Namerow

One key point hasn't been mentioned yet. Going the dash cap route means that you won't have to pull the dash out of the car (not a trivial task -- especially if you've never done this before) and won't have to re-install the new/refurbished dash afterwards (see previous comment). The dash cap will also: 1) save you a lot of $$$; 2) give you a durable surface with an OE-look texture; 3. take away the risk of new cracks appearing in a DIY refurbished dash. That said, you'll find lots of comments on this site about caps often needing some massaging (heat gun) and shaving (of the lips that fit inside one or maybe two of the gauge or air vent recesses) in order to fit properly. You will also need to use the right adhesive (and in only the right places) to create a good-looking installation that won't warp or bow/cave afterwards. One member here (name?) has posted a detailed instruction set for installing a cap. His results were very impressive and convinced me that that was the way to go. In my case (240Z), I already had a cap so the issue of whether or not to buy one was not a concern. However, when I attempted a trial fit, I found that my dash had 'grown' in width (due to the 3 cracks, I guess) to the point where the cap simply wouldn't fit. I ended up having to pull the dash and refinish it -- a job that took several weekends to complete. Although I'm happy with the end result, it wasn't easy to get right and I still think the cap is the better way to go (if it fits). At worst, you'll only be out the cost of the cap. The best, cost-is-no-issue solution is to pull the dash and send it to Just Dashes (California) for a professional repair and re-cover. They repair the cracks, re-contour the undersurface, and then apply a new top skin with the correct texture. They use a vacuum-and-thermoforming process to pull the new top skin around all of the contours and down into the gauge recesses. With the costs of crating and two-way shipping included, this approach is probably going to cost you $1,500 - $2,000.

Latch rubber bits are being offered as a 5-pce set (per side) by Datsun 240z rubber grommets & parts $15.00 per set. Website says, 'Only 4 left'.

You'll find four more of these 5/16" (8mm) spade connectors in the dash-to-front harness connector bundle, over under the RHS of your IP. In my May '70 Z (dash is out of the car at the moment), a couple of these also show signs of the same heat/corrosion issue. Working on the assumption that the (electrical) chain is only as strong as its weakest link, you may want to service these connectors too. FWIW, I also found that the copper wire was corroded in the terminal crimp area. There's wasn't enough wire slack to make me feel comfortable about chopping off a 1/4" to get to some shiny wire, so I polished the corrosion off with a Dremel (using the little wire wheel attachment) before crimping on the new connector.

When an ex-pat Brit car-buddy saw my freshly-restored Z heater box, he said that it looked just like the 'Smiths' heater boxes that he used to see when he worked in the auto trade in Britain back in the late 60's/early 70's. I can't vouch for whether it's a straight-on copy, but it's always worth remembering that Nissan's corporate president in the formative post-war period was something of an anglophile (responsible, in part, for the model names like Cedric, Fairlady, Bluebird, etc.) and the company had a working relationship with BMC/Austin in the 1950's that in many ways led to the 1600 and 2000 Roadsters (and, later, the Fairlady Z, aka 240Z).

I learned that working with music wire has 'special challenges'.

You're right. Those cables aren't OE. I re-built the cable/lever system for my '70 Z last winter, having had a very similar issue with a bent-up control cable (along with a few other problems). I also had parts on hand from a '72. Here's what I learned. The control cables for the '70 are 1.0mm diameter. The cable ends (at the Heater Box) are straight. Cable sheaths are smooth black flexy-plastic, ~ 4.7mm OD and ~ 1.0mm wall thickness. The control cables for the '72 are 1.3mm diameter. The cable ends (at the Heater Box) are looped. Cable sheaths are the same smooth black flexy-plastic, ~ 4.8mm OD and ~ 1.0mm wall thickness. For the '70, the cable sheaths were in good shape, so I re-used them. For the cables, I bought a coil of 1.0mm tempered steel wire ('music wire') and put the 'dog-leg' bend in (for the lever end) by bending in my bench vise. I had to take the curl out the wire (comes in a tight coil) by pulling the cable back and forth over a length of round bar stock that I clamped in the vise. Hope this helps. I've posted a few pictures of the '70 lever/cable assembly to illustrate.

