FastWoman

OK, more realistic -- If the car is a daily driver in fairly perfect condition, it may be worth in the low teens -- maybe up to $14k. If it's in very nice, but not perfect condition, it might be worth $6-8k. Rough condition could be anything from $500 to $1500, depending on the part of the country. So there's quite a range of values in these cars. Rusted exhaust: You're not going to find the OEM exhaust components, so you're going to have to retrofit some sort of aftermarket (and therefore performance) exhaust. I used MotorSport Auto's aluminized premium exhaust with a Magnaflow 4" muffler inserted at mid-pipe. It's a fairly tame, well-behaved configuration of exhaust that I feel comfortable recommending. Other performance mods: Hey, do whatever you like, as others have said. Enjoy the car. If you are worried about preservation of value, then focus on non-destructive mods. For instance, if you cut a hole in the hood and put a big air-inductance scoop there, someone would have to replace the hood to put it back to its OEM state. That would be a destructive mod. Different wheels/tires are another matter, as they can be put back to OEM by pulling the aftermarket and mounting up the originals. When asking what mods are destructive vs. nondestructive, you have to ask yourself what sort of effort would be required to restore the car to its OEM state. There seems to be a bifurcation point that determines the trajectory of the car. If it's OEM down the line, then maybe it can be kept that way. A frame-up restored, 100% original car that is never driven (always trailered), with factory tags, etc., can be quite valuable, at least for a historic year (like an early VIN 1970 240Z). Others of us have mildly modified cars that will never command this sort of premium, but for which the mods actually do ADD value. Bottom line, though: Just enjoy the car, whatever that means for you and your wife. Although *I* feel it will eventually have more value, it's never going to be a Duesenberg.

zKars, I regret I'm a bit (or maybe more than just a bit) dyslexic! "Dyslexics of the world, UNTIE!" ...anon

EVERYTHING that Kcars said! However, I'll just throw in a couple of other items: Pull off your cap and rotor, and try rotating your distributor's breaker plate by hand. It should rotate smoothly, without binding, and it should be under spring tension. The mechanism often rusts and/or falls apart and gets stuck in some random position of advance. I doubt whether that could result in problems as extreme as you're describing, but it might be part of the overall picture -- quick to check. Another part of the picture could be the valve lash. You say you tried adjusting it, but you couldn't get it right. To me that's a big red flag. WHY couldn't you get the valve lash right? (It's just an adjustment, after all.) Perhaps your valves are sticking? I'd suggest doing a compression test. You'll find out very quickly whether that's the case. Possible reasons for valves hanging are: They're bent. They're rusty. They're gooped up in varnish. You can address the latter problem with a solvent like SeaFoam, but the head might have to come off if it's either of the former two. It's tempting to think of this as a single problem, but on an old car that's probably seen lots of neglect in its life, MULTIPLE problems are more typical.

Thanks, guys! Well, I guess I'll drive the car a few hundred miles and see how it goes. Rob, I've not tried that technique, but it sounds good. I have a check-valve bleeder that does almost that, except the fluid doesn't re-enter. I do the last couple of squirts by having someone depress the pedal for me while I burp the bleeder plug.

Well, I've bled my brakes with my fancy MityVac. The verdict? I didn't think it did as good a job as an assistant and a manual opening/closing of the bleeder screw. Anyway, my brakes work, and I can stand the car on its nose, but the pedal is still somewhat soft. The pedal travels maybe 2", making a light wheezing noise as it travels. Of course the brake shoes are not perfectly shaped to the drum yet. They have a VERY smaller diameter than the drum, so I imagine the rear cylinder travels just a bit further for now. Would that make the brakes somewhat spongy? Any thoughts? Buy more brake fluid, and do it again?

Put clean paper or cardboard underneath all your braking components, start your engine, stand on the brakes, read a paper while you're doing that, and then 30 min later, see if you have a drip anywhere? You can of course remove your drums, put pieces of paper underneath the wheel cylinders, and reinstall the drums for this test.

Well, that's true. However, the fluid had disappeared over maybe 2000 mi. I suppose I might have explored more, but as far as I could ascertain from the PO, the brakes had been "maintained" (replacing a part here or there), but the hydraulics were at least 15 years old for the most part, without the benefit of regular use at various points in their life. So a light had already gone off in my head when I first bought the car that a brake rebuild would probably lie not far down the road. In fact I was tempted when I first got the car to tear into the brakes, but the car seemed to stop fine, and the engine was begging a bit harder for my attention.

