CroS13

its true, i have had friends get fined for that when cops were looking for defects but the guy had engineer's reports on the usual mods. I have also heard someone get done for having slip over car seat covers, because apparently you can "slip off and out" of the seat at some point during driving... i wish i was kidding. And A-Pillar gauges are also illegal, due to impact object during a accident, because of course my head will hit the bottom of the A-pillar well before it hits the dashboard and steering wheel.... Rudolf.

awesome just noticed your in west sydney too, ill have to come hear it cause yours will be running much much sooner than mine, especially considering mine is a shell right now haha! Rudolf.

Update 21/7/14: more rust, its like ive done this before? Cheers for the Kind words lads, coming on here really gives me motivation to get in the garage and give it a go, like most of you do, gives me the drive to keep at it. So a few things happened, Firstly i decided to mount my fuel regulator and braided hose, so that was done: I then looked to attack the drivers side nose section. after strip disking all the bog away i saw this: Oh...Nice try, but no.... well it seems atleast they did a better job than on the passenger side right? well no... not really..... So i wire wheeled all that crap off then i cut out the dirty part... i decided to do this in 2 steps, easier for me. made something that resembled what was there before and slapped that on here and that's what im up to at the moment..... Rudolf.

yeah but look at the bid history, first bidder placed the first 12 bids, his first was $300, final was $20,000. he is just bumping the price, next 2 bidders both low feedback and they bump it to 40k? 20 bucks says its the same bloke bumping the price. No one would pay 40k for that piece of garbage! Rudolf.

dag nam it....

Hey awesome write up and welcome to the nut house!! Your story is near identical to mine, watching wangan midnight over and over, i plan on painting my bus a dark blue also! And your accidents are my worst fears! Ive been rear ended in my daily driver 5 times now, i hope my cursed luck doesn't carry on with the Z when i get the old girl on the road. What rear wing are you running by the way? I have a Top stage carbon fiber wing, but its made for a 2 seater, and I'm not really ready to destroy it trying to make it fit my bus, if needed ill sell it and buy something in fiberglass, your one looks like it fits pretty nicely. Rudolf.

My workshop foreman used to race speed cars at Parramatta raceway back in the 80's and early 90's.... He said they used to cut the roofs of 240k's and use them as convertibles to push start the midget cars. "Its just Datsun garbage" he used to tell me when i was a apprentice, he is the typical fair dink bogan in his late 50's, if its not a v8 its garbage. i showed him a few recent ads for prices of 240k's and he couldn't believe it. He thought i was mad for paying 8k for my bus, "8 thousand dollars for a DATSUN!!??" Then i showed him the price of 2 seaters and his brain melted... Twisted old fart... ill dance on his grave....

panels are coming along real nice Gav! Any monkey can grab a Mig welder and lay some welds (look at me!), so its nice to be learning a "old school" method to weld, or at least one that's not as common. Id love to learn it, that tafe course is just too dam far away from me to get to in an afternoon. Rudolf

i had forgot you were from Sydney, ill have to pull my finger out and actually come to the next meet so i can say hello and see this old girl in the flesh! Rudolf.

ahhhh what an excellent outcome! to be honest i wasn't sure if you were talking rubbish when you first posted up, but im glad to see your success. car looks real nice, and that website you linked to had Japanese auctions to search, that's dangerous for me, ill spend many hours looking on there for S30z's and dreaming while searching hako suka's. get a build thread started mang! Rudolf.

WWE Smack down in a Melbourne restaurant. first 40 seconds nothing then royal rumble!!!

^^^ i know were your coming from, but if it cost 2k to get it blasted and find out exactly what i'm dealing with then so be it. Update 21.6.14: Dolf the fabricator? So since we left off i did a bit of work over the last 2 weeks, not much to say really here are the photo's: I cant remember exactly what i did wrong, but i stuffed something up, and there ended up being a gap between scoota's panel and where i cut my panel. but the main issue was the step in the factory section and the replacement panel. i had to bridge this gap somehow: so after scratching my head for awhile i grabbed a hammer and beat the crap out some scrap metal i had and ended up with this: welded that section in, got some more weld through primer and the KBS rust seal: welded it all together: then hit it with some primer: Pretty chuffed with myself for a first attempt at doing some rust repairs to be honest. plenty more to come! Rudolf.

See if you can fashion some form of heat sink to stick to the back of areas you can get to, like those bumper holes. I have a few offcuts of 2mm thick copper sheet, a few copper buzz bars i've taken off scrap forklifts from work and a few brass flat bars pieces. If i cant get a clamp in the area ill simply masking tape it to the backside of the area i need to weld in, maybe throw a few magnets on each end too to hold it in place. It really helps to stop blowing through the thin metal. Its what i used on the nose clip of my car when i put in a patch panel. Rudolf.

