brentz

Ollie, thanks for the encouragement. I think that is a great concept with a nice SS exhaust system. Curious what you mean by vanishing grounds? Do you mean electrical grounds? I have a few anxieties that won't be settled until the engine runs and the car shifts..I shudder the thought of the redo!

Well...didn't think it was going to take this long. Here is a photo update since my last one. Engine came back from shop, it is reassembled with new oversize pistons, new bearings, all put back together. Dropped the engine&transmission in the car, installed drive-shaft and half-shafts with new u-joints. Salvaged what was left of the braking system and installed new MC and calipers on the front. Rebuilt clutch MC and replaced slave cylinder. New clutch plate, disc, and throwout bearing as well. Replaced shifter bushings, along with all tranny seals, still staying with original 4-speed. Now down to front and rear sway bars, exhaust, and tranny oil fill to be done with under the car. Next steps are firewall sound insulation, mount the dash, and start her up!

No, you have a choice between the auto and the manual with the M-sport. I chose auto because wife would drive it from time to time. M-sport made for a fun drive, but a little firmer. Rear diff was higher ratio, different size front and rear wheels (back is nice and fat), bolsters on seats to keep your butt where its supposed to be, a cute M Sport medallion on the steering wheel and some upgraded sound system. I think that is what the option got you...oh forgot one thing, lower gas mileage and guzzler tax if you bought it new.

Daily driver is 2001 540i with M-Sport package. Picked it up new at the factory in SC and now have 154,000 miles on it. Fastest and best handling car I have ever owned. I have loved it. Thought about the M5 when I bought it, but couldn't in good conscience with 4 kids to put through college.

Thanks for the encouragement guys. We are still waiting on the L24 to drop in. We are oversizing piston bore .020 and doing an undersize on the crank, short block only. So nothing special on the engine, but hopefully will tighten things up. The head was recently rebuilt. I have also finished restoring the fuel tank, and will be installing shortly along with all new vent hoses...what a design fiasco! I have been generously using POR15 and chassis black paint to clean up many of the rusty pieces, differential, mustache bar, transmission crossmember, sway bars, heater box, half-shafts and drive shaft. Half-way through replacing U-joints in all. Gathering up some SS fastner replacements for the originals on some of the bolts and screws that look too rough (which is about all of them at this point!) Replaced floor-pan plugs and am ready to install Eastwood "fatmat" knock-off in the flooring and ceiling. A million little things to do and unfortunately having to hold down a day job! I will try to get some more pics.

KAL7467...thanks! We have been making good progress, but are now in a holding pattern waiting for the machine shop to finish the engine. It will be standard stock with new pistons and bearings. I am curious what you are using for the sound deadening material?

If anyone out there wants to sell some parts, looking for an L24 Oil Pan and engine front cover (water pump housing) with distributor drive shaft. I live in the southeast US. Trying to finish up a restoration, and the machine shop lost some of my parts over the last couple years! Thanks in advance!

Cozye, I do feel fortunate to know Darrin. Here is his website if you want to see some of his other work http://www.woodsbodywork.com/ This was his first Z car and I think I will give him an A+ on it.

Zedyone, 240Zs are beautiful no matter the paint job. This one has just a unique finish.

Well...it's ready to come home and get an engine. Here are a few shots from yesterday...ignore the wheels, they are temporary.

Ollie, it is quite satisfying to finally see paint on your car. It is worth the wait! Yeah, the unplanned stuff keeps adding up. I don't think this type of job is finished sooner thant thought...ever. The stripes were actually a variation on the originals. Before the car was stripped, my body man traced the originals and made some patterns, then he painted them on at the end. I love the striping because it is actually "in" the paint job. You can't feel it when you run your hand over it.

Here are the details taped out before spray.

Put the final "240Z" stripe inverted silver along the side of the car. Final clear coat. Time to start putting her back together!

