Jeff G 78

Our local Michigan dealers gave up on S30s YEARS ago. I tried to order rocker arms around ten years ago for a cam upgrade and was told to buy them elsewhere. They had no interest in selling me the parts since they couldn't look up any part numbers. Once they got rid of the micro fiche cards and reader, they were out of the old parts business. That was before CZCC came out with the micro fiche on CD, so I had no choice but to get them from MSA. Even with the CD, they don't trust P/Ns if they can't look them up on their own. I quit trying and call Courtesy or MSA for OEM parts. If I don't need OEM for mechanical parts, I try a local import auto parts store that sells mostly Beck Arnley. They are fine for wheel cylinders and such.

It's hard to believe that there are 87 users looking at CZCC at this moment, yet we have only 105 pins in the map. There are what, 15,000+ members??? That's only 0.7%!

Yes, I am done. Luckily, I was just able to snake the cam past the fuel rail bracket without removing the intake-side rail bolts. I just had to remove the two fuel hoses and the bolts at the right and front of the head. It flexed just enough. I haven't fired it up yet. I need to run to the auto parts store and get oil, coolant and some new fuel hose. The old ones were a bit loose at the rail.

Once you have an account with them and they have your Z club membership number, they automatically give you the discount on future orders. I didn't know they use this site - heck, I didn't know we HAD numbers. I use my IZCC number that I got many, many years ago.

Is that true again? I had a set of Bilsteins in my 240 about ten years ago. I worked closely with Bilstein for my job as a Vehicle Dynamics engineer, so I asked them if they could rebuild mine since the car I bought with them had been sitting for close to a decade and they were leaking a bit. The local engineer I worked with put me in touch with their lab guy in San Diego. He told me it might be tough as they hadn't made that piston diameter since the mid-eighties, but he said to give him a few days and he'd see what he could find. He called me back and said I was in luck. He scrounged just enough parts to do four shocks. He then joked and said that I better not wear them out because mine cleaned him out of parts for good. I sent them to San Diego and had them back within a few weeks as good as new. I'd like to know if anyone has had 240Z Bilstein dampers rebuilt in the last few years. I believe I had mine rebuilt around 1998. I guess if the demand was high enough, they might have made a small run of pistons and seals, but it would surprise me. I LOVE working with Bilstein and find their products to be as good as anything I have ever used. When we used them on our SVT products at Ford, they were easy to tune and held up great. I remember dynoing an SVT Lightning set before and after vehicle durability testing and the curves were unchanged. That simply does not happen with OEM shocks. Durability testing simulates 150,000 customer miles. Most shocks are lucky to last 40,000 miles before degrading. Here's where the story goes south. When I sold my 240 with it's freshly rebuilt Bilsteins, the guy who bought it restored the car beautifully and replaced pretty much everything on the car. When he bought it, I told him over and over how rare and good the Bilsteins were and the story about them being freshly rebuilt. After his car was fully restored, he showed it to me and told me about everything he had done to it. One of the "upgrades" was the suspension. He replaced the Bob Sharp springs and bars and the Bilstein strut inserts. He took out the Bilsteins and replaced them with Tokico blues. Surprised, I asked him what he did with the old struts. He shrugged and said all the old junk was pitched. :stupid: It was none of my business, but I couldn't help but be saddened. He sold the car a short while later and it ended up in Paris, France. The new owner is a member here. I like Tokicos and have Illuminas in my 280, but I'd never consider them over Bilsteins.

Wow, fantastic job Mike. I love the LeMans wheels in the gray color with the 903 blue.

I too will be doing the mustache bar bushings soon. I don't have a clunk problem (new diff mount and new trans mount), but I do have a vibration that I am trying to eliminate. I will be replacing the trans crossmember bushings soon. I bought Nissan rubber bushings and already installed them into a spare crossmember, so it will be a quick crossmember swap. My vibration is under acceleration in lower gears. If I am going even slightly downhill (i.e. highway onramp) it is completely smooth, but flat ground or any incline brings out the problem. Engine, trans and diff mounts except the mustache bar bushings are new, so hopefully they solve the problem. If not, it might be my diff, I guess. I did buy urethane mustache bushings, so hopefully they don't transmit too much more noise than the old, worn out rubber ones.

