lww

Jeff, yes, that was my ZX that was rolled at THill back in May. Well, the results are in. After having run as high as 6th place, some non-mechanical problems in the last 30 minutes of the race resulted in us finishing 11th overall out of 121 cars. Still a respectable finish (my highest finish in 7 events!). To top things off, the car was signed by Pete Brock at last weekends Historic Races at Laguna Seca! It's going to be hard to change the paint now that it's been "endorsed" by Pete himself! John Morton was going to come over in the afternoon to check it out and put his signature on it, but was interrupted by an unplanned trip to the hospital when he was t-boned by another car and flipped while driving 1 of 3 existing 1958 Scarab race cars! We'll get him to sign it when he makes his way back up here to NorCal. Here's a great pic of us "leading the pack" during one of the infrequent yellow flags:

This should make some purists angry... And yes, our race car # is 46!

Has anyone put a Pertronix in a 280ZX distributor? Given the cost of a replacement ignition module, the Pertronix would be a much cheaper option and probably last longer too. I was searching around on the Pertronix website, but couldn't find anything. I was planning to call them directly and see if they had an application for it, but wife, kids and work keep screwing up my schedule!

Relatively stock motor with bolt-ons... Header, airbox, re-built SU's, mild cam. It's got everything you can do shy of coil-overs. Tokico HP's with Eibach springs custom cut to height, Suspension Techniques sway bars, front strut tower bar, adjustable camber kit, custom modified rear control arms and the part that makes it truly perform, a nice set of Hoosier R3S05's in 225/50/15...

You are correct. And it's actually an Exige not an Elise, but that's not the point. Although my Z can reel them in on the corners, I'm basically a rolling speed bump for the big iron and the turbo cars on the straight! I do enjoy embarrassing the big cars from the cork screw through turn 11 where I can brake a lot later than they can and I don't have to worry about saving my brakes with the front straight to cool them off.

Well, looks like I broke a ring and possibly a ring land on the #3 cylinder... Coming around turn 9 at Laguna Seca at a high rate of speed with a too low gas tank, I starved the motor and it looks like it leaned out enough to pop #3. It's only holding 75 psi now... ;( Oh well, here are some pics anyway: http://tinyurl.com/2klvx6

Yup, it looks real.

Hey Ron, Yeah, I should have had the 4.11's or the 4.38's in, but I was pressed for time the night before and didn't have time to switch out the 3.70's. That 510 is in a completely different class and has a boat load more power and significantly more beefy brakes. I was completely out of brakes by turn 9 on the first lap and everything after that was managed purely by momentum and engine braking... :stupid:

The yellow car was a very fast 510. The little red number is an Austin Healy Bugeye Sprite. It's setup as a full race car with full road race slicks and it weighs about 87 lbs... It was ridiculous when I was trying to follow him in a different session. He has a complete disregard for the proper racing line. It just doesn't matter to that car. The flashy thing on my windshield is indeed a GTech Pro RR. I didn't realize it was right in the middle of the frame until I downloaded the video from my camera when I got home. Also, someone stepped on my panoramic mirror so the cool peripherial view I wanted was reduced to a small reflection of a part my helmet.

Don't click this link if you're on dial-up. It's 85 MB! http://www.kamikazeracing.org/dl/ZTracks/Thunderhill-20060713-FullSession-1mbps.wmv

I took a chance and bought a $50 HF auto-darkening model on sale over two years ago. Now, I've got 3 of them so when my friends and family are watching me weld, I don't have to worry about their eyes and they can really see what I'm doing. All 3 have worked flawlessly over the last 2 years with no problems. All are solar activated and I've had no flash problems.

Damn David! That engine bay looks freakin' beautiful! I can't wait to get my carbs finished at ZTherapy. I picked up a good used set with linkage for $50 that I'm sending in so I can still drive my 240.

No problem Dave, and I won't even hold it against you that I'm not MikeW! PM me pics of your LED tail lights if you've got 'em. That's got to be a nice compliament to your tail light relay harness!

