AK260

Jon is the man when it comes to these things! His speeduino setup and tuning is great to follow! So here’s the thing, I got fed up of paying money for rolling road tuning that to my mind didn’t give me as good a tune as it should have. Hence the analogue MTX. While I’m a frustrated data junkie and would love to have data in spreadsheets to play with, I find using the standalone AFR gauge invaluable under all throttle conditions. It has helped me tune the cruising AFR and with the custom timing using the 123 ignition (particularly useful for the vac advance and around the reversion conditions causing a torque hole). So in short, yes it does help in other than WOT conditions. It’s also interesting to see how the car is behaving at different AFRs and throttle applications. For example, exhaust popcorn popping on the overrun starts at 16:1 or I find it interesting to see it go instantly rich (12ish) as soon as I plant the throttle and then slightly leaner as carb pistons start to rise and then richer again as the fuel catches up with the air flow. Or even that when I come off WOT, it’s still richer than expected for a second or two - unlike what I am used to with fuel injection on other cars. Likely due to residual fuel on the walls of the intake/ in the carbs. I get a perverse sense of satisfaction having this knowledge. ;)

I use the innovate you mentioned in your original post. My initial plan was to take it to bits and build it into the clock face so as to keep the car “looking” original but at the flick of a switch, the minute hand on the clock would turn into an AFR display. (My clock is dead anyway!) Actually, that is a terrible idea as I find having it in my field of view far more useful than having to take my eyes off the road to read it. I looked at options to add rev and MAP sensors as well as the data logging unit. It does get costly though. This would be the ideal way forward and I will go that way at some point when I can justify it. What I have found though, is that even using it standalone temporarily stuck to the windscreen - doing 2nd or 3rd gear pulls on my local dual carriageway from 2k rpm, it has been invaluable for my WOT tuning efforts. It also helped me instantly know my fuel pump had failed when the engine intermittently lost power - the AFR needle went Far East quickly. Watching the needle dancing based on throttle conditions does become addictive.

I was in need to getting out of my own head this evening, so I went for some Z therapy - a drive after kiddies’ bath time. Warming the car up in the driveway on the choke at 2krpm, in want was a very dark night I spotted the primaries glowing orange!!! The iPhone camera does over emphasise the colours and makes them look 500*c hotter!!! Super glowing primaries Batman ... Is anyone else up for taking a photo of their primaries at 2k rpm in near darkness and uploading here? Would be interesting to see! FYI - that’s a Z-Story race/sport stainless steel header. And before anyone asks, the AFR was sitting at 12.8ish + timing at 2krpm is set to 22 degrees.

Just to confirm this point I swapped out my 3.54 for the 3.9 this summer and while it’s only a 10% difference, it is noticeably quicker. I hate it when you ask a question and the suggestions are trying to take you in a different direction, but let me do exactly that: you could spend the money on the head (where the power is made) and drop in a crank from an L26/L28 to get to 2.6L without any boring (if that’s what you want to do). The advice above I feel is sound, while you have the engine apart, you may as well have fresh bores with your new piston rings to wear together. You could go a little (safe amount) over and get more displacement too. Food for thought maybe.

Agreed - however, I have since this post found some without prices quoted - so I assume they will be “reassuringly” expensive ;)

Thank you! I ask as I’m pretty sure I have the same wheels on my car - just painted in the middle, so I have been trying to find who made them. There are no names in the markings, just a US patent number. Having said that, I’ve just spotted the Appliance logo at the bottom left of my photo - which until now made no sense to me.

We see quite a few of those here at classic car events - a Z parked next to one makes it look positively dated! Only 3000ish were sold in the US so I imagine they would be very rare over there. Sadly the 2.5 & 3.0 V8s weren’t the best engines for reliability, so I can imagine in a market where V8s are a staple diet, it was left wanting. They do sound great at full pelt though!

Loving this car!! What wheels are those and do you know what offset / width?

Just no!!!!

Well gang, in Blighty we’re back in lockdown from Thursday. The kids are still going to school but that means it’s not a great time to be a teacher.

Nope! I believe everything he says ;)

Nah, stupid Brexit will fix all our ills!! ;)

Now Germany and France are going back into national lockdown ... https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-germany-to-enter-four-week-lockdown-from-november-chancellor-merkel-confirms-12117056 Something to look forward to as it sounds like we are heading in a similar direction in the UK. https://www.bloombergquint.com/politics/johnson-braces-for-england-lockdown-as-coronavirus-cases-surge

PCV issues would affect all cyls not just one.

