Datsun 240Z 1972 Restomod from Germany

[bartsscooterservice]

Nice find ! If you keep going this way she will be done soon for next summer

Another neighbour ! Welcome to the international datsun club..

I believe there was another guy on here from Stuttgart...

[Radeon]

Hey Mark! I'm only living for a bit over half a yearn near Stuttgart, am originally from the lake of constance in the very south of Germany!:) Thank you!:)

Hey racer47201! Wow, sehr gut dafür dass es schon so lange her ist!:O (Wow, very good regarding it was that long ago!) Thank you!:)

Hey Charles! That's actually great advice! Did not even think about it back then! Was my first engine removal ever!;) Have to change this bushing soon anyway, the gear lever is very sloppy! But are the 280ZX rotors working with any plug & play conversion? Maybe in the back? If not I would rather go the 300ZX rotor/ later model Toyota 4x4 caliper route:). I already have a km/h faceplate!:) Sean from Zstory in France makes them, he distributes them to the Zcardepot as well!;) Will look into the dash repair thread, but everything DIY I know so far is new expanding foam, filler smooth it, paint it. Leading to new cracks pretty soon. Another DIY method Romas from DWc in Lithuania  uses is the step mentiond before, then drill holes all over the dash, fibreglass resin, fibreglass a whole sheet over the dash, then again filler smooting and painting. less prone to cracks. If I find a company like justdashes.com in Germany/Europe who utilizes the "thermo-vacuum-forming-process" I'd also love to go with that, but no luck so far!

Hey Captain Obvious! Great name!:D Already got a new faceplate, see above. Thank you anyway!:)

Hey Bart! Keep in mind that all progress I'm posting right now is from the last months from April onwards! But my hope and plan is to get her running, through the German TÜV with all it's mods and back on the road early 2017. April would be amazing! Let's see if that's going to work out!:) Plan is though just barebones! So almost no interior expect dash, steering, seats and rear cage, and possibly with just the old wiring harness with some mods. Once on the street I'll tackle a complete new wiring harness and all the other loose ends!:) So you're from the Netherlands? Are you in the Datsun Europe Group in Facebook?:)  I guess you mean Tim with his orange Z!:) We're in eager contact along our builds!:)

Okay, as promised two more posts from the blog, I will now be away until Monday evening, then there will be more posts!:)

Sound deadening removal and some bits and bobs

With the help of dry ice pellets I was able to remove a bunch of the sound deadening.

Didn’t work as great as hoped though! Had 2x 6,5kg, should had opted for the 30kg package, which would have cost me the same in the long run. You always learn!

That’s what I started with:

The magic is happening!:) Always looks cool!

And what I was left with after the second attempt. Will use the heat gun method for the rest!

As a tip for someone who's going to attempt it themselves in the future: pile the dry ice and isopropyl alcohol mixture/paste on the transmission tunnle as a big iceberg first, the vertical surfaces are the toughest and the dry ice will find its way onto the floor pan area anyway!

 

Along the days before I removed some other bits and pieces, like this snakey mess of a wiring harness!:)

Also wanted to share the exhaust setup I had, looks pretty cool with the stacked pipes, but it definitely has seen better days! Will be replaced with the beautiful stainless steel full race system from Zstory, also with stacked pipes at the end! Thanks to Sean ahead of time!:) If anyone knows anything about the exhaust, and if it's something special and still worth something, even though the mufflers are shot and there's one rust hole in one pipe, let me know!:)

And whilst we’re at it, my whole set of trim pieces are for sale! The end pieces for the long and middle pieces are here as well, one is missing though, has never been on the car as I purchased her! (As always, Europe only!:) )

 

280Z Visitation

I got a special visitation on Friday (way back!;) )!

Alex was on a road trip from Ireland to Romania with his fiancee to marry her there, and had a short stay at my place!:)

All the best to you guys!:)

Okay, that's it for the next days, I'll be writing again next Monday! A great weekend to you all already!:)

All the best

Fabian

[moelk]

Nice progress Fabian!!

love the blue color!

Wish I dident sell my blue 240z : (

Just some correction regarding the km/h speedo plates, I'm the one making them an Sean sells them for me ; ) And like you said zcardepot also sells them.

Keep up the good work.

 

/Andreas 

[Patcon]

I don't remember all the hybrid brake setups. I believe there is a sticky on Hybrid Z that list most of the available setups using Nissan parts. Those rotors will probably never go on the back though. To keep proper braking ratios the fronts would have to be huge to offset those large front rotors on the rear. Let me know if you don't find the info on the brakes and I will root around. I am sure one of the other members here knows what I'm talking about and can locate it faster than me...

