laffeaux

My smog pump is still in place, and to me not polluting the environment makes it worth it. The reduction and weight and power loss due to pulley drag is negligable. The pump does not "fool" the testing equipment into thinking that there are fewer pollutants, it actually reduces emmisions. If you're using the car as a daily driver, why not do what you can to help reduce smog? From what I've heard on another form, removing the smog pump does not really increase power, as the end of the lines still stick through into the exaust system and block exaust flow. If you want extra power the fittings on the engine need to be removed. Otherwise all you're doing is increasing pollutants.

The dash lights on my car ('71) are really dim. The bulbs are new. The brightness adjuster goes from "off" to "barely on." Could this be the fault of a bad adjustment switch? Are they hard to replace?

My late '71 (5/71 production) came with 4 screw carbs. I'm not sure when the switch to 3 screws occured, but I thought it was on '72 cars. The fun thing about the late '71s is when you order a part you never know if you need a 70-71 part or a 72 part until it shows up.

Seeing triple SUs on a Z would be kind of cool. However, I'm not sure you'd ever get a 2.4L motor to need so much air that the extra carb would help much - I guess when you were turning 8000 RPMs you could have all three carbs half open?

I have a set of Turbine style wheels for sale. They were on my 240 when I bought it, but I switched to slotted mags. The set is four 14" x 7" wheels. There is no rim damage, however there is a lot of oxidation on them. I live in the SF Bay area, and the set of four wheels (no tires included) is for sale for $150 or best offer. <img src="http://www.eandsweb.com/240/pics/PIC00001.JPG"> <img src="http://www.eandsweb.com/240/pics/PIC00003.JPG">

Thanks for all of the replies. MSA does not have any in the color that I need - they are marked "[A]" which in this case means that they are no longer made. I bought some "tan" rivets off of eBay, but they must be the tan from a 280, as they do not match my "tan" (aka Butterscotch) interior. I'm gonig to buy vinyl die and paint the rivets that I have the approvriate color.

Compared to $71,500 for the "last" Camaro, $95,000 for the first Z sounds like a great deal. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20020903/ap_on_bi_ge/last_camaro_sold_3

My first foray into Z cars was an early '71 that I bought in 1990 for $1400. The car ran great, and althought I thought I new how to look for rust, I did not. The car ended up with huge rust problems, and after a year I gave up on the car. A year later I jumped back in with an early '74 260. I spent $2000 and the car was much more dependable than the previous 240 - sure, it was less fun to drive, but rarely left me stranded (whereas the 240 left me on the side of road many times). Unfortunately, someone decided that they wanted my car and stole it one night in NYC. I never saw it again. I got away rom the Z's after that and bought and partially restored a '67 Firebird. I sold it after 5 years for about 1/3 of what I'd spent on it. Drawing from my past experiences this past summer I bought another Z. This time it's a late '71. I was looking for a car with good body and engine for about $6000. I figured I'd buy a car that someone else had already spent the money on. Well, as it turns out you can;t always get what you want. I found a car with a good body, but it needed mechanical work. In the end I'll have spent about $7000, but I'm getting a car in hte condition I wanted. What's most important? (1) a solid rust free body, (2) a complete car, so that you don't have to guess what it is you're looking for, (3) a good interior, and (4) an engine that does not blow blue smoke or leak oil.

I'll agree with your wife - you have three cars. Let her buy whatever she wants. It's her time for a car.

The emblems are not always available new. In my case they were removed for painting (by the previous owner), and the mounting tabs broke off. The emblems were in good condition otherwise. I just a bit of Silicon Glue on the backs and they have stayed on with no probelms.

I found this site via a search engine on the web. This is one of the many sites that appear while doing Datsun related searches.

The new owner may very well be a company, and not a person. I could see a Nissan Dealer paying $90K for the car just to have it in the showroom. They could use the car to draw attention to their dealership by displaying it in parades, car shows, etc. The car is easily worth $90K of advertisement value if used properly. "Come to Joe's Nissan and see the first 350Z." And while you're there you might buy a car too.

For $15,000 I'd expect something truly amazing. That car looks very nice, but $15,000???

Steve-o, What's it worth? Well, assuming it's rust-free and it is an early car, the value will increase. However since it's an automatic, a lot of buyers will not be interested. In it's current state, I'd guess you might get as much as $4000 if it ran. If it does not expect less. If it turns out that it runs like new you might get a a bit more. I was recently looking for a rust free car, and in CA you can actually find them fairly easy (or easier than I expected). The prices varied widely, from $3000-$6000 (more if it's restored). I opted for a cheaper car ($3000), knowing that I'd spend an extra $3-4 K on fixing it up. I figured it's better to get a car where I know everything is new as opposed to spending more and getting old parts that seem to work okay.

Currently I own a '71 240, however this is my third Z. early '71 240 - paid $1400 (1990) early '74 260 - paid $2000 (1993) late '71 240 - paid $3000 (2002) The first 240 ran fine and looked okay, but turned out ot be a rust bucket. The drivers side frame rail finally gave way and the engine more or less fell out onto the street. The 260 looked very good and ran great. It was not as fun as the 240, but it was more dependable. Unfrotunately someone decided to steal it from the streets of NYC and I never saw it again. I recently bought a rust-free '71 from the original owner. My budget was up to $6000, but I didn't find anything that I thought was worth that. Finally I came across this car which needed mechanical work, but otherwise had the body that I wanted. Although the car came in under budget, after spending money on carbs, tires, brakes, suspension bushings, etc., I'm going to exceed the original budget by about $1000.

The adjustment that you are talking about fine tunes the air fuel mixture. If you're trying to make your car run a bit more rich or lean then yes, that's all you do. However, theres more to it than that. A flow meter (Unisys is a particlar model) is used to balance the carbs. Since you have two carbs, you need ot make sure that they work in unison. It's possible to have too much (or too little) fuel being delivered form a carb. If your carbs are not in sync, then your engine will not perform as well. The adjustment that you describe has nothing to do with syncing the carbs - although any one adjustment effects the others. Also, if a motor is not stock there is the issue of jet size and dampning oil weight. Each can be changed to change the performance chanacteristics of the engine. For basic adjustments to a stock engine, it is pretty easy (assuming you have a flow meter).

Does anyone have extra rivets that secure the rear interior panels on a 240Z in tan? They seem to be hard to find. All of my interior panels are loose so I need quite a few. laffeaux@eandsweb.com