Totally agree with Mark, California man is trying to blow you off with a vanilla response / Jedi mind tricks. Did you tell him the other plugs are OK and you’ve checked the electrical system? If he knows that then he is purposefully missing the point. A decent supplier would have at least recommended some further tests. I would do what Mark suggested and if you have a decent phone with a decent camera on it, it may be easier to see what you have by taking pics and zooming in. I often find my iPhone 11’s camera is able to see much more detail in dark / tight places on the car than I can with a naked eye. Also, should you find something wrong, you can send photos to the Cali-man.

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And I bet you only need to charge it once a week! [emoji106][emoji106]

Wow Alan! That is pretty shady practice. I was reading the advert on the phone under a duvet while having insomnia and half a brain on - clearly missed a lot of what you pointed out. So in reality someone is likely to spend upwards of £60k only to discover they have a cut and shut in all but name! :o It reminds me of another car that came out of the ZFarm with a “questionable VIN v rest of car” situation which a good friend of mine bought and returned to them.

I’m no purist but part of me laments such a low VIN being turned into a rally car in “recent” years. But I guess in 2010 you could import a LHD car to the UK for the price of a bag of potato chips. https://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C1280219 The “Samuri” spec can polarise opinions - but that aside, this seems like a fun car to rally if that’s your thing.

Much like using carbs v EFi I guess :p But what we are not appreciating here is that [mention]Captain Obvious[/mention] is still beating his clothes between two rocks by the river, winding up his gramophone / listening to the wireless set while winding his clocks daily.

Gland nut removal tool .... Old bracket + 8.8 bolts and a step drill to widen the centre hole. Just add hammer. 2lb is ideal. Oh and bolt strut bottom to the garage floor pre-drilled with a couple of rawlplugs in place. Clearly the original gland nut needs a couple of holes drilled but the new ones from Koni come pre-drilled.

Good God man! You still don a flip phone!?!?!? You really do like your classics !!! ;)

Thanks for the kind words gents. It’s been a tough couple of weeks, but life has to go on. Nothing EVER prepares you for losing a parent. It is strange how people still think it’s not real or play Russian roulette with theirs and other people’s health / lives. I do estimate - and I say this with a positive mindset - that this thing will be with us for at least 5 years. The positive being, knowing this fact, we accept and adapt to a new normal and make it work with our lives. This is my logical unemotional view: Q3 next year we have a fully tested (albeit rushed) vaccine, but it won’t be widely available and prioritised in its dispensation. Most likely the very wealthy and societal / political elites first then the old and infirm, then Jo Public. With a wider availability there will undoubtedly be a backlash with as yet unknown or more severe side effects than anticipated. Therefore many people would likely reject it in the near term - who wants to be a guinea pig, right? Then there is the challenge of getting it to everyone within our respective borders once considered safe. That’s all lovely, but what about other parts of the world following similar timelines and widespread availability? Those people who will cross borders either as business people, tourists or refugees etc who may not have had the means or availability to be immunised. This is of course assuming big pharma does not get a greedy gold rush mentality and governments having a strong degree of influence and not being complicit. An example is a recent Covid home test kit that is available in your local pharmacy (great I thought) but at £120 a test it’s not practical for the “average” wage earner to use effectively unless heavily subsidised. Certainly the challenges posed by the likes of my buddy who are anti-vaxxers can’t be addressed overnight without major unrest and human rights challenges coming to the fore. Meanwhile, the big corporates etc are busily farming jobs to low cost offshore locations to reduce the impact of Covid on profit margins. Equally realising that remote working is really quite effective and real-estate / business travel isn’t as essential as previously envisioned. So our previous world equilibrium has been greatly upset and unlikely to return. Having ran a global offshoring programme for a large European bank where we took 6000 jobs to India in 2 years, I saw first hand the issues that resulted with many of those jobs coming back to onshore low cost locations. A discussion for another time. So, fore armed with acknowledging this reality of a new normal, we must strive to keep ourselves and others as safe as humanly possible while walking life with practical feet.

Well done! At least you found it. I tend to mark the important load bearing bolts / nuts with a little bit of acrylic yellow (airfix model) paint. That way I know if the critters have moved at all. This sort of thing worries me a lot given my very spirited driving.