[bartsscooterservice]

On ‎27‎-‎10‎-‎2016 at 10:54 AM, Radeon said:

Hey Bart! Keep in mind that all progress I'm posting right now is from the last months from April onwards! But my hope and plan is to get her running, through the German TÜV with all it's mods and back on the road early 2017. April would be amazing! Let's see if that's going to work out!:) Plan is though just barebones! So almost no interior expect dash, steering, seats and rear cage, and possibly with just the old wiring harness with some mods. Once on the street I'll tackle a complete new wiring harness and all the other loose ends!:) So you're from the Netherlands? Are you in the Datsun Europe Group in Facebook?:)  I guess you mean Tim with his orange Z!:) We're in eager contact along our builds!:)

Yeah I'm curious how it's going to work out for you ! Yes Netherlands.. a village near Arnhem, close to the German border. Don't have facebook, I am just here on this international site        Yeah I guess it's Tim, don't remember his name, but saw his topic on this forum here to, and remember he came from or near Stuttgart.

[rossiz]

fantastic start - and looks like you got a good one w/a solid body. 

love it!

[munters]

Yes really a good start and nice one.

another one in Europe Cool.

Grüsse aus der Schweiz

[Radeon]

 

Hey Andreas! I'm sorry, didn't know!:O Still very happy with the quality of these, can highly recommend them!:) I'm actually still a bit unsure about the colour! I love the (original) blue, but don't want to end up with "yet another" Devil Z Replica. That's why I'm pretty sure I'll be going with anthracite. Thank you!:)

Hey Patcon! Found the thread I guess you're referring to!:) They actually mention 280zx rotors, but for a rear disk swap, which I'm sure utilizes the original rear 280zx rotors, whereas mine are pretty sure front ones!:D I think I'm going to run full stock for the first restoration iteration, maybe with some upgraded brake pads, but the once on the car are basically new, so are the rubber brake lines. Would be a shame to through them directly away.

Hey Bart! Maybe you want to come to Frankfurt am Main next year, the guys in the German Facebook Group are planning a meet then!:) This is Tim's thread!:)

Hey Rossiz! Thank you! Yeah, I got lucky! Just some work under the sheet metal under the hatch and under the windshield gasket really!

Hey Munters! Thank you!:) Where from Swiss are you exactly? I'm originally from Überlingen/Lake of Constance! And do you know Nils from Schaffhausen? You can find his progress on JDM Junkies!

Okay, next two progress posts!:)

Suspension removal and disassembly

"As I said a post before" I’m tossing the idea of completing a task till the very and and just update you guys on the progress so far!

The complete suspension components are removed quite long ago and most of it is already fully disassembled. Let’s get you up to speed!

I don’t have that many pictures, but you’ll get the point. Here’s one of the front suspension still assembled to the car, already took the brakes of though.

Aaand it’s out:

Also took a nice explosion view of the front suspension disassembled:

The rear suspension also dropped right out:

Since the axles and hubs are not yet disassembled I didn’t take a picture of the disassembly progress of the rear so far! Wasn’t able to geht the U-Joints out of the axle, and the spline in the hub was not willing to get out yet as well… Don’t really have the space for a press, but maybe the only option. Or do you guys know another great option?

And ablaze! One picture of the old bushing removal at least!

Since I’ll be going with upgraded sway bars from suspension techniques the original front sway bar is for sale! Hit me up if you’re interested (Once again for the European guys only)!:)

Engine disassembly

Right ahead on this one: I won’t fully disassemble the L24 engine. It ran great when I bought the car, no reason to fiddle with it, since I’m planning to build a performance L28 after the Z is finished but still am going to keep the L24 as a night stand or something (:D) because of the matching numbers, no reason to rebuild the L24. I will however check valve lash, but the head will pretty sure stay on the block and it will only get a clean up and fresh coat of paint. Oilpan and valve cover will get a coat of black powdercoating, the latter one in wrinkle structure.

Without further ado, here we go:

This is what I started with:

Keen eyes might have spotted the cracked area in the valve cover. If you have a spare and are located in Europe hit me up!:)

After I got rid of all the wiring and plumbing I removed the intake with the carburetors as well as the fuel lines.

Next to go was the exhaust manifold and I just took the upper coolant inlet with it:

I noticed something strange about the exhaust port on cylinder 1. Had some weird deposit in it.

As you can see, the other ports were perfectly normal.

Same thing on the exhaust manifold as well:

My worst idea was a coolant leak in the head gasket into the 1st cylinder, but I never saw white smoke from the car when I test drove it. Any ideas what it could be? And if it’s something to worry about?

I also checked the spark plugs for irregularities, but the spark plug from cylinder 1 , the one on the left, looks just like the others.

That’s as far as the engine is disassembled for now. Plan is to only remove the oilpan and valve cover for powder coating, but leave them on for now the protect the innards of the engine for now. I also think a new waterpump was installed not long ago!

