Matt, the L-jet is primitive and borderline-scary, but to me it's a thing of beauty, once cleaned up. Eye of the beholder, I guess. (BTW, that's a ZX engine bay -- not as pretty as the 280Z bays, IMO.)

Edited April 19, 201212 yr by FastWoman

Engine bay patina...

It took 42 years to get this look!

Loving the engine bay shots!!!

I am envious of the 240z, so much less **** running everywhere. My 77 has crap going all over the place. My engine bay looks like poop. When I pull the N/A motor for the turbo swap I am going to sand it all down and repaint it the OE color code before I slide in the new engine. I have a non egr intake for the Turbo motor, this should help clean things up. I plan on buffing the raised portion of my turbo valve cover and wrinkle coating the rest. Probably wrinkle coat the intercooler pipes as well.

Here's a few of mine.

Mike.

After looking at this engines compartments and looking at my Z and 510 engine bays , looks like this weekend will be dedicated to detailing both . I admire the dedication that you guys put in your cars/toys,this validates my passion . Thanks for sharing...........

The before photos is what it looked like after sitting in the back of the garage for 26 years, a mixture of primer over spray and plenty of dust.

Some shiney parts, can't have enough of these.

After installing the shiney bits with a flash then in the sun. I need a better camera after seeing some of the above. The engine needs to be removed for further detailing of the bay, paint the engine block, ceramic coat the headers etc...

Bonzi Lon

Looks like they loaded backward, you get the idea.

My 1976 all original 280 with many years of cleaning to remove the Ziebart undercoating, it was sprayed all over the inside of the engine bay. The engine was not removed for cleaning.

Late to the party....but here's a few.

Edited April 20, 201212 yr by mally002

Michael,

I also had the Ziebart dilemma. I am the original owner of my car and had Ziebart applied right after I purchased it as there was no such thing as factory rust proofing back then. The Ziebart has been a blessing and a curse. A blessing because it is probably the single biggest reason that I have such little rust on te car today. A curse as it was sprayed everywhere on the car including the entire engine compartment and it was not a joy to clean up (as you know). Even with all of the effort to clean my engine bay, I stilll periodically find spots that I have missed and have to go back and clean them up.

As an FYI, I have found that the citrus based version of Goo Gone does a great job or softening and removing the Ziebart without harming the paint. I have let this stuff sit overnight on some hard to remove areas and it does a good job without hurting the paint underneath. Beware of other removers though such as Goof Off which is much more caustic and will eat into your paint. Unfortunately I found that out the hard way.

You can get a large spray bottle of Pro Power Goo Gone at Home Depot which is thicker than the normal stuff and I have found that this works the best. Already on my second quart.

Mike.

Mike, I started my cleaning over 30 years ago and used WD40 back then it can and has done some damage to the paint. thanks for the tip. I haven't do much cleaning on the painted area of late.

Late to the party....but here's a few.

Mally002......Did you ever sell that car? It's nice! Guy