I don't know if i would say im 'proficient' with the welder just yet, im scraping by, which means spend 3 hours cutting and practicing on scrap steel before i hit the car. For example, yesterday i made up a test patch to butt weld together which i have painted on the bottom with the KBS rust seal, so i can practice at different voltage settings to see how the kbs will react when i weld ontop of it. I also made a long strip to test my plug welds with, it has about 60 holes ive drilled into it, so im coating the length with different thicknesses of Upol weld through primer to see at what point it wont strike a good arc. And yes, i think it will be very interesting what hides under the rest of the paint. After i repair this nose section on both sides i think ill take it to the sandblasters, i have already been able to push a screwdriver through the dog legs, so ill probably be asking someone to make me those panels too sometime in the near future. But hopefully it shouldn't be too bad, my slam panel is fine, my doors are perfect, as in not even surface rust, my front guards are the same. How do you eat a elephant? ...... One bite at a time. Rudolf.

welcome mate! great to have another member in the Sydney crew! Do post some photo's up of her Rudolf.

Update 6.6.14: tackling some rust: So while doing some other work, i accidentally caught my jumper on the little tab that the grill bolts to, and ripped that tab right off. Well that's odd i thought to myself, so i went to the drivers side one and wiggled it around, and its quite loose too! Hrmmm... time to get out the grinder with brumby wheel and see what we have under that nice paint.... so my initial reaction was: but then decided to jump on evil bay and buy some spot weld drill bits. A few days later we were left with this: so i dusted off the old air grinder and hacked away until this was left: I also painted inside the radiator support with KBS rust seal, (or Por15) as far up as my brush could go anyway before i would weld in the new panel. So i went to work over a day or 2 cutting out a new bit of metal, trimmed it all up and here is the final fit as of now: Also a big thank you goes out to Scoota G for making me up the outer panels! I managed to find some of that UPOL copper weld through primer, and i hit the middle of the panel with some KBS rust sealer. Here they are: Over the weekend hopefully i can atleast attempt to weld in the inner patch panel. Ill need to beat on the nose first, as its all warped around from me grinding, getting snagged on it while i was rushing around the garage and from hand filing it here and there to make the patch fit. Rudolf.

cant wait to see some colour on this thing! not too far to go now. Rudolf.

this bus looks like its had a paint job, simmons and a L28, nice interior....10k, too bad it wasn't for sale when i was looking for one, looks like id have saved myself alot of work http://www.carsales.com.au/private/details/Datsun-260Z-1976/SSE-AD-2823282/?Cr=9&sdmvc=1 Rudolf.

to be honest i wanted something basic i could practice on before i tried my hand at doing the rust repairs, this way i could weld, and go inside and see how my penetration was. Plus i plan on having a minimalistic engine bay when finished. Ill tuck all the harness too. It makes it a lot neater i think. As for the cable hole, yes it will be big enough, i plan on using a universal Lokar accelerator cable, so it will have a point to bolt to the firewall, ill just need to drill the hole the correct size for it. I only plan on doing this once might aswell do it the best i can, if i can weld up a hole instead of using a grommet ill go for that. On a downside, with that mentality my car might never get finished haha! Rudolf.

The same applies to NSW, I plan on running a basic "vintage air" heater unit. It will be a basic electric heater/demister in the cabin made for hot rods. Rudolf.

UPDATE 25.5.14- Welding up the firewall. Well to start off i did get the rest of that mastic off, it took about 3 hours over 3 days, then also about 3 more kg of dry ice and about 4 hours worth of work took care of the rest of the sound deadning. I never...never want to do that again! Now i decided to tackle the holes in the firewall, i had been meaning to smooth it all out for awhile, as i wanted to run my fuel lines to my fuel regulator. Where i wanted to run them, the braided hose ran right across all the old holes for the heater core and choke cables. I wanted to secure the hose to the firewall with either storff clamps or saddle clamps, so i needed to clean that whole area up. I also wanted to get rid of that blanking plate i made that the fuel regulator mounted to on the passenger side. I had made it up to cover the holes in the firewall made for US spec cars, but It didn't really give a nice neat finish in my eyes. So i removed the plate, and tackled the holes on that side. Lastly, i wanted to remove the bracket and post used to mount the accelerator linkages. I wont be needing them as ill be running a cable for the bike carbs, so that went too. The offending area: Drilled out spot welds and chiseled off the linkage post for accelerator: On the passenger side: Smooth! And hit with some primer: The next thing is to re mount the fuel lines and regulator, clamp it all down and that job is done. I will also need to weld up the hole where the accelerator rod goes through the firewall, its waaayyyy too big for what i need, i think the hole only needs to be between 12 to 14mm for the accelerator cable. Ive seen people just use mudflap washers and sandwich one on either side of the hole, with the cable running through the middle, but ill do it properly. Only problem i see is getting a grinder in the area to smooth off the welds, as that panel is 2 layers thick, and im working on the second, sunk in panel. I'm thinking to weld from inside the firewall, so all i have to clean up on the outside is the small weld penetrate. If its not 100% and some small gaps i can bog it to smooth it out. Rudolf.

