do this for my suspension later on. Not sure about chip resistance of the epoxy paint.

[thriller]

Thanks PeterAllan (and everyone else!). Exactly what I'm after. Time to get gritty with the wire brush and prep it all then.

 

 

EDIT: I must ask as I'm about to strip the engine down...

 

I love revvy engines, so what kind of bits should I be collecting for the rebuild? I'm thinking lightweight flywheel, higher comp pistons (no clue where to find or what I can use though?), decent sized cam and ~40-44mm() webers/dellortos/mikuni/etc. Honestly I'm not too clued in on what cam specs I'd need, if anything should be done to the head, blah blah blah. Every time I search all I see is stroked out L28's built for grunt. Any wisdom to impart, L6 gurus? Also diff ratios etc...

[Patch]

Hi Thriller,

I personally like the 240z motor, but a lot in your choice is how you want to drive it and how much money you want to speed.

The 240z motor with a sports cam triple webbers and extractors will give you a 6 sec car and 14.6 to the 1/4 mile and top speed of 145mph, it will be alot of fun to drive and likes to rev,lower bottom end tork, It is like driving a race car and needs lots of driving to keep it in it's rev range.

 

If you want to spend lots of money and drive with your arm out the window and take a Sunday drive with the wife with a powerful motor with lots of tork you can make a 280 perform as well.The 280 motor was used in 4x4 and family type vehicles, in standard form they are a pig of a motor but can go well if you spend lots of money on them.

 

I have a ZXR750 bike and a Harley 1340, the zxr is by far a more fun bike to ride with it's short stoke and loves to rev, the Harley is more suited if I want to ride long distances with a group of slow riders.

[thriller]

Time for an overdue update hey? Turns out facebook has decided to change their image linking, thus rendering all my photos in this thread inert. Will eventually re-upload everything to flickr, dump a link on my original post and then from here on just use flickr...

 

Anyways where were we?

 

I got most of a donor shell in the form of a '77 260z 2 seater. The N/A 2L engine in the S13 had a fun drive up the freeway  got lots of funny looks from ... pretty much everyone as I drove home:

 

Attacked with ye olde trusty 4"

 

Decent sill panels, floors, footwells, spare battery tray, spare spare wheel well, good A-pillars + front roof rail.

 

Cleaned up tail light lenses. Might get the centers re-chromed down the track, but that's a while off:

 

Photo of all the guages done:

 

Comparison of floors. I mainly got it for the footwell section, because that was boned. Probably not worth getting new floor pans, as I think these replacements are pretty good.:

 

Bought this center console from Dimitri aaaages ago, can't remember if I posted it up or not.

 

As you can see, it didn't have the front support bar thingy, so I cut it out of my old one and made one good console! Will need to spend a bit of time on the joins, but not going to bother until it's time to put it into the car.\

 

 

So. Engine.

Managed to get it around the side of the house, down a small flight of stairs, through a small door and up on it's stand. That was fun.

 

 

 

 

Ancillaries all off:

 

Unfortunately noticed a small chip on the crank.... Should I worry about this?

 

As a side note, the timing chain guide had snapped.... Just where it bolted on, didn't seem to be a big problem. Thought that was strange. Will have to hunt one down.

 

Sum of parts. God I love living with my parents  . Oh well, least it's cosy. Bolts will all be cad plated when I get to that stage.

 

Crappy china shiver valve spring remover bent like a banana 8 valves into the job. So goodbye $40. Went to bunnings, $27 later had all the parts to do this. Probably should have used a deep socket, but this does the job well enough.

 

Spent hours cleaning the block. Wire wheel, rust converter, wire wheel, wax and grease remover, high temp primer, high temp ford engine enamel, new welch plugs.

Quite happy with that outcome. looks good I reckon.

 

What color is the dipstick tube meant to be? And that funny (coolant?) pipe that sticks out the other side of the block?

 

 

Also got myself a little BOC 150 mig unit. Got it for $350 odd, still had the original roll of wire in it back from 2001 hahah. Bought this crap bucket to practice my welding before tackling the Z. Good thing I did, have improved a fair bit since starting on it already.

 

Excuse the dodgy photoshop lowering job I did for a laugh. Plans are pretty much get a 7MGE in there (cheap as chips, will be good practice wiring an EFI motor into an old carburetted body too). Weld fresh metal anywhere that has rusted through. Fender mirrors. Good chrome trim. that's pretty much it. I don't feel it's worth spending money on paint, mainly because I'd rather spend the coin on the Z, and a few people said it looks kinda cool all rat-rod like (cue controversy). I'm ashamed to say it, but I like the quick photoshop picture 

 

Here's a photo of the wheels that will go on the front. Techno TRV. One polished, 5 left (took two hours...). Need to paint centers too, then sell 4 of them and keep the leftover pair.

 

Also imported a pair of 14x8 -12mm SSR MK2's, they should arrive sometime around christmas .

[Scoota G]

Wow been a while since an update. Nice work but with the floorpans? i would throw them all to scrap and get new ones. The amount of time you save with a new section is incredible.