speedyblue

My 4X4 has an auto in it and i wouldn't have it any other way. I have an International Scout with no roof as a weekend car. I drive it to the beach and such so I'm always in traffic and it would be a mission changing gears all the time. It uses a chrysler 727 torqueflite behind the 345 cube international donk and has a real low stall converter. The stall is generally supposed to be set where the engine makes max torque, which is at 1800rpm on the scout. It's the perfect car for dragging off guys in their Range Rovers. But for the 240Z, definately prefer the 5-speed.

Having a hi stall or low stall converter won't change the overall ratio. Just incase 280zx fevers post threw anyone off. It is like a clutch that will keep slipping up to the stall rate, whether is be 1800rpm or 4500rpm. The closer it gets to the stall point, the less it slips. Having said that, a 4500rpm stall would severely increase fuel comsumption. Auto's are made to change gears fast and hard. Most people don't want this so car manufactures restrict oil passages and stuff so that the autos sliiiiiiiide into gear smoothly, ensuring that the driver/passengers don'e spill their coffee. They also wear out faster because of this. Get a shift kit and the oil gets through better, the gears change faster, wheels chirp and less fuel gets used. Down side, it is all a bit harder on the driveline. My fathers HQ 1 tonner ute with the holden 308 would chirp gear changes with work gear in the back and 265 tyres. Until the input shaft on the auto snapped off. Also broke the teeth off a few diffs. Useless background info I know, but just incase someone was unsure.

I don't think i have ever seen a thermo fan thicker than 2 inches. That is roughly the thicknnes of the one I have. There are quite a few different fans lying aroung the house and they are all about the same size also. Actually, just realised you can just see the fan in my altivar and it is on the front of the radiator. That is why I had no worries with clearance.

Yep that's my car in the Avitar thingy. Very slowly being fixed up to get it back on the road. The G-nose is only recent and hasn't seen the road yet in this car. It is now back to the driveable stage with all the lights working properly, but there are a few little rust issues to fix. It took me to uni for 3 years and to work for about a year and a half, then sat in the garage for another year and a half. But soon to be back in action. I'll try get some piccies uploaded this weekend of various stages. Nissan quoted me $65 for a new boot, and the Zcar shop quoted me $80. I guy had one in the trading post, like new and wanted $5 but it was the early rectangular type. I baulked at paying $65 and was just wondering if anyone had a spare sitting about. In the manual it is referred to as a dust excluder, which is also one name they called it at Nissan.

I am chasing the rubber boot/dust excluder that goes over the gearstick and screws to the gearbox tunnel to keep dirt and water out of the car. It is for a 73 240z so I am after the ovalish one for the later 240Z's and the 260Z's, not the early 240Z ones which were rectangular. Brisbane or Gold coast area would be a bonus. Thanks Scott

I replaced my viscous fan with a single 10 inch thermo fan and temp switch on what is pretty much a stuffed radiator and it worked great on my L28. Even with about a quarter of the cooling fins gone if would only heat up to about halfway. Not running a thermostat though. No idea what volume it flows. But I do love the lack of fan noise when it revs. Makes for much quieter under the bonnet. Revs quicker, but didn't notice any different on the road.

When it is warmed up, run your hand over the radiator tubes and make sure the whole thing is the same temperature. There might be some crud in there blocking up a few tubes and reducing the area it cools with. At least then you can be sure that the whole thing is working properly. I had a car where the bottom third of the radiator didn't heat up because it was blocked. The tubes ran horizontal on it though.

A few of my mates have the ricers. They have basically saved up the cash to start with and gone from there. As you finish uni you get the better job and it all moves along faster. He started with his mum's ford laser. Swapped to a 1.8 liter engine, then swapped that for a 1.8 litre turbo engine, then upgraded that. He was lucky though. His GF's father is a panel beater and so far she has got him various body kit parts and a nice set of racing seats. This has been over about 3 or 4 years. My story, I saved a bit of money working for my father at a labourer whilst at uni, then managed to purchase my first car at the start of my second year of uni. A nice metallic blue 240Z for $2000 from a wreckers in Brisbane. Cost me another $500 to get it in the road and it has continued from there until about 18 months ago when it got parked in the garage for a while. It is getting a second chance now and should be back by the end of the month. It has always been a daily driver though, never got hotted up too much. Looked very tough and sounded even tougher with 235's all round and an L28 with a very open 2.5 inch exhaust. It has got a muffler but it is hard to tell sometimes. Scott

I don't have to worry about the fan shroud because I run thermo fans instead. Much quieter under the bonnet. I can't put the bonnet on for a while yet because the front is stripped bare, hinges, headlights and all in the ready for fittment of a G-nose so I can't go by trial and error. Thanks Scott

I just threw a 280zx radiator into my 240Z because the original one is shot. I can't put the bonnet on just yet, but it looks like it will hit the radiator because it sits higher. The 280zx is a 1983 model. Does anyone know off the top of their head if it will hit and how much it needs to be lowered by? Thanks Scott

When my car was up for sale, someone went over it with a fine tooth comb, and a stud finder. Good Idea actually. Maybe that was the body filler testing device you heard about. Good luck

Once again the 280zx member is still attached to the gearbox while the 'straight' 240Z one is on the floor. Didn't overseas 280zx models have a different, stronger 5-speed? I think I read on the Z-garage site that the rear mount was a little farther back and required something to be modified to fit it in a 240z. They must have moved the mounting points back on the car to accomodate the longer gearbox, but then neded special mounts to fit the old style gearbox to the Aus spec models. I guess by using this mount facing backwards, you could fit one of those gearboxes to a Z without having to modify the cross member. Any thoughts?

