Homegrown Hotrod

[blitzkraig]

Nobody I know thinks of the Z as a hotrod, but I think it fits that category just fine, so that's why I'm callin mine the Homegrown Hotrod.

Now that mine's on the final steps to "completion" I just wanted to give some background as to what has happened.

Back in 1971 my dad was looking for a nice low cost sports car to replace his '62 Vette (which he SOLD:tapemouth ). After searching and searching he decided to buy a brand new 240z. He wanted to get one of the blue ones but apparently there was some kind of shipping problem going on and the only ones they had at the dealership were two red ones. My dad was apparently not willing to wait so he drove off the lot with a brand spankin new red 1971 240z. The car served him well, but at some point in the mid 80's I remember it was set out in the corner of our farm for about 7 years. We ended up moving off the farm property across town to suburbia around 1993. When we got the Z towed to the new house my dad was determined to get the car running again. Thankfully it just needed a tune up and a new clutch. I ended up learning how to drive a manual in the Z, and learning how to get in minor accidents :dead: . I felt bad about the damage I had done so in my senior year of high school I did all the bodywork in my autobody class and the teacher painted the outside of the car a new chevy red! The car pretty much served as my backup when I was doing work on my 56 ford pickup now and then.

In August of 2002 I started tearing my truck apart for a frame off resto, and the Z became my daily driver. Then around February of 2003 the stock tranny in the car finally gave up the ghost in a Kragen's parking lot. I towed to poor car back to my rented house and sat down to contemplate its future. After a week of thinking I decided to keep the car and swap in a 5 speed transmission. So I pushed the car in the garage and put it up on jackstands for a new transmission. While it was up there I figured I would also replace all the original suspension bushings with urethane. While I had all the suspension out I figured I would strip the underside and spray undercoating under the whole car, and sandblast all the parts and paint them with epoxy black. And while the engine was out I would paint the engine compartment (it never got painted in high school). And since I was going to repaint the engine compartment, I rationalized that I should just redo the whole damn car and make it blue (the color my dad originally wanted and I thought would look super cool). See, all very logical thinking wouldn't you say?

So I finished off all the underside, suspension, T-5 Tranny swap, painting of the engine compartment, and cleaning of the engine by September of 2003. The car was finally driveable again, and I was happy with the fact that I had managed to do all the work myself in the garage of my rented house! The outside bodywork began after about two weeks of enjoying driving around. Over the next 3 months I welded up all the emblem holes, shaved the door locks and antenna and gas door knob, fitted new mirrors from RBS Auto, and customized some early repro quarter emblems to fit on the car. On the first weekend of January 2004 I spent around 40 hours wetsanding, masking, and painting the car myself at the autobody shop I work at. I drove the Z back to my garage and began tearing out the interior to lay down a coating of sound deadener, install a restored dash, and route new speaker wiring in the proper places. By the third weekend of February the interior was all back together, the paint was buffed, the new wheels were bolted on and it looks like the car is finally done.

It's been a long process but I am very satisfied with the results. Even better is the fact that I can tell people I did almost all of the work myself. One homegrown hotrod done...now back to that 56 ford! Enjoy the pics in my gallery! and hope to see yall at the MSA show this year!

[seerex]

very nice , I love the color , glad to see you decided to put the work into it , it was well worth it , enjoy the ride

[hls30.com]

Your car iz Beautiful! I hope the shop you work for took notice! should be a good case for a raise! I am getting ready to do a very similar thing to a '72. What about the emblem modifications? I didn't see any detail (closeups) of them.

Will

[v12horse]

I totally agree with what these guys said about your car. It looks great!!! I am not for many mods on Z's, but you executed everything very nicely. The paint looks as smooth as glass. I think your car should be the next month's Z of the month. Take care and enjoy your Z. Maybe sometime we will have that drive. Just pm me.

Take care,

Ben