Lukas

Thanks for the responses everyone. I decided to give them a call this afternoon, but the mechanic who worked on my car was off for the day (or hiding). The receptionist was nice and understanding - I didn't get angry at her but I made her understand I was upset. Should be getting a call from the mechanic tomorrow. Even if I don't get a partial/full refund I'd still like to let them know what I thought of their work, and that I won't be back . I'll keep this thread updated Cheers, Luke.

Hello everyone, I'm in a bit of a situation. Prepare for long, drawn out explanation lol. My father and I have been restoring an import 1984 Z31 2+0 Turbo for about a 2 years now. We've done all the rust repair work ourselves as well as a lot of other smaller mechanical things (wheel bearings, brakes, etc, nothing engine related). It looks pretty rough as panels are different colors and the interior isn't the greatest, but overall it's 100 times better than it was when we got it, so we're quite proud of it. Plus it's sitting on some flush 17x8.5 +10 Rota RKR's . The only things left to address were the timing belt (preventative measure) and the slightest little fuel leak.We wanted to be able to drive it around without being worried it would catch fire (Z31's have a habit to do that lol). We had been driving it around before this but not much, as most of the time we were working on it. So we booked it in to the mechanics about a month in advance so they could order all the parts for us. Anyway, on the day, they had Not ordered any of the parts Had no idea what work we wanted done Fast forward a week, we decide to pick the car up because its clear they have done next to no work on it and don't plan to do any more. Before we get there they tell us the car is now overheating "slightly", and blame our radiator. We insist it was fine before they got it, but they can't think what else it would be. Keep in mind that they've replaced the timing belt, water pump, and thermostat... They also say they can't be bothered working on the fuel injection because it would be too hard... The car ends up boiling twice on the drive home (15min drive) and it's leaking petrol like there's no tomorrow. Once we get home we have a look at the car. Turns out they took the intake manifold off and obviously had a poke around the area which has upset the old hoses (or they didn't clamp them back properly) and now there is petrol literally pooling on the intake manifold. We also spend about 5 hours diagnosing and then fixing the overheating issue: The new thermostat was put in backwards. Aside from this it was evident in many small ways (e.g. radiator shroud loose) that they had not given a shit about the car. Needless to say i'm pretty upset :'(. So my question is, what do you think I should do? Chalk it up to a learning experience (ie, do all mechanical work myself from now on), or go and try to get my $800 back?? Feel free to share your own mechanic horror stories . Cheers, Luke.

Oh god that made me laugh... (I own a 280zx as well, so I'm allowed ) - I was going to suggest a Mitsubishi Galant Wagon, but then realized they are way more than $3000... So... My dads (EF?) Falcon wagon has been going for near 500 000 km, only problem I can remember it having was when it got water in the fuel...

Thought i'd jump on this. I've often wondered how a modified/chopped 280zx 2+2 would look (Makes me sad the 2-seater wasn't sold here...). In the end i think it would make more sense to just import a 2 seater. I did have a go at photoshopping a 260 2+2 though . I haven't put the extensive thought that RBZ 260 has in to his, but I'm sure with enough time & money you could manage it . Mod List: - Modified roofline - Lowered - Deleted rear bumper - Custom front spoiler - Tinted windows - Awesome lense flare Thanks to RBZ for the source image.

Gave it a go as well... Pretty dodgy job. I've tried to scale them relative to the size of the s30, but since the corvette is probably a bigger car they may actually be substantially larger in real life?

My girlfriend got me this magazine for Christmas They are very, very nice. I know what colour I want my zed to be now !

Those look badass... Any (rough) idea how much shipping will be?

Hi again everyone, long time no post. Due to life in general I haven't been able to get all that much done on the zed over the past few months. I have managed to do the following: Bought LH/RH floor pans. Cut the LH floor pan out and also repaired the LH dogleg. It isn't fully welded in yet simply because we were unsure of how to seal the metal underneath. What would be better, cavity wax or something like por-15? And is it possible to seal the back of the outer panel before putting it on, or should we put a hose in there after its welded and spray some por-15? ​ Stripped out the front suspension and have started to refresh some of the components. Haven't thrown any money at it yet, mostly just cleaning gunk of everything and recoating with por-15 or KBS where I can. I have been thinking of what I'd like to purchase though and will probably ask your opinions before it comes time to buy. (And yes dad did a dodgey job with the sandblaster at his work ) Most recently I've started stripping away all the under body seal from the front RH fender. I'm starting the think this wasn't such a good idea. It's been 99% rust free and now I'm worried whether i'm going to be able to seal it as well as the factory did? It's 99% stripped, it's just taking forever to get the last of the gunk out of seam lines and the like. Does anyone have any idea on how to get it out other than hard work? What I'm starting to realize is that even though I might look at, for example, the suspension and think "Holy shiver this is so complicated, I'm screwed", once I actually have a read and then take a crack at dismantling/fixing it, it turns out to not be so hard. It's encouraging. And, yes, of course I am putting a manual in it . Any questions, critiques, tips & comments are appreciated. Luke.

Not sure if these have been posted already. Yellow Car - One of the better Z videos I've found as far as overall quality/presentation goes. Utah Z Club 2010 Promo Video - No s30 unfortunately but some decent footage of a 280, 300 and 350.

I'm actually contemplating doing this to my 280zx 2+2 after my 240z is finished. I was curious as to what it would look like so I did a little photo-shopping of a 280 I found on the net (Can't find the original link at the moment), I think it looks pretty sweet. The interior is pulled from a BMW convertible and the wheels are Rota RB's. Update: Found a link to the source pic, http://home.earthlink.net/~dvgreimann/index.html.

