madkaw

I am trying to get my wiring harness back together to get my car started. After some endless searching to find out what the fusible link even LOOKS like I figured out what I am missing(by looking at the MSA site:)) My question is; to save time and maybe expense can I use just a maxifuse or something in place of that fusible wire and more importantly what value of fuse would I use at this junction?

Thanks for the link. When i searched I didn't put in corner seals, I was using quarter window seals so i didn't come up with that thread. I guess i will need to take my laptop to the garage and read as I work!!!

Thanks E, I knew you would know. So the seal that goes on the DOOR frame, it should be folded like I found the old one? Does the pointed part go up or down? I guess I will try turning it all around to see how it goes unless someone has a pic. As far as the quarter seals, these old ones I have seem servicable, would they be sufficient? I think I have one side of the other type you are refering to E, but I didn't see where there was enough fastener attachment points on my window. I have only two screws at the top of the quarter, nothing at the bottom. I figured that the seal on the sheetmetal was for later models. Thanks again guys.

Even with my 'how to restore your Z car" book, I can't figure out the weatherstrip for the quarter window-specifically the lower corner pieces. My car is a 9/71 which is one of those transitional months for these cars. From what I read my car uses just the small piece in the lower corners. I don't remember what my car had since i took it apart so many yeras ago:stupid: I have included pictures of what I have in the way of new pieces and some old pieces I had laying in storage. Picture 2 shows some old seals that I had in storage. I think it is obvious that these slip on the bottom of the quarter window frame. They are actually very usable. Picture 3 shows the new seal that I got from MSA. Not sure where it fits into on the window. Picture 4&5 show another old seal that i had. It is basically the new seal from MSA with one end folded over. Still can't figure how it fits. So I need help fitting these seals. Do I use both kinds or will the seals in pic 5 suffice?

I try not to watch the calendar, but it is only 4 months away and I have lots to do. I have made some major progress in that I got my headliner in, which was holding back from completing many other jobs. The front windshield also went in with little trouble, though I nicked the seal slightly installing the trim. I had my trim powder coated matte black like everything else that is trim ,and I am happy with the look. The rear hatch was a bi$%h and it took three of us to persuade it to settle in. Again I suffered a nick installing the trim, it was even tougher on the rear hatch. I also got some tears on the inner part of the seal, but no one will see them and it shouldn't affect the sealing of the window. I also got some needed items from the plater, but once again there are issues. The acid or whatever they used ate up some off the nylon pieces. I was told by the plater that the "plastic "should be fine, but this stuff is nylon I guess. Anyone else have this issue? The ball end on one of the carb linkages looks really bad, but I can't remove that end since it is pressed on or something. So maybe I can replace that end or see if they can plate another one without dipping that nylon ball. Questions: Is the door latch assembly supposed to be yellow zinc like everything else? Mine are very clean, but it doesn't look like it everhad any "yellow" to it. How do you install a new choke grommet on a set of choke cables?

I have heard of this problem before, so i plan on installing rivnuts in all of the holes and installing the panels with black machine screws so they won't move around it all. Sorry i can't comment on the MSA rivets

I talked to the VB customer service and she said that there seals were NOT made by precision, but wouldn't tell who did make them. Your point about the channel might be valid, but I didn't notice much of a change in channel width with the precision seal. Either way, the precision seal channel is VERY tight around the trim and I did nick the seal installing the trim. Definitely install trim before installing the glass in the car. Lubricate seal with windex or something so the trim will slide around easier. I'm going to live with the nick, because it was scary enough putting a new seal on a 40 year old glass(with the vertical lines) without busting it, I don't want to do that again.

Arne, I would be tempted to use the VB seal, but it wouldn't match the front seal-and the difference is too great. I think your right that the seal does hide more of the SS then it should, but I powder coated all my SS black, so it doesn't show much anyway. A special note; I read that it is a good idea to install the trim before installing the windshield in the car and that worked out well. I put the glass on a body stand and was able to "work" the seal as i installed the trim.

Okay, so I thought I lost my precision hatch seal from MSA and i ordered another one from VB,---because MSA was on back order. I get the VB window seal today and notice a distinct difference in the seal when it comes to the SS trim channel. The pic says it all. The VB channel for the molding in MUCH wider then the MSA seal. It looks too wide and I would be skeptical of how well it would hold the molding in place. I used a precision on the front windshield and the molding fit very snug under the channel lip. I will probably send back or sell the hatch window seal from VB, but I wanted to present this to the forum for some feedback. I will say that the rubber on the VB seal looked better and seemed a bit softer, but the difference was negligible IMHO. There was no manufactuer name on the VB packaging, so I don't know who makes it

I had a big day today. I finally got my headliner installed with the A pillar stuff too--what a big job-I'm sore.