My dash had three, full-span cracks and that was what made me decide to do the repair. However, when I had the dash out and sitting on my workbench under good lighting, I found a few tiny hairline cracks (~ 1/16" long) along the forward (windshield) edge. My guess is that these little cracks are the way that the big cracks get started. All I did was grind out the vinyl top surface locally so that the ends of each little crack got round edges. What I would end up with in each case was a cut in the vinyl that was the width of the tip of my Dremel bit ( ~ 1/8") and -- in length -- a little bit longer than the original hairline crack. The ball-shape of the Dremel bit automatically gave me the rounding that I wanted at each end of the crack. If you've got a long hairline crack (I've never seen this -- they usually open up, starting from the windshield and getting wider as they track towards the gauge openings), you still need to: 1) 'V' the edges of the vinyl all along the length of the crack (so that you filler coat has something to bond to), and; 2) round off the end of the crack, to stop it from growing any further. You should probably try to fiberglass along the underside of the dash foam too (that is, if you can access the crack area from underneath), because a long hairline crack is almost certainly going to grow as the old foam shrinks and pulls back (and Bumper-Bite filler on the top isn't going to stop this from happening).

I've just finished my dash project. Will post pix and notes later, when time allows. I tried a lot of different bits in my Dremel when working on the vinyl overlay (which is ~ 1/16" thick). It's very a tricky process. Too aggressive with bit choice/speed results in melting rather than abrading, and creates a mess. The goal is to feather-edge the vinyl so that the top-coat filler (I used SEM Bumper-Bite) has a good edge to bond onto. In the end, I found that an engraving-type bit (all-metal, ball-tip -- not the textured tip -- the one I had good results with looks like it's fluted, like a drill bit) with medium-low rpm worked best. My attempts with various rotary sanding discs were unsuccessful (too easy to overshoot the vinyl and accidentally create unwanted deep gouges into the old foam underlay). This job requires a lot of patience to do right. I used a cable-type extension drive, hooked up to my Dremel tool, in order to get the bit at the right cutting angle. Remember to wear safety glasses (a small chip of vinyl cutting lodged in the eye is not a happy experience - don't ask me how I know this). Be sure that you cut back the vinyl and oem foam far enough away on each side of the crack to get past the curled-up area. Otherwise, you'll end up with a big problem when you start sanding. Avoid cutting too deep into the oem foam during this cut-back process, Otherwise, you'll end up having to use too deep a layer of Bumper-Bite (which, by the way, isn't really all that flexible). Aim for a depth of Bumper-Bite fill that's no more than 3/16". Important FYI - Even though the textured bedliner paint looks like it will mask small mistakes in your sanding/contouring job, you may as well know right now that it doesn't. Be sure to put a full primer coat over the sanded areas of your dash before you even think about reaching for the bedliner spray can. Then take a long, hard look at your work under natural sunlight before you proceed to the bedliner spray (shop lighting won't tell you the whole story). I found that sanding the Bumper-Bite to get true contours over the arches of the gauge clusters was r-e-a-l-l-y difficult to get right (you'll be working with a combination of concave, convex and flat surfaces -- the convex ones being the most difficult to get right). Recommend you get a set of hard-foam sanding blocks from Eastwood for this job. There's one in this set that has an onion-type cross-section that works really well for the concave and flat surfaces of this job. However, none of these blocks is suitable for the convex contours of the gauge bezel peaks. I recommend you find a piece of properly contoured thick rubber for this part of the job (go to the plumbing section of your hardware store and look for a large-diameter rubber pipe-joint, and then cut a small section out as your sanding pad).

