Zeddophile

why not just swap the alternator + battery from your partly dismantled car into your complete car?

I've got headlight relay upgrades in my rangie, and also had in my alfa - used the NewEra relay blocks which are designed for it, they have a low and high beam circuit on the same relay, which are individually 30amp fused. Rear spoiler could conceivably help with fumes, as it would alter the airflow/turbulence at the rear of the car, possibly helping to extract the fumes away from the hatch.

for a rolling shell, 3k should be pretty on the money, you can find some in primer already for around that sometimes. Ozdat is your friend - www.ozdat.com. Keep an eye out, if there ain't one now, one will come up sooner or later. I found my car (which admittedly wasn't the BEST buy, but I've seen cars a lot rustier, mine was mostly accident damage) for $2000, which had running l26 and auto in it, and came with a couple of spares, including a complete L28 EFI motor and 280zx five speed gearbox, and one or two panels.

if by ems you mean the engine computer, as far as I'm aware the 280zx computer does not take any inputs from the auto.

How'd you go about fitting the BMW calipers? And where'd you collect them for $60? It seems to be an interesting alternative.

I have a 280zx efi motor in mine, it bolts straight in. I swapped the 280zx gearbox in before i did the engine swap, and the box bolted up to the 260 motor fine, so I would imagine that the 260 box should bolt to the 280 motor just as simply. You will find that when you put the intake tracts in, that the air flow meter needs to be turned to a pretty specific angle to fit in easily, and that your air filter will need to be placed in front of the radiator for reasons of space. You should ideally put an electric fuel pump in somewhere, mine is running a VL commodore external fuel pump at the tank. Upgrade your flexible fuel lines to EFI spec hose and hose clamps, and its recommended but not entirely necessary to change your fuel pipe (hard lines) to a bigger diameter. Beyond that, from memory its a very simple swap. Lot of people running 280zx blocks with 260 or 240 gear bolted to the top, so the gearbox shouldn't be an issue I imagine. Any questions, ask away.

well, i had to fit a speaker into a Magna loan car at work, and since the front speakers are a pain to get to, I just chucked it inside the centre console - it actually sounded quite good.

Evan, did you notice on that auction it says seller will not ship internationally?

No, my stockies are the cross kind of alloy things.

45 Psi will tend to make the centres of your tyre wear, and you'll chew through tyres faster, because the tyre balloons, and only the centre contacts the road. You may find more understeer and a bit more wheelspin also (especially in the wet). I really wouldn't go over 35 for a street car. (of course, pressures too low tends to wear the outers of the tyre more, due to the way the tyre sits, and also the 'rolling' action of the tyre under cornering) For a reference point, my 34inch offroad tyres for the rangie give the max load rating (1120kg) at a pressure of 210 kpa - which is 30 PSI. These tyres are 6 ply jobs with very thick sidewalls (and tread area), which are designed to be run at very low pressures (ie 10psi) offroad for maximum traction, which also means they should be able to withstand high pressures no worries. The Yokohamas fitted to my Zed stock rims have "44Psi Max Pressure" written on them. There should be recommended tyre pressures on the tyre placard in your glovebox - in my zed, its 28psi for speeds under 110mph, 32 for speeds over. To me, that would also suggest that staying in the range of 34-36psi to be a pretty good figure.

I believe AE86 (toyota sprinter) wheels are the right stud pattern, and if they are normal width, the offset should fit.... If i had my adaptors made up, I'd sell you my stockies...

Tyre pressures is a good idea to check - I used to run about 28-30 psi in the fronts of the Alfa, went to 32psi one day and never went back... That 2 psi made a huge difference.

i'm not really bothering to paint under my carpets... kind of giving it a dusting over to neaten it a little, and a good squirt where patches have been welded, but thats it.

Yeah, I pretty much plan on running the stock 280 motor while I collect bits to build a stroker out of it, and bits to make custom intakes with multiple throttle bodies...

I would, if you aren't fussed about originality. I know my alfa didn't have one, and I know exactly what you mean about not being able to see out the back!

The whole 280zx motor came with my car, so it hasn't cost me anything for the injection, unlike the carbs will (since my l26 has the crap flat top hitachis). I'm pretty over carbs anyway.

its a 280zx motor, but in my 260z. I was thinking about running the crow cam thats supposed to be good from 3000 to 6500 rpm, or maybe the slightly milder one thats supposed to run from 2200 to 6600.... http://www.crowcams.com.au/templates/Catalogue-Datsun-OHC.shtml Then again, I was going to do it when I put the xr6 turbo injectors I've got lying around in, and run megasquirt, since I don't know whether those cams will go that well on a car which only has 6 into 1 extractors..... I'm not sure what you mean by a 74 degree cam though - 74 degrees exhaust open, or 74 degrees intake close? Seems to be a million ways to specify cams.

so then what would you do to run a big cam on an L28E, other than run an aftermarket ecu?

