Ed

Someone spend thousands on bodywork and paint. Then ran out of money for the engine and interior. Now they have to sell. Hold on, I think I feel a tear coming.... No, just dust. It's had 97,000 views with two days left. Maybe a publicity stunt for the bodyshop?

I think we scared him . You will also need a place to do all this work. I have a 2 car garage and a big basement. When I stripped my car every piece went to the basement for a rebuild including the engine. You will need lots of room to store all your parts. Also look through the archives of this website. Restorations have been talked about several times and were always here to help and give advice.

How much of a restoration are you talking? Ground-up, full restoration? Or a "refresh"? Ground up is a lot of money, the more you take apart the more you have to fix. If your car is in good condition and all it needs is fresh paint and a new interior then start with that. Buy the new interior items that you will need. Remove exterior items like, turn signals, lights, bumpers, glass, etc.... You can also start removing some of the interior items that need replacing. Get the car painted. Then install the new interior. One thing to remember. Your car is over 30 years old. And it probably needs alot. Suspension; bushings, shocks, brakes, u-joints etc... Engine; rebuild? And the list goes on. I just finished my ground up restoration on a car in very good condition. And it was not cheap. Tell us a little more about what you want to do. Good luck.

When I finished my car I used the body seal "kit" that's available through just about everyone (MSA, VB, Too Intense). And as we all already know the door seals are a B!+@#. I've done just about everything except wait a year. It's actually been about 3 months and they are still tight. Well, at this past convention I spoke with several people who used a universal door seal from JC Whitney . They told me it was an easy fit and the door closed right the first time. When I looked at the seal they looked almost like the OEM factory style. If you didn't know they were from JC Whitney then you wouldn't even notice. So my question is, has anyone here tried these? Any feedback? And is the seal in the above link the correct one? Thanks, Ed

I agree with Lance. Leave it alone. Either take the head off and do it properly or leave it alone. Your asking for a world of trouble if you start messing with the deposits. Imagine one piece of crud getting stuck between the valve and the valve seat. There goes your compression. On another note what is the condition of the rest of the engine? If you have build up on the valves what's it look like in the rest of the engine? My $.02, leave it alone until you can afford a proper rebuild.

First off you have to wonder, what is the current condition of the engine? How many miles does it have? When was the last tune-up performed? Has it been abused? Usually if you can see smoke coming out of the tail pipe it means your burning oil. How often do you have to add another quart? It could be bad valve stem seals or it could be bad rings or even valves. Start with a proper tune up. New plugs, fluids & filters, timing and even a new cap & rotor. Adjust the valves and finally do a compression test. Low compression would indicate bad rings or a bad valve to seat seal. Decent compression could mean you have bad valve stem seals. Is the car hard to start after it's been sitting for a while? Let it sit for a couple of days, pull the plugs and inspect their condition. Are they oily & wet? Let us know what you find out.

The "plastic" material is actually a tar like matt that was installed for sound proofing. If your car is in good shape I would leave it alone on the transmission tunnel. However I would remove it from the floors regardless. The matts are notorious for trapping moisture. The floors are where you will find rust if any. You can reuse the "horse hair" if you wish or use a dynomatt type of material, up to you. The padding on the firewall is very fragile and will break. If there is no sign of rust around the battery tray or up on the front section of the floor boards then leave them alone. Replacements are near impossible to find. You might find one off a parts car. Are you talking about the stainless steel drip rails? They clean up real easy with some fine steel wool. I have seen replacements pop up on e-bay every now and again. And yes remove them before blasting and paint. If you haven't purchased one yet I would suggest getting Wick Humbles "How to restore your Z" book. It has massive amounts of information that will help you in your restoration. He even shows how to properly remove the drip rails. Good luck and enjoy.

Wow, what a great find! Remember a while back someone mentioned that in order to reduce production costs, there were things that were "discontinued" or not used. What if, this was one of the "prototypes" with all the bells and whistles like A/C, auto trans, tool boxes, vents, booster, etc...? On another note. Look where the horn's should be. Is there a bracket of some kind there?

Go to "All Z Auto Wrecking" they are at 793 B&C Energy Way, Chula Vista. It's over by Coors Ampetheater where all the junk yards are.

Jet Hot has a warranty on the headers against rust. I'm not sure on the time limit (it's been a while since I went through this). I think that if it's within 1 year they will recoat the headers no charge. You only pay for shipping. After the year they cover 50% of the recoating charges.

Welcome to the world of Zed's. If I remember correctly the 240Z was originally designed for a person 6'4" tall. Getting in and out is always a challange since the car is so low. There are always plenty of 240's for sale in So. Cal. Ebay, Autotrader and the paper are your best sources. We have a classified section but I'm not sure if there are any for sale right now. There is a place in San Diego that always has 240's for sale if your down there. Good luck.

It will work but it's not the correct gasket. There are 3 different types. Round, Square (rectangular) and the hex. Get a gasket for the year 75-76 that's the years the N42 head was used.

There is a "piggyback" connector between the engine bay wiring harness and the voltage regulator. From there it goes to two relay's over on the passenger side footwell. There is a long section of wires with a fuse labeled "fuel pump" that goes over towards the fuse block. I'm not sure where it connects into the wiring harness that goes to the rear of the car. At the rear of the car by the passenger side tail light the wires go through the floor. One set of wires go to the fuel level sending unit on the tank and the other to the electric pump. Try a voltmeter on the wires to the pump and see if your getting power. Hope that helps.

Your electric fuel pump is back by the fuel tank, passenger side. You can bypass it with a longer section of hose to feed directly from the tank to the line. Additionally, the wiring for the fuel pump doesn't go anywhere near the washer bottle. The only wires over there are for the washer bottle and the brake system.

Get some jack stands, place them under the frame rails directly behind the T/C rod. Use a small piece of wood between the stand and the rail to prevent any damage to the rail.

Maybe those are the inspection lid rubber strips?

Welcome! Good to see that your doing the job right the first time. She will be a beauty when she's done. What color is she going to be? Keep us updated with pictures!

If your going with stock rubber try Victoria British most of their stuff is from China or Taiwan but for OEM applications they work just fine.

Just two questions. Why are you replacing them? Have you found a correct replacement?

Try Z car source .

If I remember right it's in the hardware section. They have a section with little drawers, where they have nuts & bolts and washers. It should be there. Another place to look is a Sears hardware store. They have an extensive selection of springs.

Home Depot. I got some there identical to the OEM one's.