Paulytunes

Cool find! Those are probably very well made and will likely last forever as long as you keep them away from water!

My resolution is to get my rusty floors replaced and drive more.

Looks like I have got a real project on my hands! I will take a look.

I thought I saw some that were like this on one of the Z specific websites. I'll look again. Even still, this is troublesome if the passenger rail repair was done by the same guy who put in the coffee cans and Bondo and then covered it with new tar mat and called it a day. As Warrant Officer Ripley says, "Nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."

Thanks. I feel like it is peeling back an onion, the more I dig, the more I find. Even where the metal is good, it seems somewhat thin and bendable now all of the fill material has been ground away. I certainly did not expect the hole in the passenger side to be that large, or the rivet patch on the driver side to be that big. SMH. Oh well. I feel like Tyler Hoover, my car is giving me an extensive bill for the holidays.

I've been working at grinding down the inside of the floor over the past few weeks when I have had some free time. Driver Side: The rail looks to be original but bent in a few places. It no longer meets the floor in the rear. In the front, the floor looks like it was cut away in the front and a new piece of metal was riveted to the original floor that remains. The bad areas of the floor are in the front, and along the frame rail, there are perforations near the seat rails too. The floor aft of the seam seal is all solid - no visible rust or corrosion. The bottom of the rail appears to be corrosion free (hard to tell in the photos), but the inner front side looks deteriorated, I'm concerned that if I grind it or poke at it, it may just flake away. Passenger Side: The frame rail was replaced by a previous owner. You can see areas where it has been bolted in. As far as I know, this was not stock (feel free to correct me if I am wrong). It looks beefier too, like some of the replacement rails (maybe from Dragon Z?) I saw online. Most of the rust damage here was along the run of the frame rail, and this is where one of the previous owners performed the coffee can, rubber, bondo non-welded repairs. It is the worst at the front, continues along the rail until it stops before the seat rail. There is also a pretty substantial hole that was filled in with Bondo. Note to self - next time try to poke it out instead of grinding to minimize the dust. So I'm pondering the best course of action. I want to repair it correctly, which means some amount of welding. I don't know that the driver side frame rail can be easily reattached to the floor, so maybe I should just invest in a new driver side frame rail? Is there a rule of thumb as far when the whole floor should be replaced versus if cutting out the damaged areas and patching in new sheet metal will suffice?

Thanks again for posting these, they are indeed mesmerizing, and it is fascinating watching a true craftsman perform. Although, it is going to have a negative effect on the repairs that I do myself, because he's in a completely different league, I'm not worthy! Also, I just want to spend time with the tools he has at his disposal, especially the sandblaster.

That's awesome! Did the new Z feel larger than the S30? My 280Z makes my WRX look like a small SUV. It's ridiculous how much cars have grown in size and weight over the decades. I'd also be curious to know how the new Z drove versus your 240Z.

I found my Z's twin! Same color and everything, just built 4 months earlier: No Reserve: 1976 Datsun 280Z 2+2 4-Speed for sale on BaT Auctions - ending December 20 (Lot #131,317) | Bring a Trailer It will be interesting to see how much it sells for, and I wonder what those floors look like under that carpet?

Me three. The process videos look like he stuck his video camera up to the view window of a commercial CNC machine. Not unlike some of the machines we have at work, which can easily cost up in the six figures and sometimes seven. The videos are also very well produced, as others have already mentioned.

Thanks for sharing this, it was an intoxicating watch. The first video exemplifies what I love about these cars - that those of us with above average mechanical aptitude can take these cars apart with a good metric toolset. Putting them back together, well, that's what the FSM and thousands of digital photos are for.

Yikes! I've tapped around quite a bit on my floor boards. After watching your video, I'm scared to do the same to my rails. But, I do need to know the full extent of the rust so I can get rid of it.

Done and thanks! It was $23 today as a black Friday deal. It'll be here in a week. I concur with all that I still have a lot of work to do. I want to angle grind away the areas in front of the pedals and clear out what looks like surface rust. Sorry about the quality of the photos - I guess my phone isn't the best for taking photos in the garage.

Thanks! From what I can see, the rails still look solid. No dents, and the driver side has the flanges intact. It's harder to tell on the passenger side - I'll need to go and take a closer look. From what I can tell from looking under the car without a lift, the rails look to be complete. I'm sort of on the fence now about the work. I've shown photos and talked to a few friends who have done their own hobby auto work. They have encouraged me not to be too afraid of trying to learn how to do some patch welding if that's all that is needed. I did do some welding many years ago I was on the mini-baja team years ago at UMBC, so I am not a complete welding virgin, ha ha. Still, I may reach out to Tim - Thanks for the contact info!