Rule number one around here is that you have to post pictures when you introduce yourself. We don't care if your car is a finished show car or a beater daily driver, we are suckers for Z car pictures.

Yep, the bushings are easy to replace. Like ConchZ said, the rubber boots will likely be dry and brittle being an AZ car, but otherwise it's easy. You might want to replace the boots if they show any signs of cracking. They keep noise, heat and exhaust fumes out of the cabin. There is a small boot over the shifter on the trans itself and a larger rubber boot on the body underneath the interior vinyl shifter boot.

Yep, I had to fine tune mine with washers on the LH TC rod to get the alignment correct. John, do you know how much the RH side leads by?

I checked MSA's website and the small B&W pictures don't show enough to tell what they look like. They just say that they sell aluminum and ABS louvers and that they don't require drilling. The ABS ones do appear to be rounded rather than angular and it also appears that they sit on the glass like the angular ones. They certainly aren't cheap at over $260.

I think you can still buy the on-glass ones, but I don't believe the larger bolt-on louvers have been available for years. They can't be too tough to find used. I have at least one and maybe two of the larger style, but they are stored at my dad's house in another state. I haven't decided yet if I will install them. I doubt I will since I don't want to drill a bunch of holes in a perfect hatch panel.

Yes, they will fit. The first pic shows the type that fit over the window trim. They are bigger than the on-glass louvers and don't obstruct the view. The downside is that you have to drill holes in the hatch for the hinges and latches. I had them on a car many years ago and liked them for keeping the car cool, but they will rattle a bit. Given the choice, I'd go with the bigger style as long as you don't mind a bunch of holes in your hatch.

While I replaced the valve springs today, I played with the rail and I *think* I can flex it enough to get the cam out without removing it. As far as the injectors go, everything was new a few years ago. I replaced the injectors and all the hoses, but it's still a major PITA. I should know tomorrow. Today, I pulled the hood, removed the rockers and swapped the valve springs. Tomorrow, I'll swap the cam and install the rockers, pads, radiator, and thermostat. From the looks of it, I'll have to lower the back of the trans a bit to allow the cam to clear the rad support. I have a spare trans mount that I installed new bushing into over winter, so that will be installed as well.

I am about to swap from my stock cam to a performance cam and I have a question. In order to pull the cam, I need to move the fuel rail out of the way as it wraps around the head and blocks the cam from sliding out the front of the towers. Since the injector hoses are so short and they are clamped on, I don't see an easy way to get the rail out of the way without disturbing the injectors. Anybody have a trick that will save me time?

Welcome. Start by reading everything on this site http://www.atlanticz.ca/zclub/techtips/ Next, download the Factory Service Manual (FSM) here http://www.xenons30.com/index.html Finally, read every post you can find on this site.

It looks like a photo of Hot Wheels cars positioned on a limestone driveway. Those rocks are really cool. Thanks for the pictures Arne. Your drive looks like a lot of fun!

Aww crap. Sorry about the bad info. I forgot that the 240 pistons are flat and that the CR is higher than in a 280.

You guys suck. Even if we had roads worth driving on, there aren't enough Z cars in my area to bother. It would be ME driving around for two days on straight, bumpy roads. Someday I will have the time and money to drive across the country so I can actually see other Z cars in person.

Only if used in conjunction with flat top pistons from a '81-'83 ZX. If an E-88 is installed on an F54 block for example ('81-'83 ZX), it would net around 10:1 CR.

If all else is stock, you should have 8.3:1 CR. If the head has been milled it will be slightly higher.

I agree and do use it myself, I just go lightly and keep it off of the crush washer so there is a good ground path. I was just throwing it out there because too many people think more is better.

Close KTM, but you use the '84 300ZX non-Turbo rotors. The turbo rotors are five lug.

The weather is starting to turn here, but the roads are still salt-covered after last week's snow. I haven't uncovered my Z yet. If the weather looks good, I'll roll it out of the corner this week and start my planned upgrades.

I have been told to be very careful with anti-seize on spark plugs. The plugs need to have a good ground path to the head and anti-seize acts as an insulator. It can and will cause misfires. We had a Viper in our shop that was running like crap. Turned out to be anti-seize on the plugs. Once they were removed and everything was cleaned, the car ran very well.