THANKS for all of your help

[71_240Z]

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU

FINALLY. The Z is back on the road! After sitting in my driveway/woods/garage for 8 years, I drove it to work today.

I noticed that it took about 1/2 tank of gas to go 10 miles. Not very good mileage. I spotted a hole one of the fule lines attached to the tank. I think its the hose to the reserve tank. Its not spewing so I guess I can drive home. Nice. I guess I will get a hose on the way home.

The carb adjustment really had me for a few days. I couldn't find a flow meter so I tried listening to the pitch of a hose placed next to the air intakes. I figured I can tune a guitar by ear - I can tune a dual carb by ear. Didn't work.

What finally worked is really kind of dumb. I took one of my kid's watercolor masterpieces (it was in the garage. it was fair game) and used it to measure flow. The paper was regular laser printer paper and I just held it in front of the air intake and let the carb suck a dimple in the paper. You have to take it off right away or the engine dies. Note the dimple depth and test the other carb. Keep adjusting throttle until dimples are equal depth. This works at all RPMs. At lower RPM, there is not much of a dimple, so you have to judge by feeling the pressure required to remove the paper from the intake.

Once the airflow was the same, I adjusted mixture according to the directions in a link I found on this site. I adjusted the flow again and like magic, my Z is running great. It has been SO hard to start and VERY cold natured. All that has passed.

I did the toyota front break job with 300zx vented rotors, a complete back brake job, rebuilt front suspension, new struts, completely tuned the engine.

The brakes a pain because the idea of a spacer on the hub really bothered me. I finally had a machine shop make me a spacer that was machined to exactly fit my hub. If there is a gap between the hub and the spacer, a lot of shearing force is applied to the bolts everytime you stop. If there is no gap, the shearing force is applied to the big fat hub and not a tiny little bolt.

ANYWAY,

Thank you all for your posts and for making it possible for me to drive my Z again. The brake posts (#$&* bleeding) and carb posts were especially helpful.

It still looks like crap, but it runs GREAT.

It is originally blue. PO changed it to red (on the outside). I replaced a damaged door with an orange door. The hood rusted and got sandblasted primed black. The red paint is chipping (A LOT) revealing a nice grey. I have sanded and chemical stripped part of the car revealing a nice (factory?) primer brown and the original blue. Its a piece of art.

I got a license tag last week and the tag lady looked at it and asked me what color I wanted to pick for my registration. I picked red.

I will probably paint it black with some metalic flake.

Thanks again. Your posts are not in vain.

[Fun_in_my_z]

glad some one helped you. Post some pics man!