240k Race car - GTR tribute

[mikec(nz)]

Any more videos??

 

Bit tricky when I am driving.  Might get some at the NZ Festival of Motor racing next month. http://www.nzfmr.co.nz/ I will be racing with the Historic Muscle and Saloon Cars.

[73 crisis]

hey mike love your car and the direction you took ,

im also from nz and own a 240K =) 

i know its a very long shot but if you have any 

excess stock you wish to sell i will be very interested

no big deal if not im sure i will need to get most my 

bits from Japan  

 

anyway will be watching your progress closely 

cheers 

[mikec(nz)]

Message sent - there are a few 240K owners in NZ with parts.

[mikec(nz)]

Well car ran flawlessly at the 2016 NZ Festival of Motor racing at Hampton Downs (except for a slight incident with a not quite tight radiator cap) , sorry no videos but here are some pics.

Our new brand Helfee- Serious supplements for the not so serious - was the class sponsor (shameless self promotion http://www.helfee.co.nz), but thought I better get a photo with the Pirelli girls too.

[73 crisis]

What a machine 

 

love it more and more !!!

 

 

[mikec(nz)]

Well the Ken Meri has seen a bit of racing and with that comes a bit of wear and tear (or in laymans terms breaking stuff)

 Seems that we might have strained the old diff.  I had put a new Quaife LSD in it but left the original crown and pinion.  Well last race of the day.  We were doing handicap standing start.  I got beaten off the line by a dirty of Capri, but then the race was red flagged so we started all over again.  MIght have given it a bit more power of the line doing the launch as it made horrible noise and I quickly pulled over and it was making more horrible noises.  Thought I had snapped a wheel stubb again, but no that was not it.

 

 Yup those bits should be somewhere else

 

 Hmmm that looks a bit munted

 

 Well even I know that dont look right

 

 So we fitted the crown and pinion out of a Subaru R180 diff (quite a rare version out of 300hp Imprezza I think) - its a 4.44 ratio and much stronger.  We had to make a thin spacer plate and use the larger bolts, but other than that pretty much a straight swap.  The good news was that the Quaife LSD was sweet.  But they have a lifetime guarantee supposedly so must be pretty strong.

 So all good and off to the track again.

[mikec(nz)]

So next race day - off again with my new diff ratio and we had decided to lower the car a few inches as well

However did not really get much of a chance to find out how the diff went as first lap of practice I lost 2nd gear, there was a strannge whirrying sound.  No worries most said sounded like a shift rod had come off.

Hmmm - no

Those bits look important

So rebuilt an early Datsun Skyline shortnose 71C box with a L6 bell housing (thanks Andy for the box).

You can see below the old 71B vs the 71C in this picture and the internals are so much bigger and stronger.  Did not quite fit as the was about 20-30mm diff in the rear gearbox mount, but other than that it bolted up.  The L6 bell housing needed a minor bit of machining to fit the 71C internals.

We also Tig welded front housing, helicoiled 2x damaged threads. fitted new bearing Kit H/Duty and synchros rings and fitted input shaft dog set, 3rd/4th selector fork, 3rd/4th selector keys, 3rd/4th outer shift hub, 1st/2nd selector fork.

[mikec(nz)]

So the good news is the car has been behaving so gave it some new boots

Ordered some Wantanabe 15 x 9.5" for the back to fill out the guards.  Now I wont bore you with all the dramas of getting that right (miscommunication resulted in wrong hole spacing) and it seems Wantanabe are quite difficult to deal with and I was not 100% happy with the quality of the wheels as the material seems weak as my wheel nuts seem to be wearing into it.  So thanks to arrow wheels we got steel inserts, corrected stud spacing and them painted to all match.

Also fitted Hoosier cross ply race tyres for that 'old school - period correct look"

Much better stance and look now.  Running 245/45 x 15 hoosiers all round on 8.5 x 15 rims front and 9.5 x 15 rims rear.

The Wantanabe centre caps did not fit the rears and kept falling out the fronts so we made our own.

[mikec(nz)]

The car has always been unhappy on cool down lap, as the heat soak from the manifolds often causes it to stall.  So Dale from Coastline Automotive fabricated me a new heat shield.

So this is what Bob Sharp did with the 240Z back in the day

So I suppose that makes it a period correct part

We got an alumium one folded up and HPC coated (thanks high performance coatings Akld)

Coated the underside with heat resistant material (the headers are already wrapped in cloth)

And the finished result

Took all to the track and she ran perfectly (well almost it seems the engine may be a getting a bit tired after 30+ hours racing - so next job ......)

well actually next job is a few gauges - will post that shortly when finished.

[mikec(nz)]

Sick of guages not working and no rev counter (because we upgraded to MSD) so fitted whole new dash.

Lot more work than planned but finally all done and working properly.

 

 

[Patcon]

Is your big red light low oil pressure? Is the other red item a push to start button?

[mikec(nz)]

red light - correct for low oil pressure. red button horn (we had to retrofit as aftermarket wheel did not have horn, but needs it for road registartion).  Starts off the key like normal.