I'm sure there is some modification which can be done to the stock ecu, because my mate had a stock ecu with his cam.... I'm fairly sure he mentioned that Z-shop fiddled with it somehow though....

There are quite a few cams available, my mate had a 280zx with pretty lumpy cam, and it flew. The main thing to be aware of is you'll either need to get the stock ECU reprogrammed to match the cam, or install an aftermarket ecu.

Evan, thats what I want to do to mine (strut sectioning)..... For a street car though, I don't know that I'd bother, unless you want to lower it... Z-shop quoted $1500, and I'm not sure if that was per end, or all end - the wording was unclear, and I can do it myself a lot cheaper, since I have access to all the gear I need. I have stock height springs (new king springs) and I intend to use a shock cartridge which is shorter in the body, and cut about 40mm out of the strut below the spring perch, cut the perch off, and fit a threaded spring seat. With my current Koni reds, I could actually cut the rear down by 35mm as is, since they have a 35 mm spacer welded to them, but the fronts were shortened to exactly the right length for my struts I want externally adjustable now anyway.

Yeah, the high fuel pressure thing was off the top off my head at the time, one of my mild musings that usually gets thrown in the bin. Like the look of the speed technology setup, but from the calculations i've done i need 16 inch long runners (valve head to plenum) to produce peak torque at 4,500 rpm on an L31, with about 30-35mm throttle bodies. The shorter the intake runners, the higher rpm peak torque is produced at - although ram tubes have somewhat different rules....

well, I put Koni Reds into my car, which are adjustable, but you have to remove the shock to adjust them. I think it is Z31 shocks that you can put in, if you want Koni Yellows (externally adjustable), with spacers underneath. Not sure what you mean by sectioned struts? I don't think your description describes it at all though, by what you are saying :? If you only want the car as a daily driver, I'd just put Koni Reds in and be done with it - and if you PM me, we MAY be able to work something out there, since I want to put Yellows on for light track work. When you put the heavier engine in, your front springs will need changing, but you'll get away with just clicking up the damping on the front shocks one or two clicks - you could even leave them as they were if you wanted, the shocks only control the speed of movement, and if its a street car only, you don't need to get overly fussy. If you do the bushes, make sure you put decent urathane ones in, and yeah, you may as well do all of them if you don't know what they're like. Swaybar wise, I'm going to run whiteline adjustable swaybars either end (about $230 each) unless a better option comes up. For strut tower braces, ask sulio if he can get more carbon fibre ones - they weigh under a kilogram at my guess, and look damn cool. They're also cheaper than the Whiteline alloy ones. Personally, out of the shocks you mentioned, I would go Konis. They are, without a doubt one of the best, if not the best shocks. The problem however, is that mine cost about $900, and that was trade price. They had to be modified a bit for my car as well. I think for you it would cost over $1200. However, like I said, if you want to go with Koni Reds, and assuming yours is a late 260, PM me, because I'm thinking of Yellows and chopped struts, and I may be able to come to an arrangement.

they aren't that light, actually - i weighed a 16x8 last night, it came out at 17kg..... :cry: I think fitting will be a while off, since I'm going to leave the stock wheels on until its painted... I may get impatient at some stage and bolt them on though :twisted: *EDIT* just reweighed the 16x8, got 16 kilos. Then weighed the spare off the zed, which has a 205/70-14 on it - its 17 kilos!!!! So with the 225/50-16 on, i shouldn't have gained much if any weight at the back - maybe half a kilo a wheel... The 16x7 comes in at 15.5 kilos, so should be a little lighter than the stock rims, although the fact that they have 195/65-14s on might be it a bit closer.

I'm assuming you are using an L28 from a 280zx, in which case there really isn't any manifolds that will interchange, due to the layout of the intake ports. You could perhaps try hunting down a turbo manifold from an 280zx turbo in the states, but I'm not sure if they're different at all - they might be.... There could be custom or specially fabricated aftermarket manifolds available, but I think you'll find them hard to come by, and expensive if one did come up... Probably the best option is to get someone to fabricate something up for you, depending on what you want. Possibly get the plenum cut off the runners, and a bigger plenum and throttle body put on. Personally, when I get around to it, I intend to custom fabricate an intake manifold with longer runners (designed to give peak torque around 4500 rpm) and a throttle body for each port. But I have access to a number of facilities which means I can do most if not all of it myself. Other things you could maybe look at would be making a straight fuel rail, and putting in different injectors, and a higher pressure fuel regulator to try and atomise the fuel better, and perhaps going to a map sensor or hotwire type air flow meter, but I'm not sure how effective these would be, thats a matter for a dyno.