stock head for a '72?

[clutchdust]

so i'm getting ready to pull the head and check out those valves but i thought i would call a Z shop and get some pricing on some of the parts. they told me they needed a code off the head. now, i don't remember where but i thought i heard that the early cars had iron heads. this one is aluminum. the code on the head is E88. is this the head that is supposed to be on this engine? does anybody know of a good site for replacement parts? does this site have any supporting vendors?

i also have an unrelated question about the rear end. is there a HD unit for these cars? what year(s) have such a unit and how do you identify them? are these cars 'posi'?

[Mudge]

The E88 was on the early 240Z and 260Z cars according to the head/cam spreadsheet I have, with the E31 being the first head used.

No, the cars have no limited slip by default. There are upgrades to R160/180/200 LSD though, but its not a 100% straightforward process, nor is it that easy finding the parts.

[clutchdust]

thanks for the reply. does that mean i can order the '72 valves for this head and they should be the same? i mean, what is listed in the parts house books for a '72 will be correct for this head. right?

i'm really surprised an IRS is not posi (limited slip). is there another third member commonly substituted for the factory one that is posi and how difficult would such a swap be?

[Mudge]

Difficulty depends on several factors, I'm in the middle of an R200 LSD swap and ran into a few hiccups, just finding the parts to complete the setup can be a bear in itself.

R160 LSD from a Subaru supposedly plugs right in, with only the diff being used, if you have a 71 or earlier though the 72+ housing location is different, I dont know if the front Xmember is different but the moustache and transverse link I belive are both shaped differently (boy I use that word alot) to locate the rear a tad further back to get rid of a wear problem that they apperantly didn't catch earlier. If you want to put power down though the R160 may not be the way to go.

R200 can be found in 3.70 LSD ratio, but I hear all too often "I saw the car arrive that day, so I went back the next day with my tools to get it and it was gone"... There is also a Quaiffe unit, guess how much they go for, $1200-$1600 from what I've seen, thats enough to buy an aftermarket beefed up 12bolt or 9" for a heavy american car, not just a limited slip unit, ouch.

There is also the R230 which requires an adapter for the CV joints, otherwise mostly plug in, other than grinding needing to be done in the finned rear cover, I believe that covers that one. Those are found on the Inifinity Q45 and not sure what else.

Then there is the C4 Vette rear end, which would be nice, usually $600-$800 but come with kind of a crappy gear ratio, gear swaps are a pain I hear and $$$ if you pay a shop ($500ish), plus cost of the gears and whatever else is needed tool wise that you dont already have.

Yes it is a bit supprising, but with such little power I guess they felt like it was ok. BTW, it is generally aknowleged that Japan didn't think Americans gave a flying hoot about a sports car anyway, so we didn't get the FIA stuff like Europe and Japan did, and the racers in the states had a bear of a time gettin any support from Nissan for a long time (so I've read), because they just thought we were ignorant fat slobs and didn't care about real racing, plus many within Nissan didn't care about racing, and only had a few real supporters from within.

[Mudge]

You can open this file with Internet Explorer (after you unzip it), I forget where it came from on the net.

Some people weld the diff for a locker style setup, but as a road kinda guy thats not my flavor, and I dont really know what it entails.

rear end swaps for 240z\'s.zip

[HS30-H]

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QUOTE: BTW, it is generally aknowleged that Japan didn't think Americans gave a flying hoot about a sports car anyway, so we didn't get the FIA stuff like Europe and Japan did, and the racers in the states had a bear of a time gettin any support from Nissan for a long time (so I've read), because they just thought we were ignorant fat slobs and didn't care about real racing, plus many within Nissan didn't care about racing, and only had a few real supporters from within.UNQUOTE.

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Whew, thats a bit strong Mudge.

I think its true to say that the USA-market spec. S30-series cars were a slightly less "sporty" specification than the rest of the world got, but please don't think it was ever easy to get the Sports Option / race parts from Japan over here in Europe either. The only place it was all really easily available was in Japan.

The USA market model "HLS30" had only the four-speed trans and rather low ratio rear end ( with no other choices offered ) and no rear anti-roll / sway bar. You can probably blame this on Yutaka Katayama; as it was ultimately his decision to make the USA / North American market cars to this specification. I honestly would not imagine that anyone at Nissan really DID think that Americans were "ignorant fat slobs" - so I think its probably not fair to attribute this kind of comment to them..............

Its a strange dichotomy that Katayama was one of the main forces within the USA arm of Nissan who was promoting the support of private race teams in the USA and Canada, while at the same time he decided that the USA / North American market cars would be arguably less sophisticated than the cars that the rest of the world got access to. In the end, he was probably right to do this. Nissan had supported American racers with parts and parts development ( a two way street ) since the mid Sixties, and no other countries apart from Japan got a setup like Datsun Competition in the USA. Compared to the rest of the world ( outside Japan ), the USA actually had a rather good slice of support from Nissan in relation to motorsports . Did you know that the prices for the Datsun Competition parts sold in the USA were deliberately priced DOWN for the local market? If you wanted to buy those same parts in Japan ( where most of them were made ) they would cost proportionately MORE. In my book, that's what I call good support.

