Aussie Zed

Deep breath... My 1976 260Z 2+2 is for sale:cry:. This car has been absolutely brilliant to me but I daresay it does owe a lot to the people on this forum. I've recently been looking at forums for other cars and they are so far behind in usefulness and overall quality. I have come to realise that I have been spoiled by starting out on this forum, which I have taken for granted. Just wanted to say a big thanks to those who have helped me out over the last couple of years and to those who maintain and run these forums, I've really learnt heaps. Having said that, I'm sure that I will return to the wonderful world of Datsun ownership one day . If you are interested here's the link to the ad. http://www.classiczcars.com/classifieds/showproduct.php?product=1785&cat=11 THANKS!!!

There's a few 2+2's advertised for big $$. Anyone know if they are getting what they're asking. Eg. on carsales: 1975 260Z dark green 2+2 Automatic, 'excellent cond.' $8500 1977 260Z silver 2+2 Automatic, $6500 1975 260Z blue 2+2 Automatic $6000 1977 260Z silver 2+2 Automatic, 'one owner last 25yrs' $5800 1975 260Z silver 2+2 Man. $9000 1976 260Z white 2+2 man (2.8 efi turbo) $12000 2 Seaters: 1977 260Z light blue, man $10500 1976 260Z ferrari red, man $11500 1975 260Z green, auto $11900 1976 260Z pearl blue, man $5500 240s: 1972 green, auto $9000 1973 red, man $10000 1972 yellow, man $12500 1973 purple, man $7500 - modified and slightly odd looking. 1971 burnt orange $15000-20000 (previously mentioned by Gav) These are all on CarSales at the moment, but the prices look unrealistically high to me. Anyone else? I know this was a '240Z' thread, sorry for putting 260Zs there.

2 Victorian Z's on ebay at the moment. 1970 240Z http://cgi.ebay.com.au/1970-Datsun-240Z-Rare-Series-1_W0QQitemZ4653731044QQcategoryZ102336QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem 1973 240Z - seems to have had the sils drilled. http://cgi.ebay.com.au/Datsun-240Z-1973-Rare-Classic-Sports-car_W0QQitemZ4649798484QQcategoryZ102220QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem I recently went and had a look at an early 1970 240Z, looked very original, straight body, etc. One or two minor blemishes in the body but wanted $9500 for it, which was just a bit much (for me at least).

Dimples on a golf ball make the boundary layer of flow turbulent - as you might guess. This gives the boundary layer more energy allowing it to stay attached to the ball for longer giving the ball a smaller wake and thus a lower pressure or 'form' drag. This effect would not apply to a valve because the flow is always going to separate at the edge of the valve and would probably increase the drag (Read: reduce the flow) due to the increased skin friction that would occur.

I was pretty unclear on what's what, sorry! See the attached pic. You want to maximise the radius on the bell mouth, r compared to the inlet diameter D. An r/D of 0.1 is OK but you wouldn't want to go much smaller, an r/D of 0.2 is twice as good again but the effect tapers off after about r/D of 0.25. It is also worth noting that if the stub stacks stick out (as most of them do) the flow becomes what is called re-entrant, which can create more losses. This is due to the big sweep that the incoming air does, causing vorticies (swirling, energy eating air) depicted by the red ovals on the third picture in the inlet. The negative effect that this has is almost exactly equal to the positive effect of a good bellmouth, which is possibly why many people experience no gains from installing them. Just me guessing on this though. The blue lines on the second pic show how it should be done, the red ovals on the third pic show the vorticies cause by the flow coming from the sides.

The function of air horns is to reduce the entry loss coefficient from the large resevoir of air inside your engine bay into the pipe flow that exists inside your intake runners. My fluid dynamics textbook tells me that a square entrance will have a loss coefficient of 0.5 and from there the loss coefficient is a function related to the raduis of the bell mouth to the pipe (intake) diameter. The entry loss coefficient decreases with an increasingly large radius on a bell mouth but after about 0.15x(diameter of inlet) the intake loss is pretty small (~0.08). This doesn't mean 5 times better flow but it is a significant improvement. Most of the bellmouth radii pictured look pretty small to me and I doubt that they have been designed by an engineer or someone with some experience with fluid flow. Choose one with a big bell mouth radius, the curved trumpet style ones have a large effective radius that prevents vorticies from forming and should be quite effective especially with a rolled lip. Also, the tuned length of the intake runner will be changed from standard with a bell mouth that doesn't protrude out the same amount as the airbox does. I knew all of this theory would come in handy one day!

I'll try a Nissan dealer on Friday and see how i go. Thanks for the help. 260DET, i originally tried to get Bendix Ultimates but have been informed that they are now a discontinued item (they are bringing in another performance replacement soon though). Thanks Jon

I've got the dreaded brake squeal, it is now time to do something about it (well it has been for a while). I've read that these can be bought from MSA, but i can't see them there: http://www.zcarparts.com/store/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=SBC I've also read that brake grease can solve the problem, but doesn't always. So, i figure that if i'm going to do something about this then i should do it properly and get some shims. Where else can i get these from? Is there anywhere in Australia that has them? Could i make them myself? Thanks, Jon

I just thought that i'd report back to say that i've finally won the battle (well almost)! I've fixed my clock by sacrificing a clock from a Datsun 120Y (don't know what year). Evidently this had almost exactly the same internals as my clock but had a seconds hand aswell. I just pinched the circuit board and screwed it into mine - too easy! Now if i can only find the bracket that holds the clock in - i been so slow getting around to fixing my clock that i've misplaced it... Thanks to everyone who has helped with advice, Jon

