Walter Moore

Going back to SUs, or something else?

I didn't try to rebuild the breaker plate in my original distributor, but when I was tinkering with the ZX dizzy that I put in my car I ordered a new breaker plate assembly from a Nissan dealer. It came as one assembly, not two separate plates.

Congratulations! You have just discovered the dark secret of car show judging! Have a nice day.

I had a centerforce (that I bought on EBay...) I couldn't get it adjusted to where it didn't grab when I took off. I have a stock clutch now and it works great.

I second everything that Bruce said. Maybe I am dense, but I couldn't get my head around the SU until I saw the video.

Great looking car. I have always loved the styling of those cars, and wished they had been sold in the U.S.

Link to the actual video: http://www.jaylenosgarage.com/cars/nissan/nissan-fairlady-aka-datsun-240z/index.shtml

Check very carefully for rust around the mounting location of the front sway bar. The clamps for the sway bar actually bolt to a bracket that is welded to the inside of the frame rail. On my car this bracket had rusted away, and eventually the remainder of the bracket pulled through the rail. (With the stock sway bar installed.) The tell tail sign is when the frame rail develops cracks along the edges of the reinforcing plate that sandwiches between the bracket and the frame. By the time they appear the internal bracket is gone, and you are going to need to repair the frame rail.

36.3 psi = 250 kPa so precision isn't a big deal here...

The mechanical part of the distributor is basically the same regardless of the ignition module. The Vacuum advance changes from year to year. I modified my breaker plate to limit the vacuum advance to 17 degrees at the crank, but most people just disable it. I have a chart on the site showing the different distributors that shipped, but the only breaker plate available from the dealers is the one for the 83. (As of a few years ago.)

It isn't that low. The cam that I have is 222/222 .460/.460 lift. I am not sure what the lift is of a stock cam. Mine is a reground stock cam I think.

The headlight buckets are somewhat adjustable, as are the hood hinges. It took me a long time to get mine to line up.

It all depends on how fast you are going when you hit the brakes and how many times in a row you have to stop. The tires are only the limiting factor if the brakes can disipate the heat fast enough to keep the brake fluid from boiling. Car brakes work by converting the kinetic energy of the vehicle into heat. KE = MV^2 so a panic stop from 120 MPH requires disipating 4 times as much energy as a panic stop from 60 MPH. If you have to stop often enough, in a short enough period of time, from high enough speeds, the stock brakes are not going to do the job for you. The brakes on nearly all cars from the 70's were woefully undersized by today's standards. But if you use the car as originally intended, and aren't breaking the posted speed limit, the stock brakes should be OK. Just don't expect them to bring you safely to a stop from triple digit speeds very often. (or perhaps at all...)

Is it an OEM sway bar, or aftermarket? I am not sure if a 72 came with a stock rear sway bar, and I don't know where they mounted the stock bar. This kit: http://www.thezstore.com/page/TZS/PROD/PSDC05/23-4101 Mounts in front of the differential, not behind as shown in the previous post. See my attached pictures for more information:

He does still have the stock fan, (visible at 0:30 in the video) someone just added a pusher fan for extra cooling. (Give him a break, it gets hot in Kuwait.)

Do you drive a lot in the winter? The only purpose of the heat riser hose is to speed engine warmup in cold weather. Most people just pitch the things. You could clamp a piece of tubing to one of the header tubes down near the collector and accomplish what you want. I thought that I saw an adapter like that for sale somewhere, but a quick internet search didn't return anything useful.

I bought my door seals at a Nissan dealer using the part numbers from the CD that this site sells (or used to sell). They fit perfectly.

What do you have now? The 3.36 was standard equipment in North America, but I believe the 3.9 was stock in Europe. Did your car come to you from the U.S. or Canada, or was it originally sold in Europe? If it has a 3.9 now, I can not imagine dropping down to a numerically lower ratio unless you have a lot of high speed long distance crusing to do. Most people here want to find a 3.9 when they drop in a 5 speed.

My 71 has wiring for an electric fuel pump, but it isn't hooked up under the dash. I ran my own wires because I put an oil pressure switch in the circuit to shut the pump off if the engine stalls. The stock wires require the addition of a inertia cutoff switch I am told, otherwise the pump runs whenever the ignition is on which could be a problem in a crash. There should be wiring at the pump location on a 73, but who knows what the wiring is like 39 years down the road.

In stock form any car from the early 70's leaves a lot to be desired from a safety perspective, but any car is safer than say a motorcycle.

A few comments: (That granted, I should have posted at the video..) 1. It is always bad form to "talk" with your hands, but it is really bad form to do so when you are DRIVING!!! (Use you mouth to talk, use your hands to steer the CAR!) 2. Does anyone really beleve that this kid passed over a GTR ($90k+) to buy a BRZ? ($25k maybe) (Does he have a rich relative?) 3. Everyone who reviews the BRZ/FR-S comments about the junk tires. They are a Michelin low rolling resistance tire that are apparently on the car to get the fuel economy numbers they need for CAFE. Road and Track replaced them with real tires, and it took over 2 seconds off the car's lap time on their test track. I doubt that Subaru put them on there to make the car more exciting. 4. He thinks the car isn't exciting? Have him turn the traction and stability control off and drive it in the snow. That will get his pulse elevated I am sure. I personally question if 25% of people on the road today could drive a rear wheel drive in the snow without those features. (I can, and have a good time doing it, but not in the Z because I fear the rust monster.) As one member of our local club said: If you can't drive it sideways, you have no business driving at all!

He says that he "...won't take less than 10..." I guess he is serious. I also expect he will own that car for a while longer.

And if he doesn't get around to restoring them before he passes away they will come up for auction...

:cool:Good to see you have it tuned and operational.

Bad links... A bigger determining factor than the wheel width is the tire section width. That is what will hit the springs. What tires do you intend to run on this beast of a wheel? The narrowest tire that I see in my copy of the T&RA book approved for a 16 x 9 wheel is a P245/45R16. That is a lot of tire for the front of a 240Z. You would need an offset of less than 4mm, and yes fender flairs are going to be needed. Even with that I expect that you would rub on the inner fender when you made sharp turns. It might work in the rear... but tires that wide will increase the high speed drag and reduce the car's top speed. (at least in theory.) You should do a search of the site for tire sizes to see what others are running. I don't think I have seen a Z with tires wider than 225mm. P225/50R16 tires will fit on a 16 x 7 wheel.