roastbeef

Hi I'm in London, but my Z is in Australia. I went to most of the usual places in sydney to see if they could do something similar with trim as the pictures above but somehow it wasn't quite the same. Always ends up looking a bit 'autosalon' spec. If anyone does know of a good quality retrimmer I also want to know! Be a lot easier than shipping from europe. I have fired off an email to the company last week but haven't got a reply yet. Will follow it up with a phone call next week. shall keep you posted

You are a harsh man HS30-H Harsh but fair..

it's the current issue on the shelves in England at the moment, should be the same for you i'm assuming! otherwise can order it online at their website. http://www.classicandperformancecar.com/

Gav if you are in ireland, and thinking red interior, i've fired off a few emails to a great restorer in Norway/Lithuania. check out the skills: The have a particular love for Z's but usually do high end ferrari/porsche stuff.

Picked this up yesterday at the local WH smith. great article on a spectacular car! I find most articles in classic car magazines frustratingly unfulfilling when it comes to featuring 240z's. Usually some rehashed history snatched from google and an uninspiring rundown on spec lists etc. This car however has enough history and anally retentive detail to restoration(i mean this in a good way) to make a great and informative read.

he usually responds to his email quite promptly as well tkeyATbrightonnissan.com.au

I jumped on the trevor bandwagon as well (thanks to the OP) Got mine a few weeks ago but havent had a chance to open them up yet. Good find! I remember choking at the price of these many years ago from warren@allz and now I'm just happy I can buy them for double the cost!

PM sent Benzed

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?

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!

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.

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

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.

i always seem to get the mystery fuel filler problems as well when on track. i tried a budget fix on the day -putting a plastic bag on the inner screw cap to very minimal effect. I imagine it will require a new rubber gasket in the cap itself.