Like Escanlon said, yes, it will work fine. In fact it will work better than just a speaker. Look for an equalizer/amplifier with "surround sound" effects, like this preamplifier has: http://notebooknerds.com/sony-xdp-u50d-digital-car-stereo-pre-amplifier-customize-sound-from-your-cars-audio-system/ That will give the monaural sound a certain "liveliness" that will simulate stereo/quad. And THAT is probably as much as you can make out of a low-power monaural output. (Just to be clear, you need an amp, not a pre-amp, so you have to keep looking. This unit won't do what you need. I just has the effects you need.)

Captain, all I can point to is one rather corroded cylinder. Maybe that was the smoking gun. I have no idea how long the fluid was leaking. I usually check the fluids with every oil change, but perhaps not reliably enough. I don't think the twisted-up brake line that I replaced was leaking. Anyway, in my experience, when there's a leak, even a slow one, it's brake rebuilding time. There's usually lots of stuff like I found. In the end, I straightened out one corroded cylinder, two corroded calipers (one of which wasn't really all that old), old brake fluid that needed flushing, some brake hoses that might have been past their prime, and some rusted-solid emergency brake mechanisms. I may have one master cylinder to go. I finally got my MityVac today, so I'll do my final bleed tomorrow. I wasn't aggressive with the first bleed, because I didn't want to screw up my master cylinder. I might not have been successful in that regard. We'll see...

^^^^ What Dave said! He forgot to mention the best part -- that it's absolutely free, provided by another Z enthusiast. And if you want to feel especially cool, search out a printed copy of the FSM on eBay or Amazon. You'll pay about $80 for a gently used copy or less for a copy like mine. As with heavily used textbooks, a rough copy is often sprinkled with helpful notes. Mine even has helpful articles stapled into the pages. I got mine for $25. The downloaded version is also helpful, BTW. I can consult that while sitting at my computer. The paper copy is for spreading out in my work area in the garage.

IF you can't hold fuel pressure after you've shut off the ignition, it could be the check valve in the fuel pump, but it could also be worn/crudded-up/dribbly injectors, which would be consistent with your initial concerns (spark plugs all looking very different). I'd say if you drop 10 psi over 10 min (just grabbing numbers here), you've got a significant leak. It could be from the fuel rail into the intake manifold, or it could be from the fuel rail back to the tank -- or both.

I don't think I tested my compression until well after I adjusted the valve lash. (I had misplaced my gauge.) However, when I did eventually test my compression (approx 185 +/- 5, straight across), it was indeed with the throttle open. But this is a valid point. Toti, was your throttle propped open for the test? (A closed throttle is a common error.) If not, your pressures might be reading a bit low, although that certainly wouldn't account for the one cylinder that's off.

If your connectors otherwise look good, which I doubt, you can bend new clips out of small paperclip wire. If you decide to replace them, f0rrest on eBay sells nice sets. You might want to do ALL of your connectors, especially the ones on the front of the engine (thermotime and coolant temp sensor). There's a total of 10, but you might want to get an 11th one to have on hand for testing purposes. By "no power past 3000," do you mean the engine won't rev past that point? If so, it sounds like a problem with your throttle position sensor or its connector. Running OK on startup and then running worse on warm-up sounds like a lean-running condition. When your engine is cold, the mixture is enriched, and then when it warms up, the mixture is leaned out. The good news is that your coolant temp sensor is probably doing something to make that happen. It might still be off, though. You need to measure its resistance. You can tell the most about what's going on, electrically, by pulling off the ECU connector and going through all the electrical tests laid out in the FSM. They have a great diagnostic guide.

Yeah, definitely adjust your valve lash. That could be the problem. FAIW, my 280 was 100% dealer serviced for the 15 years prior to my owning it, and I had a few valves that were too tight. I don't know whether that comes from too infrequently adjusted valve lash (i.e. not keeping up with valve seat wear), or whether it comes from too aggressive adjustments in an ill-motivated attempt to completely silence the clicky tappets.

