In my opinion this parts car might be restorable though there is too much work in the whole process for me to take another car on, not even considering the expense. It might be that the frame doesn't need fixing I am no expert on them. Apparently the car was being driven with a stock 240Z engine with no problem. In the engine bay looking at the top of the driver's side (in USA) frame rail in the middle of the bay a foot or so of the frame rail appears to have been shoved over towards the engine a bit, maybe 1/4 inch or so. The passenger frame rail seems to have more dents in the vertical wall of it than what is on my good car, I am not sure how they might have gotten there. Also, the front left flat area that the hood hinge is bolted to has wrinkles in it seemingly indicating that the car was hit in the front left and then the metal was flattened out. There is some evidence the left radiator support was pulled out in that left hood hinge area but not extensively so.

I will post pictures later.

Edited August 12, 201311 yr by Mikes Z car

Frame rails some pictures with straight edges:

Driver's side bottom of rail pushed toward fender:

Driver's side frame rail fairly straight looking straight down:

Passenger side frame rail (bowed) with straight edge:

Left front bumper mount (?) torn metal:

Patcon, can this type of damage be fixed?

The drivers side frame rail would probably be a hard fix. The bowed frame could probably be pulled by a good frame shop. We buy a good many salvage cars and rework them. We have a frame guy that is amazing. It would be interesting to show those pictures to a good frame man in your area to see what they think. If I were going to do it myself I would replace the front frame rails or front clip entirely. If the car is really clean every where else it might be worth it, otherwise use what you can and recycle the rest. I just hate to see a Z that isn't all eaten up with rust get scrapped, but they can't all be saved.

Charles

Yes I feel the same way I hate to see a Z get scrapped that isn't all that bad rust wise, hence the decision to save everything if I can. If a Z was abandoned in a field near here I would consider sneaking over and spraying it with some anti corrosion material in the critical spots. Fortunately I know someone who has cut up a car. I will need to know where to cut to save the rear quarter panels and other sheet metal parts to maximize their usefulness. When I get further along with this I might have to start a new thread to get that info. Sorta reminds me of that cow you might have seen that has lines drawn on it for the different cuts such as rib eye, T bone etc. except in this case the cow would be a Z.

If I were gonna do it. I would drill out the spots at the rear apron to the quarter panel and cut through the floor to separate the quarters and the rear apron from each other. I would separate the floors from the rockers by drilling those spots as well. Separate the front clip in the same way or just cut it off since it is damaged. My 2 cents...

Charles

I will try that, thanks.