Independant plug for Dave and a little post whoring... After seeing the quality of Dave's original harness, I plan to buy another one (I already have two for my 240z's) for the '75 280Z I'm lookin' for. Snipping a couple of wires to get the rectangle connector is a small price for the piece of mind this thing gives me and the fact that my return caravan made me lead because no one could handle the brightness from my Cibie H4 headlights with Narva 100/55W bulbs! And that was on the LOW beam setting! When I was leading and turned on the HIGH beams, everyone could see a LONG way down the road. Lord help those in front of me if I ever decide to get the 130/100W bulbs... My switch and fusebox never even got warm to the touch and this was a 6.5 hour straight drive with only one stop for gas... Gotta love the mpg potential on these old cars! Dave's harness, good lenses and bulbs will change the way you feel about driving your Z at night.

David, while driving back from MSA, I noticed the only thing that was missing in my night drive was nice strong dash lights. I couldn't see my tail lights, but I bet they were dim too. I'm putting an MO in the mail tomorrow morning to complete my official "David Irwin" collection! Thanks, LWW P.S. Sorry I missed you at MSA! I spent nearly the entire day scrounging up transportation for the NOS OEM hood I picked up for $50!

Ken, you are the man! Thank you! WW

Now THAT one works! Unfortunately, it's missing one wire... hmmm... Mine has 5 wires including the ground (6 including the Antenna) and that diagram shows only 4... I'm starting to think this radio came out of a different year...

That looks exactly like the wiring diagram in my '72 FSM, and it doesn't show the radio wiring... just like my '72 FSM...

I'll bet, if someone can find a source for those round connectors for Dave he'd do it! Or, Dave may be able to include the other end of the 240 connector for his harness and limit the amount of "extra" work to a connector swap for the 260/280z crowd. Anyway, I'm totally miffed that I missed Dave at MSA, but I spent the better part of the show trying to scrounge up some transportation for the VERY slightly dented NOS OEM hood I picked up for my 240Z for $50... If anyone is wondering, yes, the hood WILL fit in the back of a 240Z as long as you don't mind driving around hunched over with the hood resting on the top of your seat's headrest!

I bought an OEM radio and I want to swap it back into my '72 to replace the broken 1970's Pioneer that was in there. I just want to make sure I don't put the power wire to the speaker... Or if anyone knows what color is what. Even my '72 FSM doesn't say exactly what color wire does what...

135.1 * 1.25 = ~168.875 crank hp 127 * 1.25 = ~158.75 crank torque If you have an SAE Net rating you can calculate the approximate wheel hp by multiplying it by 0.8 to get a relatively close approximation. Mine doesn't have any of your upgrades either... My next shot is a header, cam and ZTherapy carbs... We'll see how it does once I get some more capacity into the system.

Not too bad for a '72 with 150k on the odometer. 116 hp and 121 ft/lbs of torque with stock airbox, stock SU's and stock motor. Air fuel ratio was spot on through nearly the entire rpm range. A little lean at the bottom and a little fat at about 3750 to 4250 and spot on up to redline. Took it to 7000 rpm... complete waste of time. Second and third runs only went to 6500. The only upgrade is a Crane XR700. No more points to worry about! WooHoo! Every mechanical item on the car with the exception of the heater core has been R&R'd or verified it's within factory operating specifications. Now all it needs is a complete paint job... and interior panels... and carpet... and weather stripping... and vapor lines w/new grommets... and stock radio with hidden modern radio... :stupid:

Carl speaks with authority. There are exceptions to this rule, but they are so far and few between as to be statistically improbable. I bought one of my 240Z's for $500 with under 120,000 miles, mostly because what they seller thought was rust through the driver side rear quarter/floor was actually the sound deadening material cracked and flaking away. I only ever looked at the car after work in the dark and couldn't tell it wasn't what we both thought it was. Anyway, aside from that, the car was in excellent shape with good tires and new steering rack. So far, I've got about another $6500 into the car and the interior and exterior are NOT started on yet... After paint and interior, I expect I'll have well over $15k in the car and I won't expect to get more than about $8k-$10k out of it if I ever sell. A relatively good rule of thumb I use is to expect to get about half what I've got into any restoration project at the time of sale. At least when it comes to these cars.

How about a detailed step by step description of the process?