The floor plugs will cost an extra 20$ or so, I guess you'll need to decide if it's worth the extra time and cost to go without. The Nissan plugs are good quality and should hold up for many years. The holes will come in handy for when I etch the metal for por-15, I can reuse the metal prep by catching the remander from the holes.

Glad I can motivate someone else .. I usually set my goals pretty high, but I wouldn't have it any other way. As far as the floors, I did bolt in the crossmember before I tore things apart and I don't believe anything shifted with this car, but the car is pretty solid everywhere else. The frame rails and rockers are solid which makes a big difference with these cars. I'm glad on my car I didn't have to do this, my floors just had surface rust. My headliner material came in today, so i know what my next major project is now! because after that job, everything should feel down hill.

just noticed your signature ajmcforester. I was actually born and raised Moorestown NJ. Loved hanging out at the cherry Hill mall and my parents still live there. I was ever so glad to get out of that state.

Floors aren't too bad since no one really see them if you do a terrible looking job:D I tried to make these look stock appearing from the outside. I also strived to do as much of the welding as I could outside the car or from on top of the panel. Anyone considering this job should order about 20 clecos from Summit or somewhere. They are a great tool for doing this kind of repair and they are cheap. I probably have 50 hours in the floors which include the floor supports and tying into the tension rod boxes to repair the bottom side of those. I still have rockers, doglegs, and hatch sill plate and a couple of other small items to finish on this customers car while i'm trying to finish mine in time for Zcon. When I get tired of doing the noisy, dirty work on this car i go and do some clean work on mine to keep my sanity. Actaully I think I like the dirty work as much!

Doesn't sound real good does it, maybe she's really stuck. When i took my head in from my early e-88, the guides were ready to fall out-so the machinist said. So maybe yours are about the same and the valve is in a bind.From Bloomington, now up in Avon-small world! Good luck

I have seen more then one Z do this, that's why I asked. The valves on the earlier car had a sticking issue. My car did it, and another car i worked on did the same thing. The valve sticks and then the rocker displaces which caused 0 compression. Keep at it with the penetrant. That car sat for 18 years and most of the cylinders came back strong . At the airport the mechanics would have to "shock" the valves on some of the recip engines by actually hitting the valve with a hammer(making sure the piston was clear).

Nice find on the car, ----how do you know the valve is bent?

Be advised that those floors are like most aftermarket panels-they need lots of work to fit. I posted on HybridZ about the floor pans , but recieved no responses. I feel that the pans are made too deep(compared to my untouched car), which causes a problem lining up with the floor support. No easy way to fix that unless you want to reform the floors on the outboard side. Then again, I repaired a Porsche 911 floors and those panels weren't that great either. As far as my health, I consider this my youth serum:) I try to stay in good condition just so I can continue to play like this. i admit that at 47 this is getting a little tougher, but I'm smarter and work smarter which makes things easier. I go to work dressed for warfare too-gloves, work boots, safety glasses, knee pads and coveralls. This is geniune stress relief for me to beat on some metal in the garage. I wouldn't want to do this for a living though!

Well I had to search to find this thread I started because it was so long ago and that scares me. Zcon seemed pretty far away in January, but as usual time is flying by. I can't say that I am on schedule , but I am getting some things done. The exhaust is finally done, or as done as i am going to get. I bit off a pretty bite trying to make duals for this car. There isn't a lot of rom to work with and this was the first exhaust i ever fabricated. The hard part was making it look symetrical. The lack of room underneath only allows for short mufflers(glasspacks in my case) and it was hard to have them not at some kind of angle. Multiply that by the fact that I put an LSD in and had to fab a support bracket for the rear control arms which got in the way of the original exhaust-sssooooo more fabrication and moving of the exhaust. I ended up with exhaust tips that came out of the rear at a slight angle(down and outward). I'm willing to live with it after seeing a 370z exhaust tips that come out at a downward angle also. Sometimes you just have to say "good enough". I also started putting some of the interior back together. As you know with these cars that everything kind of starts at the headliner when you put a stripped out car back together. Well my headliner i put in was not up to snuff so I am redoing it. The padding I used was too thin and left gaps around the top edges of the headliner-so I pressed on with other items that i could do until more headliner material came in. I installed some firewall insulation from some aircraft stuff a buddy gave me and then I was able to install the heater box which i had already restored. I then moved on to installing my gear shifter and boots. This might seem to be an easy job, but once again I was dealing with a change i made from stock. I installed the BWT-5 and that moved the shifter way foward and I updated the actual shifter which affected how the original rubber boots fit. So basically I took an one hour job and made it a 5 hour job because of my modification. I had to notch the console that wasn't the original console. My hats off to folks that work in the R&D department:) Lastly I worked on getting the accessories on my engine. All this while I was putting floors in another Z. I had a motorhead friend come over the other day and laughed when i said that i would be driving this car in July-now I'm really motivated. he bet me 100$ that i would have it done and i thanked him for gas money to Nashville;)