Nice write-up and pix. Thanks for taking the time (during and after). It's good to see that the cautions about 'jack-up-the-engine-and-remove-the-oil-pickup' were unnecessary. I'm curious to hear more details about two components of the work that you say much about (and which have earned commentary in write-ups by others): 1. What tool(s) and procedures did you use to loosen harmonic balancer securing bolt? Degree-of-difficulty rating? Did you just put the car in gear rely on wheel chocks to keep the crank stationary, or did you remove the starter and wedge the flywheel ring gear? 2. Any drama in loosening the 3 long bolts that secure the water pump & timing cover (esp. the skinny 10mm bolt located at the 11:00 position on the pump body)? Tips/techniques... or did they all give up without a fight?

For those of you who've never visited, the Hamilton Warbirds Museum is a beautifully-done, medium-scale WWII aircraft museum that holds, amongst other things, one of only two airworthy (and still flying) Avro Lancaster bombers still left in the world. The museum's B-25 (RCAF version) flies over my house most weekends during the summer... as does the Lancaster on special events like Remembrance Day in November. Both sound like airborne, multiple-locomotive freight trains (or the equivalent of about 1000 well-tuned Harleys running in a close pack). Many of the museum's aircraft (single and multi-engine) are available for back-seat guest hops. The museum's Lancaster was flown over to England about a week ago, to join the other still-flying Lanc for some special events.

"can i pull the oil pan without pulling the engine?" I'm facing a similar task with my '72, so I feel your pain. From a review of previous posts on this topic: 1. You can pull & replace the pan without pulling the engine... but it's a tight fit. Things that will help include: a) You can jack the engine up ~ 1" by disconnecting the RHS mount. The member who suggested this said, "Remove the two bolts from the passenger-side motor mount rubber. Using a jack, raise the mount arm approx. 1" and then slide a 3/4" block of wood into the gap to hold it. Lower and remove jack". I suspect you will have to disconnect the rad hoses in order to accomplish this (but maybe not?). Another member suggested undoing both motor mounts, and said that this should be done by removing the single bolt on the isolator that goes through the engine crossmember. I'm not sure who's right, but it sounds easier to try unfastening the RHS mount only to begin with. You can always unfasten the LHS mount too, if the RHS-only strategy doesn't work. c) Consider unbolting the sway bar at the frame mounts (and possibly remove the bar completely, to get it fully out of the way?). It appears, though, that this might only be necessary if you're intending to remove the oil pump. d) Adjusting the rotational position of the crankshaft might buy you that last bit of clearance needed to get the pan out (or back in). Once you've got the pan off (and located that pesky tensioner shoe and spring), check the pan's mounting flange for bending and/or dimpling at the bolt holes. Make sure the flange is flat and clean before you attempt the re-install. Re type of gasket, there seem to be varying opinions amongst members re cork-with-rubber vs. rubber-only (is there such a thing?) vs. cork-only. The main caution is not to over-tighten the bolts (see FSM), since this can: a) make the gasket try to squeeze outside the lip of the mounting flange, and; dimple the flange. There's also a general caution not to be over zealous with the application of gasket compound. For the cork or cork-with-rubber gaskets, I found this recommendation: "a thin film of aviation form-a-gasket". I'll be interested to hear what others have to say about this task. Looking on the bright side, your recent engine work means that you probably won't have much difficulty removing your harmonic balancer, water pump, and timing cover.

