Steam Powered Z???

[Captain Obvious]

i'm still ahead. wait - is that a pun??

No, Not a Pun. It's a Palindrome!

Glad to hear that the head condition didn't ruin your day. I guess I just take stuff like that harder. When I buy cheap used from a junkyard untested, I takes my chances. But when I pay good money for something that's supposed to be rebuilt, tested, and drop in ready? I expect more.

Back to the job at hand... A question for the collective. What's the consensus of Felpro head gaskets for the Z? Are they a good choice, or are there better options?

[djwarner]

I suffered an oil leak between #3 and #4 since acquiring the car. When I went to replace the head gasket, I bought a Felpro gasket only to discover after pulling the head that the car already had a Felpro gasket that looked every bit as good as the new one. So I went ahead and installed the new one. A leak in exactly the same place returned. Neither one had and gasket shellac or other sealant added during the installation.

Learned from another member who had exactly the same problem with Felpro that Nismo has an OEM gasket that solved the problem. The difference concerns the oil passage to feed the head. The Felpro has an additional line of soft rubber around the opening that is supposed to aid sealing. The Nismo gasket had a crushable copper grommet in this location. I measured the height of the rubber ring on the Felpro after I pulled it. It measured just about 0.001" high. The new Nismo head gasket crush ring measured 0.012" before installation. The Nismo gasket fixed my oil leak.

Also, the Nismo Gasket had much less extra material beyond where it was needed. This means that clamping forces were spread over fewer square inches of gasket material and hence had more clamping force per square inch.

All this said, the Nismo gasket was something like 8 times the price and at last check Nissan Sports only had like 43 left. From what I've seen on the internet, it appears the Nismo gasket was made by Ishino. I've seen Ishino gaskets for sale closer to Felpro prices rather than Nismo.

After pulling the head twice and paying the Nismo price in the end, buying the Nismo gasket first would have been the more economical solution.

[240260280z]

No, Not a Pun. It's a Palindrome!

Back to the job at hand... A question for the collective. What's the consensus of Felpro head gaskets for the Z? Are they a good choice, or are there better options?

I installed ~5 with no problems.

[S30Driver]

Rossiz - Any progress on getting your new head installed, back on the road, and converting away from steam power and back to gas.

Also, check your notifications - you have a pm.

[rossiz]

@ S30 - thanks for the pm, i just responded

making progress, in between traveling and entertaining house guests...

finally got the head installed - chased my tail for a day dealing with timing, but got it sorted eventually.

i had wedged the timing chain with a piece of wood, but didn't realize that the chain tensioner was so far down past the inward curve of the chain, so my piece of wood wasn't actually pushing on it and the chain dropped down a little and the bright links lost their orientation with the timing marks. i spent the better part of an afternoon trying to fiddle the chain around because i was stuck on re-orienting the bright links. a few frustrating hours later i took a break, had a bite to eat and a glass of water, put band-aids on my now scuffed up knuckles, and realized that the bright links weren't really necessary anyway... i had read the chapters re: engine assembly/valve timing so many times that i had fixated on those links and finally figured i'd just time the thing like any other engine: set #1 to tdc (head off, piston at top, timing mark on pulley at 0 with pointer) and set camshaft with lobes out, dowel at the mark in the thrust washer at the side of cam tower #1.

simple.

done.

slathered the cam in oil/zinc additive, oiled chain, torqued up the head, valve cover on, back to work on the manifold side. got the header on, intake manifold installed, buttoned up hoses/wires, getting close now.

need to hook up fuel on the drivers side of the engine and then focus on the exhaust. going to make up a new 2 1/2" system from the header back, with a resonator in the tunnel and a round muffler at the end. saved my old muffler and grafted on the msa adaptor and will try to jimmy it onto the end of the header just so i can drive to the muffler shop without shooting flames down the street...

will post up a couple of pics later.

[S30Driver]

Sounds like things are coming together beautifully. No more steam power - back to gas.

Thanks for the pm.

[Zed Head]

dowel at the mark in the thrust washer at the side of cam tower #1.

simple.

done.

You didn't mention the notch and groove. I think that's the best verification, for a stock cam anyway. It takes timing chain wear in to account.

[rossiz]

sorry, forgot to mention the notch/groove - used the dowel to get it in the neighborhood, the notch groove were exactly lined up on the #1 cam hole setup.

will check again after initial break-in when i re-set the lash hot.

[rossiz]

been busy the past couple of days getting things buttoned up.

head on:

header going on:

intake manifold egr plenum filled:

the msa header fit perfectly - had to remove the heat shields in front of the break masters to get it in place, think i'll leave them off because i like the cleaner engine bay and i'm hoping the headers will run cooler than the manifold.

put on the intake manifold and discovered one of the two center large bolt holes in the head was stripped out - i spent a bunch of time repairing the stud holes and missed that one... fortunately i was able to run a tap in and use a longer bolt which grabbed a bunch of new threads in deeper - got it torqued up fine and she's good to go. hooked up all the linkage, hoses, wires, etc., then filled up the radiator w/coolant and gave the starter a spin...

it sounds a little like an old pickup truck because the exhaust consists of a 6-1 header connected to... nuthin i've got an idea to just scab on the muffler right to the header to get me to the exhaust shop without shooting flames through the streets of seattle.

funny thing is, it started right up, ran for about a minute, then died on me and wouldn't fire up again. i checked the plugs and they were perfectly clean and dry, got big fat sparks from all of them, put xmas lights on all the injectors and they are definitely firing, but now i can't get it to start for anything. it spins and spins, sort of "trying" to start, but only lights up for a few fires at a time. i pulled all the plugs after trying to start it for quite some time and they were black, sooty, a couple of them wet. spun it over w/out plugs to blow out the cylinders, wiped off the plugs and put 'em back in and got a promising "mini-start" then back to the same thing. i've checked and re-checked the connections going to the sensors at the thermostat housing and tried pulling the connections off the cold-start and aux air valve but no love.

any ideas??

[240260280z]

Check for +12V to the coil with the key in the start and the on position.

Strange it ran for 1 min then the plugs fouled out. That seems like too much fuel or bad spark.

Also make sure the fuel pump is running. i think your 78 has a pressure switch on the oil sensor.

btw are you getting oil up in the head when winding just the starter?

Run it for a good 20min straight at 2000 rpm once you get it going.

[S30Driver]

Double check that your connections at the thermostat housing for the CTS & Thermotime are not switched around. Should be something simple you have missed in any case.

Glad your intake bolt issue worked out. When your all done, you should do a write up on the issues your found on the rebuild head.

Might help someone making a decision in the future.

Edited July 23, 2014 by S30Driver

[FastWoman]

Very nice! I really like the look of the headers showing through where the intake webbing has been removed. Purty!

Yeah, when there's a super rich condition, it's usually the CTS at fault.