davewormald, I couldn't agree with you more. Touchscreens are a very poor substitute for well placed, tactile buttons that you intuitively learn to reach for without looking at it - my previously and currently owned Subarus and Toyotas (and 280Z, of course) seemed to do this pretty well. The Golf Mk8 is likely the shining example, in my opinion, of one of the most poorly executed infotainment and vehicle control systems, but BMWs are pretty bad too. I agree there is much irony in the fact that operating one of these poorly designed control systems is not considered distracted driving because takes more time and focus than a terrible driver would expend upon trying to check texts or make a phone call on their smartphone. Unfortunately, we can only defend ourselves against those who don't take driving seriously. Maybe the solution is putting all of them in driverless, automated vehicles. Being a Mechanical Engineer, I have wondered often where the high point of analog/mechanical excellence is in automotive design and at what year we reached that plateau. We've certainly passed that point now, and I guess you could make the argument that when EFI entered the picture, that may be where the line is drawn. Still, my fuel injected 280Z gives me feedback that most modern cars have filtered out. Even though most vehicles now on the highway accelerate faster, the modern metal just doesn't have that visceral feeling that mashing the accelerator, the throttle linkage extending, and the L28 roaring in response. Older cars have a sense of urgency and connection that has been lost on modern cars, in my opinion. I guess that brings us into the car manufacturers getting into adding fake features to modern cars. All I want to ask is why would they choose this route? To me, this is providing a half-assed solution that no one is really going to want or respect, akin to adding silly modifications that provide no performance value, yet the installer will swear up and down that the car has more horsepower because they added a silly yellow sticker. I hate the fake exhaust sound pumped into the cabin because it is fake and serves no purpose other than to fool the passengers. If you want me to feel more connected to the road, make me a car that has an analog dash, ergonomically well placed controls, and that I can work on myself as needed. Unfortunately, no one will ever make a new car with these features, because too few people would by it. "The world has moved on," as Stephen King says.

At this point I am wondering if I should just bite the bullet and buy the set of 280Z floors and frame rails or if I should do a little more uncovering to see the full extent of the rust?

Yeah, I need to get under and take a more detailed look. My initial glances are that it appears to be solid, and the mechanic that looked at it for me when I bought it didn't see anything when he had it on the lift. I am looking into getting one of those portable lifts (maybe tomorrow if there are any good sales) so I can get under and take a look. If not, I have four decent jackstands and just need to verify the jacking points are in good enough shape to support the car. Of course, this will be after all of the requisite holiday festivities, decorating, and other activities. Happy Thanksgiving to all of you, BTW! I am happy to be part of such a great Z community and keeping our cars and hobby alive!

Thanks! Driver side has some rust and a few perforations. Passenger side appears to be in decent shape.

So I had some time this morning today to try the dry ice method to remove the tar mat from the floors and get a better idea of the extent of the rust and other non-welded repair work. It was definitely easier than just scraping, but was more work than some of the YouTube videos would lead you to believe, unless I did it wrong. Still, I was also able to turn it into a science lesson for my kids (who were off today for Thanksgiving break) to demonstrate the difference in thermal properties of differing materials. My son seemed to think it was cool, but my daughter lost interest pretty quickly. It looks like the driver side is the worst, especially at the front. The passenger side appears to be localized along the rail, and it looks like there was a bolted repair performed on the rail. They had put in more Maxwell House coffee cans along the passenger rail with some sort of rubberized coating, tar mat, and what looked like some Bondo. Despite the holes, the floor feels solid in most places. I guess I have some grinding to do now to get rid of the rust and see where I need new sheet metal.

I'll still take a crappy rental over a driverless car any day. I agree gas will likely only get more expensive, especially if the Government and auto industry pushes us to electric vehicles. I'm still on the fence with those too. Although the instantaneous power and torque provides almost unmatchable acceleration over gasoline powered combustion engines, I have still yet to see one that excites me enough to want to make the leap. I'll argue that there is no current electric vehicle that provides the same fun-to-drive factor as the few remaining performance cars still being offered.

Not much with new cars now is serviceable. With all the integrated infotainment and computer systems that look like slapped on iPads, there's no easy way to even upgrade the stereo anymore if you want better sound or other media features. And when you have to remove a lot of plastic nonsense to even get to the serviceable engine parts and need special tools to do any work, why would you want to?

Unfortunately, this is the future I think we are heading towards. To that I say they will have to pry my steering wheel out of my cold, dead hands. I enjoy driving, even in traffic, far too much to give it up, much less to an automated machine. It's only a matter of time before they become self aware and determine our fate in a microsecond. Of course, I also hate the digital dashboards, touchscreens, and all the driving nannies that most modern cars come with now. I guess I'm getting old. But, I am likely in the shrinking minority. I think my wife and daughter would welcome being chauffeured around by AI, I'm holding out hope that my son inherited the driving pleasure gene from me. That's what I got my 280Z for, to pass on my knowledge and passions to him.

I sort of suspected that there may be a difference. Nissan seemed to like to change parts in some cases almost yearly. I found that out the hard way with my 1983 810/Maxima. I'll keep at removing the tar and the repairs to get a full assessment of the damage. I did pull out the rear seats, and everything to the rear of the first front seat rail appears to be solid and in good shape. I guess I won't fully know until I pull up all the tar though.

Point taken. I guess I tend to forget just how old these cars have become and how old I am getting. My intent is to drive the car and enjoy it but treat it as a classic. I always keep it in the garage, avoid bad weather whenever possible, and not to drive when there is a threat of snow and MDOT pretreats the roads with copious amounts of road salt and other chemicals.

Thanks, it's nice to know that all these parts are available. I guess what I will need depends on the extent of the rust, so I guess I really do need to keep removing the previous repairs and find out where the rust ends and the good metal begins. Hopefully, I don't end up with an undrivable Flintstones cruiser. It's odd that one of the POs would drill an extra drain hole, I don't understand why they would do that. I did notice some of the parts you referenced were for the 240Z - I assume they were the same for the all the S30 models? Mechanically, I have run into differences between model year 280Zs on certain parts.