Beautiful Watanabe's on ebay

[Bambikiller240]

Originally posted by 26th-Z

Carl,

I just had dealings with the seller you mentioned (orestus_of_argos?) and found him to be the most communicative, pleasant, helpful seller..............

Didn't mean to say that the seller is a bad guy, just that the wheels are not a "set" as most people would think of a "set".

With different material of construction (Aluminum vs Magnesium, you will have significantly different unsprung weight on F and R of car, or worse yet R and L sides of car. I'm not sure how badly that will affect handling, but it will definitely make some difference.

BTW, I see that there is a shipping calculater on the page that I missed last night, and the shipping cost seems reasonable to the west coast.

[v12horse]

You got some watanabe's 26th? Those are going to look splendid on your car. Congradulations. I too would love a set of those Kobe Sieko wheels. The ones in picture looked in pretty bad shape from the auction if they are the ones I was thinking of.

-Ben

[26th-Z]

Cool enough, Carl. The mismatched set is not one of his best offerings, but keep watching as he has some great connection directly to Mt. Watanabe and sells wheels frequently. Again, one of the nicest guys I have met in all my parts dealings. I hope to meet him in person some day.

Yea, I bought a set of Wats, Ben. I'm half in and half out on all this restoration stuff. Carl Beck is to blame. He says I am foolish to modify the car, yet I really can't stand a stock American Z. As you see in my gallery, I had the car on slots with shaved bumpers. A long time ago, the rest of the body was shaved. But I put all the emblems and markers back on in 1990 for the sake of originality.

So the plan is to restore the car ground up to dead original as best I can, take splendid pictures of it, and then replace parts to make the car the way I want it. I will replace bumpers, headlight buckets, wheels, and steering wheel - mostly. I want to lower it, but I dare not. But it does give the opportunity to show the car stock and modified - interesting. I particularly like the domestic ZL model styling and I think the Watanabes will help that flavor. At least that's the direction I'm headed. I'm going to do the interior ala ZL with the foot rest and carpet. Most all of the mods will be with genuine Nissan parts, thanks to Chloe and Alan T. for some serious help.

I have had the worst wheel hunting nightmare story, but I ended up with something far more than my original expectations. I passed on two sets of Watanabes - by this seller - before I took the ones I got. It has been a real learning experience and I feel I have gained the appropriate appreciation for them. I think the car will look great. Meanwhile, the engine is at the machine shop and the chassis is waiting to be dipped. This is going to take a long time.

Here is the set of Watanabe lug nuts.

[v12horse]

I think you should make it the way you want. I am planning to do a few mods to my car, but almost completely stock everywhere else. Someday I would like to have a set of wats and set of the steelies. You are going to have an awesome car. By the way, what is the steering wheel you are planning to get? Compe ?

I would like to mod my car exactly as you are doing and don't listen to Carl. There is nothing wrong with making the car your own, after all it is your car and you are keeping it pretty much stock?

IMO I would opt not to lower it. I think Z's with wats look great with some 70-75 sidewalls and no lowering. It gives it a much more period look. The stance of Guus's rally Z is my opinion the optimal stance.

Take care,

Ben:classic:

[Bambikiller240]

Originally posted by v12horse

..........I would like to mod my car exactly as you are doing and don't listen to Carl. There is nothing wrong with making the car your own, after all it is your car and you are keeping it pretty much stock?........

I suspect the Carl Becks opinion is STRONGLY influenced by the extremely low serial number of the car.

[v12horse]

I realize that the vin # is extremely low, and I know that is the reason why Carl Beck was implying not to do any modifications. However, the modifications that 26th has described are very traditional, and besides the wheels, the parts are Nissan S30 parts. I don't want to speak for 26th and his Z, but I get what you were trying to say Carl, and I agree with Carl Beck and 26th I guess. I am only assuming, but it seems that 26th is making it how he wants, but being able to have it modded or oem stock when ever he chooses because the parts are all bolt on. Correct me if I am wrong 26th because it is not my place to speak for you.

[Bambikiller240]

I fully support the idea of making one's car really YOUR CAR. Mod it however one wants to do, I say. I haven't followed what modds Mr. 26thZ plans for the car except that he's got the Wats.

I wonder how the value of the car (since it's such a low vin) would be affected by any modds. I don't know, I just wonder. "Traditional mods" do take away from "originality" Can't have both, right.

Need two Z's, one for originality, one for self expression.

[trs]

those kobe seiko wheels on the yahoo auctions site at the moment have a large gash/rip on the back side end. They are in fairly poor condition which may explain why noone has bidded on them even when they are "only" 40000yen.

These wheels on the other hand popped up on yahoo the other day...

I had always wondered how much these "sakura" style wheels were actually worth.

I nearly fell off my chair when I saw the asking price...

270000yen for 2!

14x8

I still want them.

[26th-Z]

Many thanks for all the compliments and encouragement. Carl Beck has some very valid points for originality because of the low serial number and I plan to adhere to most of it. I took a lot of photographs of the car coming apart and have had several discussions with people about putting the car back together as it was originally. "Kats" has been a great inspiration. He has detail on his car that makes me smile.

And most everything will be a parts swap situation. I could always return the car to "original" by swapping the parts back. I'm going to put headlight covers on a separate set of headlight buckets and I bought this way cool mahogony Momo steering wheel some time ago.