jmortensen

If you really want a lot of power and want the best bang for your buck, go straight to the turbo or another engine like a V8. Tons of power without breaking the bank. Building a really hot L engine is expensive and will probably require race gas. I had a decent chunk of money in my L28 and I did a lot of the work myself, ran triple Mikunis and all that stuff. Was making in the 240 whp range, but the car require 96 octane gas to not ping, so I was mixing race gas with premium to get the right octane, it just turns into a real PITA very quickly. By contrast the V8 I'm building for my Z made 315 hp stock cost $1100 (of course that doesn't include trans, driveshaft, carb, etc to run it), but it should make more like 400 bhp when it is running, and will run on 87 octane.

DOT R-compound tires will really transform the car. If you're just getting into autocross I'd start with a harder compound. Don't know if Victoracers are still available, but something like that would be good. You'll find that the faster you go the more you wear the outer edge of the tire. By starting with a tire that wears better, you'll spend less money on that and can concentrate more on modding the suspension to prevent that tire wear. This is the part where the car starts to get REALLY fun to drive.

I think you're overstating the case. I ran points and my first Z did fine. I think your argument is too generic. Make a point like "they can't rev to xxxx rpm" or "the spark energy is weak because a full 12 volts to the coil will burn up the points" or something like that. The argument you have made is too generic. One could just as easily say "carburetors are antiquated garbage" or "macpherson struts are antiquated garbage" or "drum brakes are antiquated garbage" etc. EI is better because it gives a stronger spark and doesn't suffer from point bounce at high rpms, but that doesn't mean that points don't work. They just don't work as well.

I had one changed to single points on my first Z. You need the single point breaker plate. So basically, you need either parts from a single point distributor (which I had), or you need a whole single point distributor to take parts from, and at that point why not just install the single point distributor? But if you're going to buy a single point distributor, why not just buy a ZX distributor? Then you get a better advance curve from a performance perspective and it's already EI, so you don't need the pertronix parts.

I think I got a really good deal picking one up for $150. I've seen $250.

$7K for a 280 is good money as far as I'm concerned. Not sure what to think about neoprene bushings, other than I wonder if you have to pee on the bushings for them to keep you warm when you're swimming. ;-)

Literally bypassing the mechanical pump is a bad idea. I ran a hose from the inlet to the outlet when I first ran the electrical pump, because I wasn't sure it was going to work as I wanted, so I wanted to be able to plug the mechanical pump back in if necessary. The mechanical pump is cooled by the fuel that flows through it. If you cycle the same fluid through it gets too hot and the diaphragm bursts and you get a engine compartment anti-rust treatment in the form of oil spraying all over the place. If you want to get rid of the pump, get or make a block off plate.

Might also be able to grind on the calipers a bit too, depending on where they rub. Be careful with wheel spacers on a Z. The ones you buy at the auto parts store just barely don't fit. It's close enough that I bolted them on for a couple years, all the while wondering why I couldn't get the wheels balanced right. Finally one of them started to crack. I replaced with different spacers and that solved the problem.

Try plugging "drifting falling floating weightless" or whatever words you can remember from any song into a search engine. Works almost every time.

They should be the same. I would suggest you trash your solid diff mount and get a Ron Tyler mount. It's better in every respect. He didn't flip the mustache bar by chance, did he? It should be behind the suspension.

Poly bumpstops aren't punishing unless your springs and/or shocks are worn out. They only get used when the suspension bottoms out.

Sounds like a badly blown out strut to me, but I think you're going to have to take it apart to figure that one out.

NSFW--What is your major malfunction, Private Pyle? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecpuOJwQKQg

I would suggest disconnecting the vacuum advance and running the car at about 18 degrees BTDC timing at idle and see how that floats your boat. I got really good mileage like that with SU's. Add MSD for even better mileage and you don't have to use the E12-80 module, just run the module built into the MSD. The one thing I didn't see you mention is jumping the ballast resistor. It should run with the ballast in place but you'll get a lot hotter spark with it bridged. Having used both quite a bit (first Z had points) I wouldn't run a point distributor unless it was absolutely necessary.

The external kind is a can of fuel. Has a carb fuel pump to fill and an overflow at the top which goes back to the fuel cell, and a bung at the bottom for the FI fuel pump. Here is an article on building one for a 510. http://www.ratdat.com/?p=168

With a separate tank you do need a carburetor fuel pump to fill the tank (overflow goes back to the cell). Then you have your FI pump coming out of the tank to the FPR/fuel rail. If I understand it right the internal surge tank is more like the baffles around an oil pickup than a separate surge tank.

A surge tank would have return lines back to the cell if external, so putting it up front would require plumbing a couple more lines to the front and back again. I would put it in front of the cell, off to one side or the other so that a hit to the cell wouldn't necessarily mean a hit to the surge tank. The surge tank also doesn't need to be really huge, so if you make it smaller then you're taking less risk. Putting it in the cell is a nice idea, but I think risks can be minimized without the expense just by moving what you have a couple feet forward.

I thought the same thing: that course is WIDE open. It would be a good track for a high hp Z car. I don't agree about the torque though. Why would rotational force snap the water pump pulley? Was he running tar for coolant? I think it's far more likely that some gorilla with a prybar tightened the belt way too tight and that snapped the water pump shaft. Just guessing though...

I've seen it on Hybrid Z, search there. For what it's worth, if you're going to be working on the underside of the car (especially welding) being able to flip it all the way over is a big help. I made my rotisserie out of 3 Harbor Freight engine stands and my car has been on it for several years. I can't imagine only being able to rotate 90 degrees, that would have sucked for a lot of the welding I had to do.

Yes, as I said in the other thread, you can run the wires from the ZX pickup coil to the Ford pickup pigtail on a 6AL (I would assume the 6A has the same thing) and it will run fine. I'm not sure why the other threads where I said I had done this weren't good enough, but for the record again, yes, it works.

Tips for Prius drivers (NSFW--foul language)

Locost is one hell of a cool idea. If I ever give up on the Z, that's what I'll build next.

Don't you think the OP has probably figured it all out by now? He's had 8 years to mull it all over.

It's obviously a Ferrari V12 header.

How about... wait for it... Gunk. You can put the diff in a parts washer or a solvent tank, but if you submerge it you'll get solvent in the oil. Not sure what effect the solvent will have on the seals either if that matters. I put my bare housing in my solvent tank and cleaned it that way before reassembly, worked great.