Thanks Cozye! My good friend who is doing the paint and body work has really done an outstanding job. As a result, I will be replacing some things that at first I hoped to get by without! Looking forward to driving it again. Its been much too long.

Here are a few more shots of the fender, hood and doors. Next step is to assemble car and put original "240z" stripe on the sides in the silver color used for the hood stripes.

Here is the hood after detailing. I really like the striping on the power bulge.

Tom, Rubber seals arrived this weekend thankfully. So new emblems and seals are now at the body shop, ready for installation after painting is finished. Looks like the painting should be finished up this week. My next little sub-project is what to do with the bumpers. They didn't look too bad before, but now, I am not so shure.

Tom, Grantf, Ollie...It's pretty exciting when it finally starts to look like you envisioned! After 15 years there is so much angst wrapped up in the project I don't think I will have a worthy place to park it. My body man, Darrin, suggested I build a new separate garage to park it in...haha. Love the Monterey Blue...great look! I just ordered rubber seal kit from MSA and the ship date keeps pushing out. How has your experience been on replacing rubber seals? Brent

Here is the main body with 2 out of 3 stages finished. The hood, doors, and hatch will be individually done next week. Color is Dupont Jet Black. I'm getting happy now!

Well it has been over a month since my last update. The longest part of the body work is complete..that is straghtening out the bumps and dimples in the body. After three rounds of blocking, filling, sanding, and re-shooting with primer, we have a winner. I have included a few pictures showing where the body imperfections are obvious after block sanding. This last step included sanding the engine bay, underneath the car and then treating bare metal with POR15 on the bottom side. This included special tools to run a flexible spray head down each of the frame-rails and coating (drenching) the inside of the rails with POR15, along with the floor pans, and wheel wells. All seams, including those in the bottom of the doors were coated with POR15. Next step was to coat the inside roof, firewall, and transmission tunnel with Lizard Skin, which I am told is a ceramic-based thermal protectant designed to keep the temperature levels in the cabin reduced. Lastly, a thinnned-down coat of bed-liner material was sprayed in the engine bay, underneath all exposed surfaces on the bottom of the car, wheel wells, and inside the cabin of the car. I have attached a picture of how it looks. Really makes for a nice tough, fluid-resistant finish all around. If the temperature can get a bit warmer here in Alabama, (20F tonight!) we will get on with the exterior paint....Black! Can see the end of the tunnel for the body work...now time to kick the machine shop in the pants to get my engine back.

We are down to blocking out the imperfections in the body work. If you see the small patches left on the primer work, they are the small indentations that need to be filled and smoothed out. Also, some shots of the stripped headlight housings.

Ollie..I took a look at the panasports and definitely like the look. With a black Z-car, I think the graphite or gun-metal grey in the middle and with the chrome on the outside is the bomb. Thanks for the suggestions!

It's a good idea to look under that patch. The patches are pretty flimsy..I saw some rust penetration on mine, so my resto man cleaned it up and welded on new patches. Great idea to ditch the emission plumbing. I followed the same path. Balance and intake is from an "older SU" car. Any ideas for wheels? Looking not to lower or offset, but want to keep the speedo fairly accurate.

Ollie...I appreciate your pain for sure. My car has 131,000 original miles on it. I really look forward to putting the rust monster to bed for quite a while with this treatment. There were a few small rust holes on the driverside floorpan, minor pitting in the usual places, but nothing a little new metal and POR15 can't shape up. Plan on putting a thinned-down bed-liner material, black, in the engine bay as well as coating the whole underside with it. The restorer has done this before on other vehicles and reports a very nice result. You engine will sound very nice for sure. I am thinking about good wheels as well as perhaps a set of Ztherapy SUs...will have to see.

You are correct...it is actually HLS30-160400 and the engine number is L24-172010....MFR on 5/73. I had an original warranty booklet that had some stuff written in it, and it looked like what they wrote down for the VIN was bogus in there.