I think beerman's onto something. Feed the output of the radio into both the L and R channels of a booster/equalizer doobob. Here's the thing: SOME of them have pseudo surround -- basically a button you can hit to introduce some very minor reverb that will give the sound some pseudo-stereo "presence." You can output to 4 speakers (2 up under the dash). Because you're not actually loading the radio (much), the sound will be somewhat less crappy/distorted than if you were driving a speaker. Yeah, that's what I'd do (if preserving the original radio is important, that is).

Well, if it's crusty fusible links, you certainly wouldn't be the first to have this problem! There are 6 altogether on the '78. Two of them, both for the ECU if I recall correctly, are clipped to the side of the black relay housing. You can check all of these fusible links very easily by setting your multimeter to the voltage scale, touching the negative (black) probe to ground (or negative terminal of battery) and the red probe to each connector on each fusible link. You should read the battery voltage (approx 12.5V) at each connector. If any of them read +12V on one side and 0 on the other, the fusible link is bad. If you don't get +12V anywhere, then the connection between the (+) battery post connector and the fusible link assemblies is bad, most likely due to corrosion around the end of the wire nearest the battery post. The next possible failure point is the ignition switch. You might have +12 to the switch, but if the internal contacts of the switch are bad, you won't be able to crank the engine. Do your headlights work? they don't depend on the ignition switch or any relay -- only a fusible link and a couple of fuses in the main fuse panel.

Horsemann, this isn't really much different from pulling a small vacuum hose to see whether the idle picks up or drops. The only difference is that you're introducing unmetered air via the power booster, rather than through a hose fitting. The attractive thing about this test is that it's so easy and so broadly applicable. It's also fairly subtle. However, the cold idle enrichment caused about a 200 rpm blip in idle when I pumped the brakes, which is readable enough. @siteunseen: Er... I guess I should have said "while sitting in the driver's seat with the engine running, PARKED," rather than "while driving!!!"

Hmmmm... Zed has an interesting thought/observation there! Failing that, I've had luck with the Standard Ignition injectors sold on eBay for about $150 for the set. (I'm a bit "po" myself, so I can sympathize.)

Thanks, Steve! Yeah, wait a while longer before you decide to be impressed. That fitting might end up having a slow leak. If it does, I can always just buy another 30" line with fittings and leave it long-ish (by about 5"). I suppose I can make a loop in it to take up the extra length. Or maybe I can find a 25" brake line somewhere. Fingers crossed!

Sounds like an awsome car, Gnosez! OK, here's my ONLY suggestion of an evil act of molestation: Anything done to alter a car OF HISTORICAL SIGNIFICANCE from its historically significant state. That can include putting huge fender flares on a 240 that rode the first boat from Japan, or it can include filling the bullet holes in Bonnie and Clyde's car and giving it a nice paint job. Very few of our Z's have that sort of significance! I personally believe there's some inherent obligation for someone, somewhere, to maintain historically accurate representations of sufficiently rare vehicles, so to slap a Chevy 350 in even a later model Auburn 851 or 852 speedster would also be an abomination, especially considering those cars were so much about the engine. Our Z's haven't reached that state of rarity yet. Maybe another 50 years from now they will be rare indeed, and the survivors, happily, will be the most unmolested concourse show cars that get trailered around to shows and put to bed every night in climate controlled garages with spotless epoxy floors.

So I was testing my newly rebuilt brakes, pumping them repeatedly (testing pedal travel), and noticed that the RPMs took a brief hop everytime I applied the brakes and then released them. Then as the engine warmed up, no more hop. Of course when the engine is cold, it runs rich, so a tiny bit more air through the brake booster line helps burn the excess fuel, raising the idle briefly. When the engine warms up, the ratio leans out to the correct mix, and a bit more air really has no effect on idle speed, so the idle doesn't hop when the brake is applied and then released. If my ratio were too lean, I imagine the extra air would momentarily reduce combustion efficiency, and the RPMs would drop. The lesson: If you want to know how your mixture is doing while you're driving, just pump the brake. If the idle hops up, you're running rich. If it stays the same, you're running about right. If it briefly sags, you're running lean. Of course that's just the idle, but it's useful info, right? This little trick should work with any car that has power brakes.

Cool! Five cylinders are definitely better than none. I wonder whether that 6th injector might be stuck or clogged. You can run some SeaFoam or Chemtool B12 through your tank to work on varnish in the fuel system.