The Gearbox mounts are the same size and the 280zx one will bolt up to the 240Z no worries BUT the centre of the 280zx one is offset towards the front by 10-15mm resulting in a curved cross member.

These pieces are from a 240Z and a 1983 280zx. The steel plates that bolt directly to the engine are the same, 280zx bolted to the block, 240Z on the ground.

The little steel plate that bolts directly to the block and to the rubber bushed engine mount on each side is exactly the same as the one from the engine that came out of the car. The gearbox cross member id different!! Photos to come. Scott

The Engine mounts are the same. I pulled an engine out of my 280zx last night to pu in my 240 but I haven't checked the gearbox cross member yet to see if I need to swap it with my original one. Should have a definate answer some time tonight.

I'm swapping an L28 straight from a 280zxinto my 240Z. Should I swap the front engine pulley with the 240z one or just keep the 280zx one? The 280zx one seems chunkier. How do they hold at high revs?(7000rpm only, not trying to kill the engine here) I have a vauge memory of someone saying they don't cope with the revs. Thanks Scott

Any money you pour into a car you never get back. That is why it is more often than not better to pay more for a better car someone has done up, than settle on a worse one and fix it yourself. If I bought another Z, I would probably look at 8-10 grand mark. I paid $2100 for mine in about '97, plus $500 to get rust fixed and it was a good daily driver for about 6 years. I picked it up from a wrecker. It was cheap because it was dirty, full of rubbish, torn seats, no carpets and the brakes didn't work. (just needed a good bleeding) Bit of a clean up, new carpets and re-trimmed seats and the interour looked great. Drove like a dream. There are bargains out there but you have to distinguish from the rubbish that is for sale as well. Good luck finding your dream car.

If you can work it in, it is also handy to have a good solid beam running accross the ceiling to hang a block and tackle from for lifting out engines and the like. Also a toilet goes well too. You don't get in trouble from putting grease all through the bathroom in the house. But that may be a bit much in this case. I only know one thing for sure, you can never make the garage big enough!!

Single cam pushrod two valves per pot. I was thinking more along the lines of port design in the head and general efficiency and fuel injection, as compared to 10-20 years ago, and carbs, which are still good if well maintained. The engine I was referring to was the Gen III LS1, which is alloy block, alloy heads, but isn't 350cui. Mounting this in the lower position referred to would mean a better handling car again. Add a hotter cam, decent set of extractors and reprogram the computer and you get a good lump of power, but more importantly torque. One good streetable engine. There was someone on HybridZ or somewhere who was doing this swap and had his story on the net. Thats what made it pop into my mind.

If you are going to go for a V8 just slot a new chevy 5.7L engine in there. Why waste time with old technology. Easier than supercharging or NOS. All alloy, so you don't get the huge bulking weight. The engine can easy push 450-500hp naturally aspirated while keeping up to emissions on pump fuel, plus it is fuel injected for reliability and all the rest. just butt up what ever gearbox comes with it from the factory. Surely Australia isn't the only country tweaking these engines. 1hp per cube is as easy target, so 330hp from a 350cui is a bit weak.

It is one thing to be caught speeding, ie driving faster than the set limit, but how do we know that the limit was set correctly in the first place? New roads are designed with a target speed in mind. This design speed controls the minimun site distance around corners, over crests ect, so it is fairly obvious what the speed should be set at, but what about the older roads that twist and turn through the hills. The road out to my house is signed at 60. It is a good road surface with lots of hills and corners. In NSW there are LOTS of narrower roads with hills, tight corners and blind corners that are singposted at 100kph. It is ridiculus to do those speeds. There was a whole study done (Swiss I think but I can't find my old textbook) on working out the best speed for a section of road. They monitored the speeds of cars and then broke it down into percintiles, eg 20% of the cars travelled under 50kph, 40% of the cars travelled under 52kph, 60% of the cars travelled under 56kph, 80% of the cars travelled under 60kph and 99% of the cars travelled under 70kph. They graphed this against the number of crashes with the speed limit set at different percentile ranges and found that there were the least crashes when the limit was set at the 80% limit. Set it higher, more crashes. Set it LOWER, more crashes. It didn't take in to acount the severity of the crashes from what I remember (cmon, it was 4 years ago) but I bevieve it is still the system used for setting the speed limit in many European countries. Much better than some of the 'stab in the dark' methods used here when the local politicians lobby for lower speed limits. I probably have got a few thing slightly wrong here because it was a while ago, but the majority of it should be right. My long winded opinion anyway. Scott (Civil Engineer and novice road designer)