I can't be sure, but i reckon it's BS. I also have some issues with that web article: "Acetone allows gasoline to behave more like the ideal automotive fuel which is PROPANE" I don't know why propane is the ideal automotive fuel? I could be wrong, but if acetone allows more fuel to vaporise, it would be because the vaporisation energy required would be less. This would seem to me to work in the opposite way to something like water injection, which is vaporised - taking more initial energy and preventing knock. Wouldn't acetone then do the opposite and increase the likelihood of knock (reducing octane number of fuel). I am no 'expert' on this and my thinking could be off. Also, acetone has a smaller HHV (higher heating value) ~31MJ/kg compared with gasoline ~47.3MJ/kg, which means that the chemical energy released in combustion would be less too - suggesting less power. I am struggling to see a whole lot of positives coming from this. I would also imagine running acetone would stink - literally! Don't take this as gospel - i could be way off here, just trying to think this through logically. However, i would like to point out that in everything i have read or seen on this acetone really seems to have a placebo effect - nothing solid, no double blind scientific tests.

I've just attempted to bed in my new pads and rotors roughly following Carrol Smith's advice of multiple stops, building up stopping severety (thanks for posting Beandip): http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/showthread.php?t=17905&highlight=rotor+myth I am not sure if i was able to heat them up enough as i couldn't find an appropriate road to get as fast as reccomended. I've taken a photo of the rotors after they cooled down. Can anyone tell me if i've bedded them and my pads in correctly? Thanks. Jon

Tried to order some metal kings from Motor Traders today and when the guy went to order them in from bendix he was told that they are phasing them out and will bring out some unreleased 'heavy duty' pads soon. Anyway he found some Ferodo 'excel' pads, that are a metal based pad - supposedly similar to a metal king and i've ordered them in. I'll let you all know once i've put them in an bedded them in and stuff.

Ron, thanks for your reply, unfortunately my new capacitors have not fixed my clock. I cannot think of anything except for the coil (which you have suggested is easily burnt out) now that could be preventing it from working, which is frustrating! I have heard nothing but praise for your attention to detail and expertise on the z clocks, but with you being in the US and me being all the way down under, i have decided that i am just going to use a 12V quarts mechanism from another car and use that in conjunction with the current face and casing. I think that this should be the best way to do things and i cannot forsee any major difficulties apart from mounting the new innards. Thanks again, Jon

Rick, fortunately my car is no slush-box! Why so surprised that i've worn out my pads? Am i missing something here??? I still can't seperate my rotors from my hubs (i've got new rotors as my old ones were un-machinable). Uggghhh this it's sooo frustrating!

I went to watch the Australian hillclimb championships at Collingrove yesterday and it reminded me to upload some video i took at a small meet last year (you can see how dry it was then). These three Zs are always up there going hard, the white one belongs to South Aussie Z guru Peter Hall and it has also competed in classic Adelaide a few times. For those who don't know the track (most people here i'd guess) it's pretty short, very thin and very technical. I've attached a small map on the bottom of this thread. I took some video this weekend and i might upload that if i can get around to it. Anyway, here's the link to the first vid: http://www.classiczcars.com/photopost/showphoto.php?photo=17664 You might have to right click and save the file, i don't know how well it will stream. Jon

Thanks 260DET, i might go with the metal kings.

Anyone tried Ferodo GP2 or Bendix Metal King pads? I'm having a bit of a hard time finding some nice performance-street front pads in Australia. What's everyone else running? Are you happy? Thanks, Jon

Well hello all aussies. I'm on uni holidays until tues and i've just fixed a few problems with the zed so i've had a good bit of zedding. Went for an hour and a half burn through the hills on thurs and discovered some great driving roads - I downloaded the maps for classic adelaide and started from there. Need some new brake pads now though, i've worn them out good and proper. Anyone else have a look at the bay to birdwood 1700 cars were supposed to have turned up despite the wet weather. I rocked up in the arvo and there were less than that there but i did see a few 240s turned up. I'll post some more pics soon.

Hey just found this on ZCAR website, i reckon that this must be it. The only parts that i havent tested are the capacitors and what looks like a diode. The ZClock bloke had this to say: "The second non-quarts type clock is the hybrid. It has a small circit board with several components that drives a fly wheel. Basically this is an oscillator circuit that energizes the coil, which creates a field, which attracts or repels the magnets on the fly wheel, thus turning the gears. What goes bad are the capacitors. The working value on the caps are lower than the supply voltage of 12 volts (design errror). Replacing these will usually correct the problem, but not all the time. Caution: if you are not use to soldering with a 10 watt soldering iron and do not have a microscope you can destroy the board and the coil on the board in 5 seconds. Again , no joke, this is a very tricky operation. Even after you replace the caps you may find you need to adjust some of the mechanical parts to keep the clock running or just to get the clock to start." Here's the link to the rest of the post: http://www.zcar.com/forums/read.php?f=1&i=250513&t=250332 So i'm going to try changing the capacitors and i'll see how that goes. Jon

Thanks for the tips. I have thought about changing to a later clock but i just don't like to get beaten by my car. Plus, if i can fix it for next to nothing i'll save some money, which is never a bad thing. When the flywheel with the magnets on it is given a very gentle flick everything seems to move and work very well - just like clockwork (sorry couldn't resist) and it all seems well balanced, etc. The pink/orange gear does turn and if you keep flicking the flywheel, the clock hands do move. All the resistors are getting a voltage across them too. The magnets weren't really centred but i've rectified that by adjusting the screws at the end of the shaft. Still no life. Any more ideas? Thanks again. Jon