Sounds like you have multiple problems going on. To get my own engine straight, I just went from end to end, pulling everything apart, testing, verifying, cleaning, refurbing, etc. I found numerous problems, even though the engine was running "OK" before I started. Sometimes it makes more sense just to assume multiple things are wrong and to go through EVERYTHING than to try diagnosing individual problems. Regarding your CSV: Your CSV should be wired in parallel with your thermotime switch connections, so you can do simple continuity tests to determine the identity of these two connectors. Once you figure it out, you should put little zip ties around these connectors to identify them in the future. If you've definitely got the right connectors, and the CSV stays energized, then there's definitely something wrong. First, this would suggest that the CSV circuit is powered by the wrong circuit. It should only receive power when the key is in the START position, but it's probably receiving power from the IGN circuit. As a quick test, check for continuity between the +12 wire of the CSV and the small starter wire with the ignition key in any position other than START. You should have continuity. If not, the CSV is getting power from the wrong circuit. Assuming you have power from the correct source, there are only two possibilities for how the CSV and thermotime switch would work. If the thermotime switch is wired backwards, you'll have a short to ground in cold temperatures, and the CSV will be grounded through the thermotime switch's heater element. This might cause it to hang open. Then when the coolant temp dips below 50F (?), the short will cause bigger problems. If the thermotime switch is wired the other (correct) way, the ground to the CTS should be open at temps > 50F. The CTS will receive +12 whenever the key is in the START position, but it won't be grounded. At colder temps, the ground will be closed; however, the heater in the thermotime will soon interrupt the ground path. As for the other problems, dunno... I'd just go through the system from end to end: -- vacuum leaks? Fix everything you can find, and verify with what I call the "yogurt cup test." Remove the AFM, stuff a plastic cup into the rubber boot to close it. Pull off the vacuum booster hose, and blow into the intake like you're blowing up a balloon. The intake should hold pressure, leaking it off very slowly. If you have any leaks, it should be obvious. -- electrical connections -- verify all of them -- distributor -- remove the cap and rotor, and try turning the braker plate underneath by hand. It should turn smoothly, but it probably won't (common problem). Try timing it to spec (10deg BTDC). -- fuel pressure -- should be about 36 psi static pressure without the engine running. -- Consult the FSM to ensure that all your sensors are within spec. If you get that far, your engine should at least run, albeit maybe not well. There can still be other problems. Sometimes our old ECUs go a bit wonky over time, but we can do mods to compensate. Hope that helps. PS I take pics too! www.graphic-fusion.com. Next stop, I'll check out your website. EDIT: WOW! Awsome work!

I got the fronts done. I had assumed the pads could use replacing, as the guy who inspected the car said they were maybe half worn. However, I found them only maybe a quarter worn. I just sanded the glaze off of them, hosed them with brake cleaner, and reinstalled with the new calipers. The right caliper had been replaced (by itself) shortly before I bought the car. Strangely, it was dragging the brakes just a bit, while the older left caliper was not. Also the left front brake hose didn't match the other three. More piecemeal work. I didn't really know how old anything was. The PO said he had just done the brakes before I bought the car. I asked him if that included the hydraulics, and he said it didn't. The hydraulics definitely needed an overhaul. Captain, I still don't know how good my flare is. I might be missing a tiny bit of fluid, but it might be my imagination. I'll have to watch the reservoir. I also have a TINY bit of brake pedal sag, so I might have messed up the master a bit by running the seals over rust. Dunno. It's not bad, though. The pedal feels fairly firm. I got a very good bleed on the fronts, but perhaps could have done better on the rears. I'll touch it up when I get the MityVac in. The parking brakes are much better. Still haven't gone for a test drive. It was getting dark. I'll try not to be too down on rear drums. Yes, I can see how rear disc parking brakes could be difficult. I wonder why they're inside tiny drums and not clamped across the disc too.

DONE -- on the rears, anyway. I solved the mystery of the star wheel. It turns out the e-brake mechanism on both sides was partially rusted up, so that it wouldn't articulate. It beats me how the e-brake had worked like that, although it did. Anyway, the adjuster was frozen in two slightly different positions on each side, hence the catching of the star wheel on one side only. I guess I should use my emergency brake more often. I prefer to park my car in gear with the e-brake off, unless I'm perched atop a cliff or something. Tomorrow I turn the car around and start on the fronts. That should be a much better job by comparison. I had forgotten just how much I hate drum brakes.