Zed Head

The injectors are grounded by the ECU, which is triggered by a wire from the negative side of the coil. That's what I meant by injector signal. It's kind of uncommon but needs to be verified. It's easy to do, but sometimes hard to understand. For starter fluid, I would pull one of the vacuum hoses from the intake manifold and squirt some fluid in. That way you don't have to mess with the AFM hoses. The easiest would be the very small hose that runs to the firewall and around to the air conditioning vacuum tank. It's small enough that you can leave it off without affecting intake vacuum much. Fuel pressure should be measured between the fuel filter and the fuel rail, with a temporary gauge (some install a permanent gauge,which is nice since you can check it when the problem happens. These cars did not come with a Schrader valve so you'll need to remove the hose and attach T-fitting. The hose is typically very difficult to remove, so I would buy an extra foot of high pressure fuel injection hose since you'll probably have to cut it off. IF you haven't downloaded the FSM yet, and read the Engine Fuel section, you should. It's very informative and good to have the knowledge in the back of your brain while you're pondering what your engine's doing. I will bear with you, but, to be honest, will probably never bare with you.

Yes, but different parts. The parts work together to produce spark.

If you can, check for spark when it is difficult to start. If you have no spark, that's a sign that you have an ignition problem, but it may not be the module. If you have spark but it still won't start, then fuel supply or injector signal might be something to look at. Try starting fluid also, if it starts then dies, you have a fuel problem. You should verify fuel pressure first thoguh. You could have a dying fuel pump. You really need to take some measurements with fuel injection, there's no way around it. You could have 15 psi fuel pressure, which will look like a lot of flow, but won't be enough pressure to run the engine right.

MY fuel gauge (1976) stopped working about two weeks ago. I pulled it out to replace it with one from another car, checked the various circuits to see where the problem was and couldn't find any. Put the old one back in and it worked correctly. I don't know if the connector just worked itself loose (we were in the first really cold weather of the year) or the needle just got stuck and it jarred free when I took the gauge out.

I think that you are embarking on a lonely quest. Not many people rebuild their differentials, and those that do, from what I've read, tend to have problems afterward. Even the guys on these forums that have lots of experience have stories. Despite the simple concept and relatively small number of parts, the parts have to fit precisely or you'll just get more noise, but with new parts. I had considered rebuilding mine, but couldn't justify it, since replacements were easy to find. Good luck. Report results if you do go for it, there are a lot of noisy differentials out there.

Groovy. I'm taking a gold star. The main reason I thought of it is because that's where I jumped in to the fuel pump power line to supply the "brake warning lamp check relay", after I installed a ZX alternator. And I too have found a long jumper wire in my car, running all the way from my ignition switch to the fuse box, to take the place of a rusted out relay. Once I fixed it, my accessory position on the ignition switch started working again. If you're measuring at the AFM connector, back through the harness, then what you're seeing is probably the resistance of the solenoid in the relay. 6- 7 ohms is about right for a relay solenoid. One down...

The Pertronix unit has an ignition module built in. The 280Z distributor has an external ignition module, up by the fuse box, in the cabin. You can use a GM HEI module if you don't have the stock Nissan module. The 280ZX distributor has its ignition module mounted on the distributor, the small black box on its side. What kind of L28 distributor are you using?

Did you even try the double-nut method? If not, why not? Just wondering...

The harness has several connections under the carpet next to the right side of the passenger seat, the fuel pump power runs through them. Easy to get to and one possible spot for a "hack" or even a short. According to the wiring diagrams, the only power supply to the fuel pump wire runs through the combined EFI and Fuel Pump relay. All you can do is try to trace it out. The 76 diagram shows a green wire with blue stripe all the way from the pump to the plug you disconnected, through the C8 and C3 connectors.

If you'll be taking a lot of curves I'd go for the parabolic formula.

Did things work right before and why did you do the alternator swap? Which swap method did you use? The last time I had a faintly glowing Charge light, my alternator was dying and took my ignition module with it.

Great suggestion. I think the hole is on the bottom side of the lobe though, not the tip. Probably the leading face, to get the oil on the lobe before it starts working. For future oil fill hole peekers...

Since you're thinking about - these two mounting points are supposed to be somewhat self-adjusting when the weight of the car is on the suspension. The mounts are left loose, the car is settled on to the suspension and rolled around a bit to get everything in its proper position, then the eight bolts are torqued down. You can reach the bolts when the car is on the ground, if your exhaust pipe is not in the way. Might be worth some time to reach up under there, loosen them up and see if you can get things settled right. It won't hurt anything and you might get an easy adjustment.