The gauge faces are thin-gauge sheet-metal stampings. They're one-piece (full-disc) stampings for the speedo, tach and clock; two-piece (two half-discs) for the other two. IIRC, the half-disc stampings can be removed without taking off the gauge needles. The full-disc stampings require removing the gauge needle first (Blue showed an interesting technique to achieve this by using a pair of spoons as levers). You may want to think twice about attempting a refurb using a rattle can. It would be nearly impossible to mask off the white gauge markings. If you have only a few minor scratches to fix, I suggest you use multiple coats of thinned-down flat black modeller's paint (Testors or similar) applied with a very fine-tip artist's brush (and a very steady hand). I wouldn't touch the gauge face with sandpaper, either before or after. The topic of painting the inside of the gauge 'cans' with gloss-white paint has been covered well in another thread somewhere on this site (use the 'Search' bar). Brush-on paint will be fine. Mine already had factory-applied white paint, although the coverage wasn't complete and the paint had yellowed a bit. EZ job. Choice of replacement light bulbs for the Z gauges is debatable. Many have switched to LED's and are happy with these. MSA has recently introduced higher-wattage replacement incandescents and these look promising. The trick is to make sure that you don't buy a higher-wattage bulb that has the correct bayonet fitting but has a glass bulb that's too long (these won't fit inside the green-plastic bulb shroud that's mounted on the inside of the bulb housing). Perhaps someone who's bought the new MSA bulbs can comment on their effectiveness and fit. One thing you didn't mention is cleaning up the clear plastic gauge covers. These are just clear acrylic plastic discs and they respond well to power buffing (Dremel tool) with a liquid plastic cleaner. They're easy to remove in the case of the speedo and tach, but very challenging in the case of the 3 small gauges. In the two small twin-gauges, they are held in place by a stamped-metal shroud which fits over tiny plastic pins. The shroud was locked down at the factory by melting the ends of the pins to form nubs. You'll need to grind off these nubs in order to remove the shroud and the clear-plastic disc. Unfortunately, this means that when you go to re-fit the disc and shroud, the remaining pin length is only long enough to locate the shroud. There's nothing left that you can re-melt. Instead, you'll need to drill a (tiny) hole down into each of the pins and then use (tiny) self-tapping screws with (tiny) flat washers to hold the shroud in place. A visit to your local model train shop should provide the necessary screws and washers. Be careful when drilling into the pins - if you go too far, the drill exits through the front of the bezel and you will now have visible 'air conditioning' holes. Getting the clear plastic face out of the clock is another challenge. Instead of using melted-over locating pins, the clock's clear-plastic face is glued onto a narrow ledge molded into the inside the black plastic gauge bezel. While the disc can be removed successfully, you'll need to be very careful or else you'll either crack the disc or splinter the glued edge. The disc comes out with the centre time adjustment knob captive. When re-installing, this disc needs to be glued back in place and the glue job has to be strong enough to withstand the pressure of you pushing on the time adjust knob when you go to set the clock time. If you get this wrong, the disc will come loose and may bend the clock hands (or worse). Overall, if any of your gauges are in really bad shape, I'd suggest that you just get a used replacement unit (lots of them around). Hope this helps.

I've been playing recently with de-rusting parts by electrolysis (12VDC battery/battery charger, sacrificial steel anode, soda bath -- lots of write-ups on this technique available on-line). This approach won't harm the rubber (polymer) bushing and I have a suspicion that it may be more effective in getting to the concealed rust than something like penetrating oil or naval jelly. Just a hunch, though. Used in combination with thermal shock and a slide hammer, it might just work. In the end, it's no more likely to damage the parts than a torch

Nice job, great results. Your attention to planning and detail has really paid off. I'm curious about the extent of coverage this cap provides on the ends of the dash (i.e. the surfaces visible only when the doors are open). If you get a minute, what you mind posting another photo or two? Also: 1. As you know, there's conflicting advice about where to apply the adhesive. Which approach did you choose? What adhesive did you use? 2. Do you think the cap installation clearances would have tolerated a layer of 1/16" open-cell foam between the dash and the cap? I'm thinking that the foam might provide a bit of cushioning for areas where the dash and cap don't actually meet. Maybe just use in the broad top surfaces?

