Sirpent

"Luke ! I am your father !" LOL OK guys lets be fair here, first lets see if the poor guy can help us, then if we are serious, I think we should put our cash where our mouths are. John

Mick In my last year with AMMI, I attended a seminar on future production techniques. The word is that within the next 10 years we will see a return to VW beetle style construction where everything is a composite bolt or glue item. Imagine a chassis made up of composite components that are crash zoned for impact, you simply unbolt the damaged sections, and replace them instead of unplucking seam welds rails skirts gussets etc etc etc, onto that you have tight tolerence fitting panels that just bolt on also like the old VW panels. And if you look at some of the Benz's currently out there they are already using composite plastic skirts that are bolted on including guards. The Z4 BMW's have been using rear 1/4 in the same way now for almost 10 years. The other great point with plastics is.... A they dont rust B they have a degree of form memory meaning they will bounce back in a minor impact C They can be formed more acurately into much more complex shapes D Easier to re-cycle And to further prove the point, headlamp glass these days is all plastic, and has 10 times the impact resistence of glass 3 times as heavy and twice the thickness. remind me to tell you the story about the factory poooohba with the VS commodore radiators, and the Vic police problem with power steering in the first of the 5.7 litre cars, they are classics !

Mick, Just to back you up, when I was assessing with AAMI, I did an assessment on the very first smashed VS Commodore requireing an entire Bulk Head replacement, when the beater rang Holden for the parts, there was an alert sent out by Holden, this was the first reported bulkhead change, problem was these things wernt welded in but urethaned, these days they all are. Long story short, Holden techs came out to oversee the change over in workshop conditions, the bulkhead was pre-painted by the shop, and glued in place, all went well. These days the entire dash wiring on Commodores and falcons are pre assembled on the bulkhead and glued in place as a single assy on the line. This also means that a lot of new cars are written off for the pure fact that the process of gluing in new bulkheads is a serious process, and most cars hit where the bulkhead is only slightly warped cant be beaten and welded up at a skirt rail intersection, you must replace the entire assy. So if you are looking at a smashed car at the auctions beware, there is good reason why they were written off to start with. This has been Panel Repair 101 session 2 presented by Mick and John.O.

Chartoo, It would be really appreciated and of course, speaking on behalf of myself and my evil twin Loui, will be glad to return the favour any way we can in the future. Loui, I cant ask my Mum, I was an orphan....... Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm :-\

Loui, You sure you aint my long lost twin?

US BOTH OLD MAN ! The Baby Boomers !

If it dosnt put you out, Im happy to put my hand up for 2 sets and pay the freight and a handling fee to you for them. Cheers John

Welcome, and good luck with the build. Seems there are a lot of us old timers coming out of the wood work and experiencing The "Z" mid-life crisis bug for these classics. cheers John

VERY SHEXY VISA, AMEX or your PayPal Account? And I'd be interested in a pair either alone or as part of a group buy if you were prepared to assist ?? Cheers John

Best just to go out see the car in the flesh and hagle with him. Remember he can always end the sale early and sell privately.

If the floor is glassed over........... http://cgi.ebay.com.au/FLOOR-PANS-DATSUN-240Z-260Z-LEFT-AND-RIGHT-HAND-SET_W0QQitemZ190351122647QQcmdZViewItemQQptZAU_Car_Parts_Accessories?hash=item2c51cfa0d7

Yeah The order would read. "Please send all part bar windscreen moulds, upper door belt moulds, and turret drip rail moulds"

Mine looks like it came from the Blair Witch Project forest, but yours is like The Swamp Creature Yes Lurch, the U.S., do you honestly think any Aussie would let one go far ? And this was from an advertisement that read Good restorer or parts car, US$800.00 I could almost hear the Banjo music playing in the background

Dont you just hate it when you come across something like this? What would you do to the owner?

Very nice work Mick, restoring old classics is 10 times the work of doing the same to a current car, so maticulous And I know you will understand when I say that as much as you hate working on them when they first come in, it breaks your heart when they are done and leave the shop, that orange job reminds me of the XA GT RPO83 that took me 2 years to complete, I hated it the whole time then was sad when it left the shop. Cheers John

Look fresh clean and very impressive, Im feeling a whole lot better about eventually doing mine one way or another. Great Job !

If I had the spare cash at the moment, I would snatch the shell up quicker than you could say "ZED" Looks very rust free, and apart from the LH skirt damage which dosnt look to bad either, its just a matter of hunting down parts, panels are easy as anything from a 2+2 front will fit, there are bound to be doors and a hatch floating around,, and bar the dash board which there are a fair few about what more does it need, the real benefit if the pics are a true indication is the fact that for the better part its rust free in the crucial area's, hell you would spend the better part of $3G's on an average Zed rust rectification and this is a rarer 2 seater.

RB Sounds like the same type of coating used on new OEM alloy wheels, any chance of a pic of your weber / manifold set up? Cheers John

UM, Guys......... Scroll up to the link at one of my last posts.........

By the way, this thread has screwed around with my head as I also have triple DCOE's that need cleaning, so surfing this afternoon I came across a mob in Melbourne who can ceramic coat aluminium, going to look into it this week and will post back on the forum. Cheers John

In the meanwhile, surfed the net and found this, seems there are some useful ideas out there http://www.aircooledtech.com/tools-on-the-cheap/soda_blaster/ But I think WR-Us is on to something with the football pump tip, does it give you a more controlled localised area when directing the soda? This set up looks like it would have way too much flow.

Pictures please and a non patented drawing of the configuration would be nice.

WB Apple.......... Lurch, down boy (When you read this) no more attempts to scare her away. Loui, your 14 year old daughter and my 15 year old son think alike, little does he know it aint going to happen, Ive got 3 ford probes, 1 parts car, one my daily drive and 1 in storage, he's getting the storage car........LOL And Apple, get your Bro out of it ASAP before he develops an attachment to it, these cars are like black magic when they get into your system. John

Just a reference to a guy I know who does a lot of older ECU mods. Ivan at T.I.K. Motors in St Albans Vic.

I see a friendship developing here.......