Anyone Know? Nissan Restorations

[Carl Beck]

Found it on eBay. 1971 burnt orange. Gorgeous. Some of the paper work it came with I think mentioned it being one of 42 or 43 in the program before it was shut down.

Interesting - how long ago did you find one on E-Bay?

There were about 59 240Z's purchased for the Program - several were "Parts Cars" that had blown engines. When the Program was shut down - there were about three complete shells, still waiting in the body shops.

37 {Thirty Seven} 240Z's were completed for the Vintage Z Program. The VIN numbers are listed on the Z Car Home Page's - Vintage Z Register.

http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/showthread.php?8106-Anyone-Know-Nissan-Restorations

At this point we have about 80% of them found and registered there.

Do you know what the VIN is for the car you bought your Father?

FWIW,

Carl B.

[26th-Z]

Nissan did use a "consistent" model. All Vintage Zs produced were HLS30s. There is no such thing as "series 1", "series 2", etc. from Nissan's point of view. That is a terminology peculiar to the American user market. Similar to the terminology "factory restoration" which is why I did all the research back in 2004 - 2005. In 1997 there was no shortage of acceptable restoration examples. In fact there were body shells left over when the program ended. I know people who bought them. Marc Jones - Datsun Alley was one of the restoration shops Nissan USA used.

Coincidently, the April issue of Old Timer magazine has an article on HLS30-13018; a Vintage Z / Z Store car in Japan.

[tlorber]

I guess what I'm saying is that, in my search for parts to repair my car, it has become apparent that there are quite a bit of parts that will NOT interchange among what "we" call series 1 and series 3 cars. In reading the article it appeared that Nissan had a tough time sourcing the parts-to the point that they had to have them remanufactured. Using different models means they had to repop that many more parts (e.g. center consoles, bumpers, instruments etc.) than they would have had to use with just one model.

Here in So Cal, finding salvagable Z bodies does not appear terribly difficult given enough time and patience.

[26th-Z]

Yes, I know what you mean. Serious Series One parts are seriously difficult to find from my own Series One point of view. The series description we (knowledgable American enthusiasts) refer to is quite convenient, actually. But do keep in mind that it is a description peculiar to what was imported into America and is not consistant with domestic market models and models exported to other parts of the world.

I recall talking to Pierre about the Vintage Z program when he commented that if Nissan wanted to do 200 cars that he would need 200 sets of tail light lenses, an impossibility at the time. Part differences are also characteristic of the Vintage Z "restorations". In fact several cars were not restored with their original engines.

Most of the restoration candidate cars were purchased in the So Cal - Arizona area and were in pretty good shape. I have heard stories of people offering their cars to the program. I think in all cases, the body shells were sandblasted. There has been some criticism about the quality of bodywork for the Vintage Zs. What few people realize is that during the period of time that the cars were being built (May 1997 - October 1998) So Cal experienced abnormally high rainfall. Most of the body shops filled up with collision work and the focus was shifted away from the Vintage Zs. Dozens of body shops were involved in the program.