xa1973

Hello Mate Thank you for the welcome, all good here I think you have mis read the paragraph where I say WTF.. followed by one of my follow up posts to a question asked by another member I have been led to believe over the years that the 240 is the most desirable, naturally being the first of its kind thats understandable, followed closley by the 260 with the 280zx being the ugly duckling coming in at a long third If you read through my posts you will have noted that I have a 280zx that I have refurbed as a daily driver NB: No offence given or taken Thanks again Cheers XA1973

Yep This is what its all about Good and varied responses on anything that comes to mind, thanks Guys XA 1973

Hello Mate And thank you and others for the welcome. first time on a forum for me, so far so good, seems to be a lot of good blokes with knowledge and points of view that dont mind sharing it around. My kind of guys. I have the sedan as these were the cars benchmarked to meet the 200 production output for the homog regs for Bathurst. Four Phase IV race units were made before the Government of the day canned all production of high powered production road cars by FORD @ Phase IV Sedan, GMH @ 308 XU1 and CHRYSLER @ 318 Charger citing they were death missiles on wheels. The Phase 111 at that time was the fastest 4 door production car in the world at well over 130MPH out of the box under the whip, the Phase IV reported to be in excess of 140MPH ( too fast for the general public ) combined with soaring fuel prices and the rest is dust..... Funny though........look at the production cars of today, even the four cylinder jobbies!!! Ford had a LOT of Phase IV parts to move so they put them into what they called the RPO 83 sedan, a slightly tamer version of the Phase IV, the easiest way to recognise an RPO 83 was the tacho which went to 8000 instead of 7000, with parts also finding their way into the Coupes and the top of the line Landau. I like the Coupes, but find they suffer from far to much rust, which if really bad, is time consuming to fix due to the huge rear quarters on them, there is also a lot of dodgy units out there, the Yanks love the Coupes with many of them being shipped to the USA by a couple of companys here that restore them and ship them as SPECIAL orders. A bit off the track in a Z forum, but for those such as yourself who are interested its a bit of a talking point This bought us to the affordable, fuel lean, swift and light Japanese cars, the Z's, Corollas, Mazda RX and the like. I like all the Models, but find I prefer the 280ZX being a bit bigger and heavier, which suits my driving style better, Ive rebuilt mine to basic specs, prothane bushed through out the whole car, complete new front end steering components,front and rear suspension, front and rear brakes, the engine had been reco so the bores, pistons, crank etc were in very good nic, replaced basic items ie: new bearings, welsh plugs, timing kit, water pump, gaskets, injectors etc, the gearbox is auto which is tight and smooth. Ive removed all the water traps in the body, ie: the rear quarter windows have a channel of sorts under the seal which " should" drain the water, Ive reformed these sections of panel so the water does not sit in there, Ive done the same with the fuel filler opening, the windscreen scuttle and the tail light sections, Ive also slotted under the lower front guards, rails and rear quarters for better drainage. NOS and GSH interior, seat belts, refurb seats, dash and gauges, light mirror finish tint on windows, plexyglass head light covers, HID 6000 candle Blue light with ballast conversion, new body seals, new glass wear that I could get, transmission cooler, ram pod filter, 10 stack CD changer with amp. I did find a point of concern though, when I changed the tie rod ends ( inner and outer side Rods ) that the passenger side set were a lot shorter than the drivers side with a LOT less thread going into the adjusting tube, the same for the new set I was installing, I machined a new adjusting tube which was longer than the standard one and packed the center section with thread bar to extend the overall length of the rods and make it rigid, is this the norm? Any thoughts would be appreciated. Deciding on type and style of wheels, probably 15 x 7 alloy's all round at this stage. Im toying with a 4.4lt alloy V8 with turbo 400 tranny, all in all she should be good for another 30 years Cheers

Performance Alloy Wheels make an off the shelf selection to suit the Z's or will custom make to your specs www.performancewheels.com.au Cheers

Hello Mate Try looking at www.jagsthatrun.com/pages/parts_datzx_mountinginstructions.html They have a complete breakdown including step by step with pictures and the parts and part numbers for a chev conversion into 79 to 82 zx's, its all there!!!!!! There are two companys that supply the kits one is sensational the other is so so, or you can use the templates and make your own Cheers xa1973

Hi all Im xa1973 from QLD, Ive been a long time watcher of the site and thought why not join Ive refurbed and modified a couple of 240, 260 and 280zx's with mates over the days ( mainly for their wives to drive ) and have enjoyed the simplicity and ease of working on the cars, not only the mechanicals, but also the paint and panel ( made from real STEEL ) all of which I do myself. I bought a 79 280zx 2+2 for myself to tinker with in my spare time, she was a bit of a SHI ER, plenty of rust, good interior, reco engine ( 2 out of three aint bad ) Full strip down including engine, retinned panels ( no bog ) many, many, many, many, new parts, some from the USA, colour coded charcoal gey interior, respray in straight black tinter and shes back on the road, a tidy runner. Now many of you say a 280ZX!!!!!!! WTF, their a cruiser and I like a car with a bit more weight in it, I can modify and balance this car with virtually any block I can get my hands on and make a ball tearer out of it, or spruce up the L28e which is a good solid base for heavy mods more than capable of giving many modern V8's a run for their money on any Sunday The price and availabilty versus value for money and condition of the 240 and 260's is getting up there, I saw a 240 full resto posted for $37 k the other day, the 280zx will come into favour as the others become unreachable or disappear into collectors garages as many already have, never to be seen again. Anyway thats my lot... Cheers XA1973

Gday Lurch How was WA, I spent the best part of fifteen years in the Pilbara region, now back home in QLD Yes, your quite correct in your follow up, my post is a basic setup for the weekend warrior Cheers

The focus of circuit chassis tuning is to remove the compliance from the vehicle, and instead make the shock absorbers and springs do the work of controlling the body. With this in mind, every litle bit of rubber between the body and the tyres needs to be removed and replaced with solid, metal type mounts. Many conventional bushes should be replaced with rod end or rose joints. Removing the flexibility of the car gives the driver a more direct link between the steering wheel and the road, in turn delivering better on the limit control and more accurate use of the tyre rubber, which all adds up to more consistant and higher levels of speed, when set up correctly its easy to see how far removed a road car is from a decent circuit weapon. CIRCUIT SET UP SHOCK ABSORBERS COIL OVER PLATFORM ADJUSTABLE SPRINGS SINGLE RATE HEAVY SWAY BARS ADJUSTABLE BODY STIFFENING INTEGRATED ROLLCAGE ARMS ROD END JOINTS RIDE HEIGHT MINIMUM TO AVOID BOTTOMING FRONT 4* NEGATIVE CAMBER REAR 2.5* NEGATIVE CAMBER BALANCE NEUTRAL Adjustment of the roll centre and weight distribution of the car can lead to some serious gains in lap speed, optimal camber settings can really only be determined via tyre wear patterns, a vehicle with toe out will turn into corners better, but have less straight line stability. As with everything its a comprimise, even purpose built big ticket racers have deficiencies, but the methodoligy remains the same

Hello Mate Give Warren at Allzed in Sydney a call, he carry's everything for all models 0410549070 Cheers

Always a joy to see old become new again, why not put a chev in it and be done!!