That bondo is sneaky stuff:)

It depends on what por15 product your using-but in the case of the rust preventative you need to follow the instructions or it will not adhere-though it will good for a while.

If they were 280 motors I'd be there today, but already have a 240 block in storage.

....because it could have been ugly! My daughter was home for the holidays and I try and take the oppurtunity to check on her 81 280zxt and make sure it's okay. I put some new speakers in the car for her Christmas present and I also had some maintenance items I wanted to take care of. Due to the extreme cold here in Indianapolis the 30 year old oil seals were starting to give out. The Crank pulley or front main seal started leaking and the power steering pump started spewing too. I happened to have an extra crank seal and I was actually able to order a shaft seal for the pump from Napa(6$). I never had messed with the PS pump before but thought it couldn't be too bad. I was actually guessing the seal was bad on the shaft since I hadn't taken it apart yet. Both jobs went pretty well and I was bale to replace the crank seal without disconnecting my condenser and moving it. The hardest part was getting the keyway to line up when reinstalling the pulley-I couldn'y really see it and had to feel my way around. I was really nervous about dropping it into the timing cover. The PS pump was a learning curve but not too bad, but I did booger up the first seal when i tapped it into place, so I had to order another one from Napa(last one they had). I was doing this job without removing the PS pump, because I didn't have a wrench big enough to hold the HP line nut to get the line off. I got in a hurry the first time installing the seal but came up with a better paln of attack the second time. Since I had to wait another day for the new PS pump seal I was putting my schedule in a bind. I told my daughter I would get the car to her that day that the seal came in, so I had to move effeciently to get everything done and checked out. The second seal went on great and I finished putting the car back together and test drove it-no noises, no leaks-i'm cool:cool: Well I hop in the car and drive it 50 miles to her school and drop it off and everyone is happy:) A busy day and I was done Z-ing and I would clean up the garage tomorrow. Tomorrow came and I cleaned up the aftermath on my work bench of the pile of tools rags and stuff. Then suddenly I locked up looking at my bench--------there sat a C-clip-a C-clip to hold the PS shaft in place--OH Sh%t, I said about a million times. I called my daughter right then and told her to not drive the car until I get down there. Then I had this scary image of being on the highway at 70mph when the shaft came out of the PS pump and how much damage that would have done:stupid: I really got lucky this time-thankyou Z Gods

Well ever since I found out that Z con was going to be so close to home this year, I have been telling myself that I've got to be there with my Z. The reality is that I have a ton of work to do. You might have seen my thread where I had posted that the car was finally painted, but now it's time to put everything-and I mean everything back together. This is a daunting task with a deadline that is getting closer everyday. I've tried to have a lot of things ready to just bolt back on after painting, but all those details are what's going to catch up with me. When I make out a list it seems never ending: Things to do; 1.Buff out paint job and fix any imperfections 2.Install all glass including door glass and hardware 3. Install interior, the car is gutted(95% is restored-just need installed) 4.Install all weatherstripping 5.Start, breakin and tune new motor after I finish accessory installations 6. run engine compartment wiring so I can do step 5 7. Install all exterior trim, lights What I do have done; 1. Drivetrain installed, engine,trans, diff, axles 2.Brakes installed,just need to bled and tested 3. Interior refurbished-including dash 4. Gas tank installed(non factory type so it needs testing) 5. Exhaust fabricated and partially installed, another couple of hours of work Oh, the other things I need to do; 1. pay lots of attention to wife-keep everyone happy;) 2. work lots of hours to pay for daughters college 3. hang out with son and go to his swim meets 4. maintain the other 3 cars in the household 5. finish all the sheetmetal repair on the customers Z in my garage 6. maintain the house Hope to see lots of folks at Z con. If I'm not driving my 240, I will have the daughters 280zxt-come to think about it, it has A/C:cool:

I believe I used nason clear on my car and I am almost sure it is made by Dupont.