I like the "vaporizing inside the injector" theory also. I'm just throwing out other possibilities. I've not seen the inside of an injector or studied any diagrams closely so don't know if anything could bind when hot or not. I was thinking more of the metal piston inside the electrical windings though, the solenoid, not the fuel valve components. It has more mass and might explain why it takes so long for the problem to go away once it occurs. Who knows, maybe there's an area of the electrical contacts that can open under expansion. I have a bunch of old injectors, I'm surprised I haven't cut one or two open yet.

I don't know about the R180s but the R200s tend to be loud in general. The noise can be transmitted in to the cabin through worn rubber mounts allowing metal mount parts to contact, through stiffer urethane bushings, a lack of insulation or carpet on the rear deck, etc. It may be that your R180 is not worn out, and that you can reduce the noise through other means. If you're just trying to reduce the noise, an R200 might not get you anywhere. You might consider new mounts and/or carpet and insulation in the cabin. An alternative.

So you're offering $1700 for two parts cars? For all of the little parts. Asking because if you read through the thread the conclusion seems to be that the first car would be the driver (it ran [drove I assume] in 2008) and the second car would be the parts supplier (it's totaled). What year is the 280Z that you currently have? Some major items changed in 1978 so they might not swap over to your current car.

Seems like a fair trade. Gotta have a little fun now and then...

The black box on the side of the 81 distributor is the new ignition module. Your original ignition module is close to the fuse box in the passenger foot well. If you just stuck the 81 distributor in and connected wires to it, then your old one is still there, but useless. I really don't know if it would affect the tach or not, even though it is still a branch on the blue wire circuit. You can't disconnect the blue wire in the engine bay because it feeds the tach and the ECU. It wouldn't hurt to crawl up under there and disconnect it to see what happens. If you still have the problem, a small capacitor, like the one off the alternator, is worth a try. It will absorb some electrical noise that the new coil might be producing. Also, you might have disconnected the original one when you made the swap.

Here's a followup to my last post. I still have the hot start problem, even with an FPR that holds pressure over time. It seems to be holding close to full pressure also, because the engine starts right up over night and after sitting a few days, just like a modern car. But even with a rail full of fuel, if I get the engine nice and warn, then let it sit for about 20 - 30 minutes, I get a nasty thirty seconds to one minute of stumbling, low idle poor running. I'm wondering now if the problem might be an overheated solenoid, sticking and causing the injector to stay closed. Just another way to get to a lean condition, which is what my hot start problem is like. It seems to be isolated to one or two cylinders, based on the way it runs. Just wanted to followup. On the plus side, a system that holds pressure is nice for restarting in general.

You'll save yourself a lot of time, money and aggravation, in both the short and long run, if you download the Factory Service Manual, and read the Engine Fuel chapter, and do some testing. It's free - http://www.xenons30.com/reference.html If "bit" means "not" then it's unlimely the dropping resistors are bad because they have nothing to do with power to the fuel pump. Blown fusible links or bad connections are a more limely cause. Good luck.

They don't really do much work besides convert a small amount of electricity to heat. I don't think that they go bad very often. Have you measured resistance and continuity? The test is described in the FSM Engine Fuel chapter.

You didn't provide the details or reason for your swap, but I had a problem with my tach after modifying the ignition system and found that an extra condenser/capacitor on the coil negative post fixed the problem. But my tach needle would just bounce and jitter at zero, it's not clear in your case what you mean by "not work". I swapped all of the 76 parts out though, so this might not help your situation. You do know that the 76 coil is a low current coil and uses a ballast resistor to drop the voltage when running, but the 81 coil has no ballast resistor and uses the full 12 volts and full current. Did you do any other modifications or just swap the coil? Edit - just saw the part about the 81 ZX distributor. So you're using the E12-80 module? Did you disconnect the 76 ignition module by the fuse box? It's not necessary any more. Maybe it's interfering. You can just disconnect each wire and cover them up to avoid shorts, since some of them are hot when the key is on.

Whoops. Here it is - http://courtesyparts.com/ Don't try to put you vehicle description into the Search box, just put the part number in the box on the right. I have ordered directly from the web site, but you can call them too. Good luck.

This mighthelp you out - http://www.carpartsmanual.com/datsunS30/DatsunZIndex/PowerTrain/TransmissionGears/4Speed/tabid/1707/Default.aspx Find your part number, then go here - http://www.carpartsmanual.com/datsunS30/DatsunZIndex/PowerTrain/TransmissionGears/4Speed/tabid/1707/Default.aspx and put the part number in the search box. The one I picked actually shows as available but I don't think you'll know for sure until you call or order it. Notice also that there are two 1971 4 speeds. If you have a post august 71 4 speed, it looks like any 4 speed after that might have a gear set that would swap in, based on the "superceded" comments. Probably cheaper to get a later model 4 or 5 speed and swap.

It could also be the brake pressure differential switch, either stuck or indicating low pressure in one half of the brake system. How do the brakes work on the car? Does the light go off if you pump the brakes?