If the USA / North American market bore any similarity to other markets ( I'm particularly thinking about the UK market here ) then it was probably down to the ignorance / apathy of individual dealerships that could not be bothered to help racers or sports-minded drivers of Nissan product. The parts were out there if the dealers could be bothered to get them in. How many times have you heard stories of people asking Nissan dealers for sports option or competition-related parts, only to be told that the Factory "does not make them" or that they cannot get them? This obstructiveness has got to be blamed on individual dealerships, not the Factory in Japan.

In truth stuff like LSD units, brake upgrades, all sorts of transmission upgrades and engine performance increasing parts were ALWAYS available from Datsun Competition in the USA. Clutchdust is looking for an LSD unit for an R180 diff. - which Nissan still sell, but he might find prohibitively expensive. This is why so many people go looking for interchange parts that they can get a lot cheaper ( and naturally so ). My point here is that Nissan DOES make the parts, and they are available from other companies in the aftermarket too. Its just a question of price ( ouch! ), and a little bit of proactive thinking. A brand new LSD for just about any non-American car is the USA is going to be expensive in comparison to domestic product. Unfortunately, its quite often the Japanese parts that are the most expensive. Its just an economic fact.

I've been through several R180 LSD-equipped diffs. over the years ( even used a 4.875 on the street for a while, which was quite funny around town but pretty tedious on long-haul journeys ). I'm now using R200's that I bring in from Japan, and are already equipped with LSD units and nice gear ratios ( 3.9, 4.1, 4.375 and 4.6 are still quite common over there ). They are quite expensive, and its a long way to transport them - but you do get a great condition unit, and they are stronger, cheaper and more common than the equivalent R180. I can't understand why more people don't take the option of getting them from Japan ( and surely they have to be cheaper to transport to the USA than to the UK? ). I suppose that if no company is already doing this, it must mean that the market in the USA is not willing to pay what they would cost?

In Japan, Nissan has always been seen as THE company that supported racing and sports driving. They were head and shoulders above all the other Japanese car producers in this respect. This has only changed very recently, and it is a very sad fact that Nissan has virtually stopped race-proving its product on the world stage. Compare this situation to the one at Toyota. It seems that Nissan are now happy to let the aftermarket produce parts for the sporty / race driver. Its probably a sign of the times.

Regards,

Alan T.

[clutchdust]

one thing about the LSDs. if i can find one that's drop in, i'll likely go that way. if i have to do any fabricating to make something work, i'm not putting an import diff in there. i see corvette dana 36 and dana 44s on the corvette forum pretty frequently. i really wanted to buy one from this guy as a backup for mine. dana 44 all aluminum housing for $250. i really wanted to buy it but the guy lives in florida and i'm in vegas. it would have cost me as much to ship it as to buy it. the nice thing about the dana is i know i WILL NOT break it. i'd break the car before i'd break one of these diffs. the other nice thing is the dana 44 and c-4 dana 36s are all aluminum housings, they only weigh 75# fully assembled. might look at those infiniti and suby third members though.

back to the head issue. do you guys buy your parts locally or are there any good mail-order/national parts house that specializes in the Z? i'm wondering why i don't see a supporting vendor menu that might have required parts. i only see 'restoration' stores advertising interior and body parts. the other question i had was when i pull this head off, do you think having it milled will result in any significant compression change? how will that affect the cam chain and cam timing?

[Zedrally]

Originally posted by clutchdust

major snip

how will that affect the cam chain and cam timing?

Didn't we discuss this issue last week in one of you're first questions?

In any case,

Any slack will be taken up by the tensioner.

If you mill the head make sure you use shims on the cam towers to restore the geometry.

MN

[Mudge]

Originally posted by HS30-H

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I think its true to say that the USA-market spec. S30-series cars were a slightly less "sporty" specification than the rest of the world got, but please don't think it was ever easy to get the Sports Option / race parts from Japan over here in Europe either. The only place it was all really easily available was in Japan.

Thanks for the post Alan!

The article I read was some years ago, from an American SCCA racer, as for the accurateness who knows. He basically said he was put off at every attempt to get any kind of support, or help from Nissan until maybe 72 or 73 I think he said.

I unfortunately found out that my R200 that I was told was LSD, is not. It is a 3.90 open diff, I only payed $150 for the rear, rubber mount and driveshaft so I'm not really PO'd, just dissapointed. Shucks

clutchdust, there is at least one site entailing the C4 IRS swap, and its not exactly plug and play, but it can be done. You dont just want the center section though, so you would probably be much better off buying the whole assembly if you can find it, and I haven't seen them for under $600 but maybe they are dropping now. That would be great to run, stronger yet lighter. Another issue is it will put you with 4 lug rear wheels, which means the fronts wont look quite right, but oh well.

http://www.turbobuicks.com/members/scottiegnz/vette-irs-swap.htm

[Mudge]

Originally posted by Zedrally

Didn't we discuss this issue last week in one of you're first questions?

In any case,

Any slack will be taken up by the tensioner.

If you mill the head make sure you use shims on the cam towers to restore the geometry.

MN

Why are people just not removing a link or two from the side without the "bright" marks on the chain?

[Zedrally]

Originally posted by Mudge

Why are people just not removing a link or two from the side without the "bright" marks on the chain?

If you need to remove a link, then may I suggest that you REALLY need a new chain!

I mean that's a huge amount of stretch.

It wouldn't be possible to mill that amount off the head and have it remain servicable either.

[Mudge]

Mike, it was of course with the purpose of getting some of the slack out of the chain, not for keeping an old chain.