If anyone’s interested, the exhaust manifold and warm air inlet thingy are for sale as well as the fuel rail setup (in Europe: ), I already ordered a full race stainless steel exhaust and manifold from Sean from Zstory!:)

 

That's it for today guys! There will be two more blog posts tomorrow, then you'll be pretty much up to speed on how far the progress on the car is so far!:)

All the best

Fabian

 

[Radeon]

That will be the last two posts that already existed on my blog, now you will be up to speed on the progress so far! Which means that the posts here will only be as frequent as I get to spent time working on the car!:)

Carburetor and inlet disassembly

Directly after I finished “disassembling” the engine I started on the carburetors. The plan is to clean them up optically as well as technically of course, rebuild them with new carb rebuild kits and yellow zinc plate all the screws, springs and linkages and so on.That’s what we’re dealing with “today”, you can still see all the plugged up holes from the EGR crap:

First I disassembled the “balancing bridge”(?) and the first bit of throttle linkage.

Then disconnected the carburetors from the inlet and removed the coolant lines. One of the heat insulating spacers wouldn’t come off. Does anyone know if the coolant lines are really necessary? Or just if you cold start in really cold weather to get the carburetors up to temperature? Seems odd to preheat the fuel/air mixture. Especially with a heat insulated spacer to avoid it… Or does it actually cool it and I’m all wrong!?:D

After the inlets were off I completely disassembled both SU carbs and the linkage and sorted it into two separated zip loc bags.

Big new parts and some rust "discoveries"

I just got a huuuge package from Belgium.

 

The rear cage from Safety Devices arrived well packaged! Thanks Frank!:)

Had to roughly put it in, need another hand and a ratched strap to get it into it’s “final” position and mock up all the support braces! Looks already great! Didn’t want to unwrap it yet though, to protect it as long as possible!:)

I really lucked out regarding rust problems on my shell, I always knew though that I should inspect the metal under the hatch closer and wanted to definitely remove it just to be sure! I sadly don’t have a proper before pic, but you can somewhat see that the metal was in great shape on first sight. Looked pretty much like that from side to side.

After I drilled out all the spotwelds (after way to many dulled out drill bits:/) I was able to lift it up and inspect the rust under it:

It’s nothing too major, and will be fixed with a few patches, no need of a completely new piece! But still very happy I went this way!

The only other rust issue I have is under the windshield gasket! Already trimmed it out a bit, but didn’t finish yet. That’s what it looked before!

I hopefully soon find a good price on a middleclass welder, so I can tackle everything that has to be welded on the chassis. Mainly those little rust repairs, sidemarker delete and a bit of engine bay shaving. As well as the rear cage brackets and I plan on reinforcing the sway bar mounts up front and connecting the frame rails.

I actually got myself a welder last week and ordered some supplies already. Think I can start learning to weld on a lot of test material by the end of the week!:)

That's it for now, as I said you're now up to date and the next updates will only come as fast or slow as I get some progress on the car!:)

All the best to you guys!

Fabian

Edited November 1, 2016 by Radeon

[disepyon]

Your extremely lucky if that is all the rust there is on that Z.  I too suffer a little of rust around the windshield frame area.  Thats a nice looking rear cage section too. 

[munters]

Ich in aus der Region Zürich.

Yes i know Nils by Email and Forums.

Actually i did read his blog before i startet my restauration and i went through all low's and high's he does now.

[Radeon]

Newest progress, parts and a "rolling chassis"!

Today’s update is about miscellaneous stuff and a “rolling chassis” at the end of the post!

I hassled for weeks with the rear spindles, they just did not wanted to come out… Heated the housings with a propane torch for several minutes and bashed on the spindle with a wooden hammer to not mangle the threads on the spindle. Just shortly before the spindle was out on the second housing the wooden hammer gave up!:D Was able to get the rest of the way out with the remainings of the hammer!:D

Already went an bought another bearing remover for the ones on the spindles, but haven’t tried it out yet! And I wasn’t able to get the bearings inside the housing  out yet.

Drum Brake Calipers removed and partly disassembled.

I also removed the sleeve of the lower control arms of the front with a handsaw.

And cut out the rusty areas. Already did some sheet metal  patches for the rusty aread as well as for the window mirror holes since I’ll be going with fender mirrors, forgot to take pictures yet though!

And since I freshly got new Vogtland lowering springs in the mail and never posted about the other new parts I already acquired I wanted to take a group picture before i put everything back into boxes to store it for the next time! There are still some new parts I acquired not showed, I may post something about them in following posts!

The majority of the time working on the car for the last times was for this bad boy. Also my first welding exercise! Now I can finally roll the chassis around and work on the body outside of the garage!:)

I also took that chance to clean up the garage quite a bit and hung the dashboard on the wall, so its finally off the ground!

Let’s see how fast I’ll be getting the body ready for paint!:)