When i bought my S15 around 7 years ago, i paid 24k for it, well out of reach of the Flat brim Yolo punks, who back then, were driving around in VN commodores and the like. My car is in as good condition as it was then (immaculate) and ive spent 20k on it since i purchased it. And yet now, within the last 2 years, more and more young punks have been able to afford them, as they have now dived into the 10k range. I wanted to sell my car, id be happy with 17k, id never get that. My car is one of the best examples out there... maybe its worth hanging on to, as all the 10k S15's are thrashed out crap boxes. I want a more practical car for a daily driver. I want a Forrester XT, to do up tastefully. But i don't want to let my car go for 10k. Shame i don't have the room for the S15, i really want to hang onto it. Maybe i should wait until they all get written off and they skyrocket in price again. Same thing is happening with old KE70's, and AE86's. The " YOLO punk Drifting crew" (who i will stereotype as the punk skateboarder kids who have now grown old enough to drive) are getting hold of them, whacking on some sick JDM wheels, dumping it with blast pipes and everyone of them thinks its the best car in the world. I blame the internet, and cable TV, and Facebook, and the dumbing down of the generation. Now all these kids don't want to spend the effort and time to do things properly, that's too hard, lets just cut corners to get a certain Look to get as many likes as we can on twitter and facebook. Bah! Rudolf.

Im trying to set up my Mig Welder to weld some holes in my firewall and fix some rust. I did a test patch, im using 1.0mm sheet. Welder is a 205a WIA Mig. Settings are on LO, with fine voltage set to 7.5 out of 9 and wire speed at 1.5 out of 10. To weld im holding gun dead straight, about 1cm from pannel, and tacking, waiting to cool, and doing another tack. I hold the trigger for only 1 second. What im finding is when i lay the next tack, as you can see, i do get penetration, but the penetration of the welds arnt joined together, even though im laying the front tacks close together. Any advice? I tried upping the fine voltage to around 8.5, but it didn't really help with penetration, much the much, should i hold the trigger longer when i tack it? or should i then go around and tack from the opposite side to fill the gaps? Rudolf.

I can see rust bubbles on the sugar scoops. The last car i saw with rust in the sugar scoops was George's, and look what the rest of the car was like! Just saying if you got it sandblasted i bet you could take it home in a box trailer. Rudolf.

UPDATE 2/5/14- Rotisserie finished, breaking out the heat gun and dry ice! So i have been busy the last month, firstly I finished my rotisserie. Now the only issue is how to lift and lower the car, i have incorporated 2 elements into the design for 2 possible ways of doing this. A foot and gusset at the bottom to lift it with a 4wd high lift jack, or an anchor point for a boat trailer winch and d shackle if i go from the top, unsure which way to go yet, but either or, i need 2 lift devices, and both are around $100 each. Here is the finished product, at this point the only thing i needed to buy were the castor wheels: I also got stuck into scraping out the old sound deadner from the floor and boot as i had heard the media might just get imbedded in it, instead of removing it. I tried a heat gun and scraper and that got pretty old in around half a hour. So i went down to BOC, and got some dry ice, layed it over the floor, had a beer then went to town with a rubber mallet and chisel with hammer, I got 3/4 off and ran out of dry ice. And at $10 per kg it gets pretty expensive!!. Lastly, what i am finding the worst job on this car so far, is scraping off all the old Mastic used on the inner door panel to hold the plastic weather cover on. Using wax and grease remover and a rag only results in smearing it all over the place, and its only clean after wiping 3-8 times in the same spot with clean rags. Not only that, but when the previous owner had the car painted, squirted a whole bunch of it inside all the old door rubber seals and quater window seals to re seal it up. so its EVERYWHERE! I have spent 6 hours on it so far and im not finished...... Rudolf.