Burlen Ltd. in England operates a group of carburetor-related business enterprises under the umbrella of The Burlen Group ( Burlen LTD Home page ). They appear to have purchased the manufacturing and brand name rights to the three principal (but long defunct) British carburetor companies: SU, Zenith and Amal. While looking through the latest edition of my favourite Brit car magazine this weekend ('Buying - Restoring - Repairing Classics' - worth checking out if you can find it in your area), I found an article on updating carbs to accommodate ethanol-cut fuels. In it, there was a picture of a recommended upgrade float, trade-named 'StayUp' (no viagra jokes please). I've now checked the Burlen website and find that this is one of their new ventures. There are currently only three or four offerings in the 'StayUp' float lineup, but one of them (the 'T1' model) looks suspiciously like the Hitachi SU item found in our Z's. It goes for 21 Pounds Sterling (about US $30 if I did my math right), plus shipping. That's for one unit. If anyone wants to roll the dice and order one, I'm sure that the rest of us would be interested in finding out whether it fits the Hitachi SU clone. It might end up being something that MSA or Bruce Palmer at Z Therapy would be interested in stocking. Have a look at: Home Page - StayUp Floats Co.

Should have read, "240Z Series 1 dash. No cracks. Includes shipping case on rollers. $1,000."

Your Z is going to be a real showpiece by the time it's back on the road. Hope to be able to take a look at it at Whitehead's sometime before you pick it up. Can you comment a bit more on the parts-plating work that was done... Is it cadmium, or something else? Do you know how the price was set... flat-rate for the batch, $/lb, or ___?

I'm in the final stages of restoring the Heater Box for my 70 Z. I measured all of the factory foam (intact, but badly aged) during disassembly so that I could duplicate later with new foam. Sorry, no pix, so I'll try to explain in words... The job involves a total of 8 pieces of foam. Six are applied to the Core. The other two are applied to the inside of the Heater Box side plate (driver's side only). Pieces 1 & 2: To start, you'll need 1"-thick foam, cut into long, 30mm-wide strips. It needs to be quite 'crushable', so use open-cell foam. I found a package of scotchbrite-type sanding sponges that were perfect (after I cut off the abrasive layer). You could also try the foam from a cheap floor mop. Cutting foam this thick is easiest with a long, hook-shaped X-acto blade. Just press down hard with a steel ruler along your cut line, then run the blade two or three times along the cut. First, you'll need to apply strips along the upper half of the left (driver) and right (passenger) sides of the Heater Core, filling in the depression between the edges of the header tanks. Cut two strips of 120mm length. Glue in place. Pieces 3 - 6: Next, cut four short lengths (35mm length each; again, all are 30mm in width). Glue two of these onto the ends of the header tanks on the driver's side of the Core. These will butt up against the fixed side plate of the Heater Box. Then glue the other two pieces onto the inside surface of the side plate (driver's side, of course) of the Heater Box, to line up with the pieces you just glued to the Core header tanks (i.e. you'll have a double-layer of foam cushioning in these two locations). Pieces 7 - 8: The last two pieces are a bit trickier (if you want to match the OE installation). These are specially-shaped and holed in order to slip over the supply and outlet tubes of the Core. They're also vinyl-faced (on the side that will face outboard and butt up against the passenger-side side plate of the Heater Box (i.e. the removable side plate). I used the same 1-in. -thick foam as before. Glue thin flexible vinyl sheet onto one side before you cut the pieces to shape. Now: Cut two rectangles (57mm x 37mm for the rear Core tube location; 43mm x 35mm for the front Core tube location). Now you need to make a hole in each piece so it can slide over the Core tube. The hole in each piece should be 15mm diameter. In each case, it will need to be positioned quite off-centre... For the rear tube's pad, the hole will be biased towards the upper rear corner of the pad. For the front tube's pad, the hole will be biased towards the upper front corner of the pad. To locate the hole centre in each pad: From the top outboard corner of each rectangle, measure in 15mm and down 15mm to locate/mark your centre). Once marked, it's easier to punch out the holes rather than trying to cut them out. Make a punch from a suitable-diameter piece of thin-wall tube (sharpened by chamfering one cut end). Once finished, just these two pieces over the Core tubes. No glue here. The long dimension of each piece runs horizontal. I had great results using 3M 80888 sprayable contact cement. Requires a lot of masking off off the Core and the Heater Box in order to avoid getting it in the wrong places. Do NOT use this glue indoors (it's really hard on the lungs -- probably explosive, too). If you follow the directions, this glue gives you a ~5-minute grace period where you can adjust your positioning before clamping. Before you slide the Core back into the Heater Box, apply a (very) thin smear of white grease on the surfaces of the 'shelf' brackets so that the Core slides in nice and EZ. Hope this helps.

