Patcon

Is it me or should the slam panel not be totally flat in that picture?

Yeah, the vin location is weird! Covered in bird guano...

Yup A good tip about cutting at an angle. Remember too, that old truck bed is much thicker than datsun steel. So not as affected by heat or air cooling

That why heat wrap is asbestos!! Proceed with caution...

Also the shape of the S30 Z cars requires that all of the seals on the rear half of the car be in good shape or your gonna get lots of fumes

Love the reflection in the rear valance!!! Thats a hard panel to get that smooth!

Oh, I agree, single stage is the more authentic looking paint but not as forgiving. BC/CC is more forgiving and easier to touch up. I will be running BC/CC on my Z for that and other reasons

I agree with Namerow, and his excellent explanation. If I am understanding the OP correctly, he is talking about removing the lower sections on each side of the engine bay (that we call frame rails). If the car is stripped and not rotten as swiss cheese, there just isn't a lot of weight up there to cause distortion. Floor pans and rocker panels is a different thing. With different tactics...

I would be surprised if any repaint was the same thickness as the factory paint even on bare metal. The first reason being is many people run base clear on their repaint. So you have at least one extra layer of paint. Painters also tend to stack layers of clear so there is room to cut and buff the car. Also most decent painters spend a pretty good amount of time trying to get the car straight and smooth. That means lots of buildable primer and filler which adds thickness really quickly. These cars never had paint stacked on them in the factory like that. It would be interesting to get some readings off of cars like mine (if I ever get it sprayed) or Wheee's or Grannyknot's if it was bare metal to see what our finished paint thickness is

Wow!! Now that image is gonna be hard to scrub away

Me too!!

If the upper structure is good and the car is supported properly under the rockers, I dont think I would add any bracing to replace the frame rails

Yes, that is the basic idea. I use a heel dolly to shape them because it has a similar radius to the factory floor pans

I think the bigger the panel and the longer the seam the more chance for problems. Small patches are a great way to learn because they are reasonably forgiving

I agree with the whole rant! I too have found that section of the pin deformed and it takes very little of that to make the pins really hard to get out. That little lock pin is really not designed to be driven in or torqued to silly values...

Charlies floor pans don't have the curves on the inside to match the tranny tunnel. I cut into them until I can shape the petals of the floor pane to match the tunnel. Then I zip screw it in place. I take a cut off wheel or body saw and cut through both layers of metal in one area. That makes it exactly the right size. Tack it and move on. When it's all tacked, dolly it to a nice shape and weld it off

I have found that cooling with an air hose will cause excess shrinkage and warping. It is a technique used by body men to remove dents and oil canning.. Don't get me wrong, I use to do it but I ruined several panels this way and simply let them air cool now. Sometimes I dolly them along the way to prevent the weld bead from warping the panel

I slot the floor pans every 2"s or so on the edge. This allows me to adjust the edge to match the tunnel. Then seam up the slots when it's all tacked in Look at Whee's thread where he's doing floor pans (like page 200 out of 600 )

I am not a pro welder and sometimes I struggle but I don't really judge my welds by the back side. For starters your seam of buttons looks pretty good. I have found though if the gap is too tight my welds aren't as good. I want a skinny 1/16 or so to bridge, not butted up tight. Also your test piece has a lot of splatter. Are you running shield gas? are you close enough? Is thee flow high enough? Did you clean the test piece first?

I predicted six figure Z's a few years ago when we started to see $50-60k cars. I was told I was crazy. It actually happened faster than I predicted it would. Now $310k is hard for me to fathom but evidently I'm out of touch... I've always wanted a low number car (sub 1000) and almost pulled the trigger a couple of times. I don't really want that anymore and am starting to lean towards 260's and 280's because I don't want to run errands in my $60k 240z. I would rather leave my $15k 260 in the parking lot unattended... This all assumes I ever own a running Z again...

Are you welding your patch panels in with little 1" long segments of weld? If you are, I have found that's too much heat. When I weld in panels, I make a small bead weld 1/8" to 3/16s diameter. Spaced about every 1" to 1 1/2". Let them cool, then add more. Keep adding beads until it's seamed up. Then grind and fill any pin holes that show up with more beads

The centering nut was loose on the one carb. You will need to get the needle centered in the nozzle and then tighten that up. Otherwise the needle will drag on the nozzle, wearing it out and causing things to hang up

Ztherapy might sell you the linkage I have found the reason they hang up is usually the wrong fuel lines to the nozzle or the long bar is misadjusted and is pulling the nozzle to one side, jamming it in the carb body

You always need extras!! That's why we hoard stuff... You're missing the choke linkage bar. The part that moves is the fuel nozzle. It moves down as a choke to add more fuel when the car is cold. They both need to move the same way when on the car and relatively the same amount. Pay attention when you get them on the car, they can stick in the down position and cause idle issues

You are so close! You've really made good time...