thriller

^ True that. Always seems a little suss when someone is asking a decent amount for a car that 'only needs a few tweaks'. If it was only a weekend or two worth of work, why not do it yourself, make the car actually perfect and charge appropriately? Funky mirrors, door handles look painted black? None of them are big issues, but if the owner can't be bothered doing those little things... Paint does look nice though.

Looking good Gav. Many more nasties left?

Certainly sounds like the best idea to get it all done there. When it's all ready, you'll have a brand new shell that you can just go about popping fresh bits onto & it'll be a breeze!

Wooo-weee! That's actually rustier than mine! Will ledge be doing the full shell + panel + paint?

Nice work diving into it. Should look real tidy when it's all done!

Thanks champ. Part of the parcel I guess when you spend 30 hours a week knocking up websites at work, and full time computer science study on the side (needless to say that progress on the Z has slowed down a little recently...) Content-wise, I like the site as is really (though find it frustrating having to zoom around when I'm on my phone). Build threads seem a little slow lately, but that's life. Design wise, it looks quite dated & that might be pushing away potential new users. I'm not sure what this forum is built on, but I guess porting posts and stats over to a totally new system would be a nightmare. I like the front-page articles, especially when there are pretty photos. Maybe whenever there's someone taking nice photos of a meet or whatever, that + a short article could be converted to a front page article? Same goes with whenever a member with a particularly nice build gets their car completed (ala mossy). Nice bit of eye-candy on the front page is always a treat.

Hey Gav, I just spent 15 minuted dicking around in Chrome's Web Inspector (see pics) Don't think a mobile-specific override stylesheet would be too hard to knock up.

I bought a taiwanese $40 eBay valve spring compressor. Don't make the same mistake! Bent like a banana on the 3rd spring I removed. Instead, just roll down to bunnings, grab a real big C-clamp and a socket that's about as wide as the valve spring caps. Grind about 1/3rd of the socket 'edge' off, and weld the back of it onto the swivelly bit on the C-clamp. $15 and presto! Socket sits on top of the valve spring, wind the clamp down & remove the collets through the opening that you ground out of the socket. Little bit more fiddly than the proper high-quality tool, but it works alright for the $/amount-of-use value

My favorite color combo on a Z. Surprised there's no speaker holes chopped out of the doors. I think the Kameari bucket seats, re-trimmed to that red, would be pretty cool. Other than the questionable body 'enhancements' I reckon it looks pretty unmolested. Engine bay looks pretty unmolested. Is that a factory plastic radiator shroud or something?

Thanks Gav. Car came with the extractors, they weren't rusty at all but were painted black. Felt like silver suited a little better. I was tempted to heat wrap them as well just to give it that cool vintage racer feel, but they'd be a pain to keep looking tidy.

Still chugging along. The night that paint went on: Motor going in (left the box off as I still need the flywheel machined, I was over having so much stuff lying around, and the motor takes up less space in the car than out of it! ) Few details: Hopefully will finish off the wetsanding over easter. Looks totally shonky straight off the gun, but I'm happy with the few sections I've sanded & polished (till you look real close )

Aarrghh... I should totally stop putting off buying the hard-to-get bits for my early Z. They're definitely not getting cheaper. :-\

^ +1. Happy to look & take some photos of the usual suspect places if it's in the Adelaide Hills, or east of the CBD.

Thanks for spotting that Gav, hopefully I'll end up with this for the '77. And hopefully it actually works...

http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/

Woops, I'm in for sure. Will send a PM now

Thanks John. Was hand sanding on the smaller curves like the windscreen cowl, everything else with a long block. I'll do as you've mentioned first thing on Saturday morning when I'm back home. Should I be concerned at all about anything that has not yet shown up, or will it suffice to just do the bits that have started to show some orange spotting?

I honestly think a 'standard' car cover is worse than nothing in the case of a carport, as the car will end up 'sweating' under there if there's any humidity in the air. Thanks for the suggestions too guys, really do appreciate it. At the moment I am I leaning towards selling off one, maybe two of my cars, strip the 260z back to metal and spend the $$ getting it done from the bare metal stage. Uni is starting again soon, will still be trying to fit in 25+ hours a week at work, a good 10 hours a week bike riding & racing means that I will end up completely rushing the primer & paint stage if I do it myself trying to finish before winter comes back for real here. On that note; anyone want an S13? Well cared for, old lady owner most of it's life, has never even seen a guard rail shopping trolley dings

So the last few months I have been focusing on bodywork, learning how to knock out little dents where possible, and a little filler where I can't knock things out. And a lot of sanding. Was getting quite close too, was starting to see some pretty nice reflections just in the primer and it was actually reasonably straight. Has been just in primer for probably two months now, but it's been a very hot and dry Adelaide summer so far so I thought that would be OK. Then the heavens broke & over the last two days we've had probably 200mm of rain & very high humidity. Was away from home, so couldn't really do anything about the car. Obviously those aren't good numbers, so I ride home today & am greeted by this... Needless to say I'm a feeling a bit over it at the moment, the prospect of doing that all again isn't a nice one. On the bright side, better this happen now than 6 months after some color goes on. Anyone else been through similar? Think my options are pretty limited.... in that the only options are grit my teeth & do it again, have someone else do it, or throw in the towel until I've got a house & shed of my own to play cars in. Unsurprisingly, none of those three options sound awesome...

Since when does a nut and bolt restoration involves rattle canning the entire gearbox and drive line black

Tread lightly... I'd rather a rough-around-the-edges car with surface rust that I know hasn't been 'fixed', than take a gamble on an unknown 'professional' job. Welcome to the mad house Whatever you get there'll be plenty of support around here, just be aware that the right car will turn up for sale faster than it will take you to fix the wrong one to the same level as the right one's starting point (if that makes any sense).

+ could bring a Silvia. Poor form for a Z community really hheh

Nice work, keep it up. Many body repairs left to do (that you currently know about...)?

Feel sorry for you George Anything less than factory-perfect and you're going to have a lot of complainers. Right down to the yellow brush marks on suspension bits. Congratulations though, you've got yourself a pretty nice talking point here. I'd suggest pulling down the car completely & sticking it on a spit first up, forget you even own the parts car completely until you need something, until then it's just one more thing to fill up your headspace (same goes with the interior, the motor, all the hanging-panels, etc). I'd guess all the spot-welded panels will need to come off and pretty much rebuild the shell from the inside-out if you want to be sure it'll last. Have fun, and "keep hoping machine running"

Nappy new year to you too Gav