Bf2x4?

The dash in my 1970 Z has the usual cracks (although not so extreme as some examples I've seen other owners post on this site). I'm in the middle of restoring the car's interior and, at this stage, the dash is only a few bolts and connectors shy of being ready to pull out of the car. I've already removed all of the instruments for service and they're now refurbished and ready to go back in. Same for the heater box, radio and centre console. The issue is that I already have a full dash cap ready to be installed. I'm torn between going that route (cap) as opposed to pulling the dash and doing the foam-and-bedliner refinish. I don't expect that I'll ever get this close to pulling the dash again (and I know it would make re-installing the instruments a heck of a lot easier, too), but after reading what seems like dozens of postings on the dash refurbish process, I feel like I'm detecting a little bit of 'good-but-not-great/your-results-may differ' sentiment. It's also hard to get a good sense from the pictures posted about just how close to OE appearance the end result really is (i.e. surface texture and gloss). I know that caps aren't a 100%-perfect solution either, but at least I can see what the end result will look like because it's sitting right in front of me (and it looks ok). So: Can anyone offer a compelling reason for (or against) either of the two options?

Sometime, somewhere I recall reading about a wood repair of this type being done using a paste made up from sawdust and a binder. I can't remember the application (it certainly wasn't a Z steering wheel) and I can't remember what the binding agent was, but maybe this will jog someone else's memory (seems like a repair that might be appropriate to musical instrument). IIRC, the Z wheel's rim was made in a somewhat similar fashion (i.e. composite, rather than 'real' wood), so it might just work. I would certainly expect the sawdust paste to take woodstain better than just pure epoxy. Maybe worth experimenting on just one of the cracks?

Re timing chain wedge: Use a piece of hardwood this. I found 2' lengths in the cabinet-wood section of the local Home Depot (1-1/2" x 3/4" IIRC). I scaled off the dimensions from some photos of the 'official' Nissan service tool. It's a symmetrical wedge: 35mm W at the top, tapering down over 185mm to a width of 22mm at the bottom. Add a couple of inches of additional length at the top, then drill a hole and run a loop of heavy cord/string through the hole to use as a pull-out aid. Don't use wire for this, because it may snag as you're lifting the head off and pull the wedge out (don't ask me how I know this). I was able to push the exhaust manifold off to the side without having to un-do the flange connection at the top of the exhaust pipe. Jam a length of scrap wood between the manifold and the block to hold it in position before you try to lift off the head.

What kind of garage heating are you using? (and what's your definition of 'warm enough to work'?)

Is the throttle knob produced as a repro of the OE piece (i.e. mirror-image of the choke knob, and with engraved 'throttle-plate' graphic)? If so, I'm definitely interested. Anybody else? Maybe Datsun 240z rubber grommets & parts would like to take a shot at this? Not a trivial task, though, because I don't know of any easy way to produce a mirror-image mold of the choke knob. Not to mention the need to cast in a mounting slot and a recessed set-screw hole. And then there's the graphics. A 3D printer could produce it easily, and maybe that's the way this is going to get done. It will depend on figuring out how to get a set of x-y-z coordinates off of choke knob. Anybody got access to a contact profilometer? On the other hand, a good tool and diemaker could probably knock off a master in an evening. Volunteers?

My understanding has always been that the U.S. dealers and/or distributors (or more likely, their lawyers) were concerned about safety issues. The hand throttle -- cool as it is -- doesn't have an auto-return feature. It also has the potential for (variously) linkage snag, cable freeze, lever bind, etc. from poor maintenance or poor adjustment (remember the million-car recall a couple of years ago for 'floor carpet' issues? And the other issue -- same manufacturer -- for 'run-away' vehicles due to owner not understanding how to turn off a car fitted with a push-button starter?).