Hello everyone, I was going to start with a little bit of history on how i got into Z cars but I think i've covered that already in my 2 "I'm new here" posts so instead I'll start with when I got my 240z. After about 1 1/2 years of looking for an s30-series Z, I finally found a nice lime-green 240z for sale at a reasonable price. It was about an 8 hour drive just to get there, but we hired a car trailer and went anyway. To begin with we were a little hesitant as there was a reasonable amount of rust, but we decided it was nothing un-fixable. The interior was actually in pretty good condition apart from the seats, it ran but wasn't registered, automatic transmission worked albiet a little clunkily, no cracked glass or anything like that... So we paid for it and went on our merry way . What We've Done So Far After that we had a little bit of re-organizing the shed to do so we could fit it in (Dad also has a z31 2+0 waiting to be restored. We're sortof in a race to see who can get theirs finished first). We've started stripping it down now, front exterior is fully off but the engine is still in for the moment. Not sure if we will attempt to recondition it or just take it to a mechanic at this stage. Interior is fully out except for the dash and the centre console. Luckily the rust we've found isn't so bad. We've found that it's been resprayed in the past and there are several bits where rust has been "repaired" (Some parts dodgier than others). The only bog we've found so far is in the hatch and sill panel. otherwise it's rusty in both floor pans, back LH fender section, a little bit along the front windscreen RH corner which is concerning but hopefully only minor, battery tray, and another section towards the front of the engine bay but i'm unsure of what to call them (the front of the under-fender section?). Plans for the Future Not really sure to be honest. Aesthetically, I'm undecided on the color and on whether to get flares or not, I want to get some super wide wheels (Looking like good ol' wats at this point), definitely keeping the interior stock, and probably getting fender mirrors. Mechanically, not really much of a speed freak so keeping the l24 or going l28, refreshing the suspension but keeping it original, refresh brakes, etc etc. After reading that I suppose it sounds relatively boring, but things may change as the build progresses. Definitely won't be turning it into a track/drift car though! Questions I'm going to have a lot of these over the course of the resto but for now... 1. What do you guys do with the interior vinyl pieces during restoration to keep them safe? I've given them a quick clean with armorall, making sure to fully dry them afterwards, and now i'm thinking maybe it would be a good idea to cling-wrap them to keep any dust away from them. I'm just scared cling-wrapping them will deprive them of oxygen or something like that? I tried searching the net but couldn't find any info on this. 2. Does anyone know where to get rust repair panels for these cars? I've tried contacting the local rare-spares distributor and I was told it would be a couple of months before they could get me a LH floor pan..? 3. I've found i need to move the auto shifter back to take the center console out. Probably a stupid question but is it ok to change gear while the car is on stands? I've attached a couple of pics. Congratulations to anyone who actually read the full post!

Hello everyone, I introduced myself 2 or 3 years ago when i bought my first Z, a 280zx. Well, I've finally bought a 240z. Its a 1973, lime green/yellow, very original (though not in great shape), auto (unfortunately). Not registered, but capable of being driven. Have already started stripping it to inspect the rust, not nearly as bad as we thought it would be so far - there are a few bad spots but nothing that can't be fixed. The plan is to cut all the rust out and respray in a different color, possibly metallic red but i'm not sure (I actually have half a mind to spray the whole thing in matte-black rust converter/sealer and leave it looking half-done...). The interior will be fixed up to mostly original spec (It's actually quite good as is), some wide wheels will be put on and then we'll see how it goes from there. Rebuild the engine and suspension/etc, but i don't have any plans for anything major as far as actual performance is concerned. I don't really have any good pics to show unfortunately but heres one anyway. I will make a project thread when we actually start to work on it, Uni starts back soon so i'll have neither time nor money to work on it though . Anyway thanks for reading, hopefully this project will be on the road within a year or 2!

Hey mate, sent you an email. Cheers.

Hey again everyone. Thanks for the kind words . The car set me back $3400. It's done 180k's but it doesn't miss a beat and fires up first time every time, and it's absolutely awesome to drive. It feels so weird when I get in mums car now . I plan on fixing it up (not in the short term, but long term), but not really racing or anything like that. I might end up buying another Z in the future for that . Thanks for the info on the B-Pillars (And for telling me the technical term ), I'll check it out this afternoon. I also searched the net, as far as I can tell the chromed ones are interchangeable with the non-chromed ones, but finding a pair of chrome ones may be hard... Also how often do you see old Z cars on the road? I've only ever seen 3 (And I've been on the lookout for the past 4 months). I saw 2 300zx's (the older style) within about 300 metres of each other the day we went to buy mine, and an orange 260z (I think) passed us on the way back from getting some new tyres. Other than that, nothing! Is it because you guys are hoarding all of them ?

Hey everybody, my names Luke and I recently bought my first car, a 280zx 2+2. I've never really been interested in cars, even a little bit. Then while I was searching on eBay for a first car to buy I stumbled on a 260z and fell in love... Now i'm thinking of going to Uni to be a designer and hopefully get to work on designing cars! All thanks to the Z series, lol. So anyway, it's in pretty good condition. Only a little bit of rust on the back near the tail lights, a bit of paint chipped off the front spoiler, and the hand break doesn't work very well , but other than that it's in good condition! I'm planning to get the rust cut out fairly soon (Once I have enough money). I attached some pics of the car. I also have 1 question: See the black window-separator... "thingy" (Sorry, I don't know the technical term) inside the red circle I drew? Well it's kind of coming off, but I don't want to pull it completely off in case I can't figure out how to put it back on. Does anyone know how to take it off & put it on properly? Also I noticed some of the 280zx's (Series 1 I think) actually had metal their instead of black plastic... Is it possible to replace the black ones with the metal ones, and if so, where would you even find the metal ones?