EScanlon

I wish I COULD send some experience with it. That alone would make this technique worth more to the "newby" metal shaper. Thanks for the comments, I hope it does save someone some $. Lastly Cuong, I was taught to use the slap file to "pull" the metal when working it. This shrinks the metal in that if used judiciously you "pull" the stretched portion back into it's original non-stretched shape. It's called a "slap" file, because unlike a standard file where you lay it onto the metal surface and then, while applying pressure, you shave the surface by drawing the file over the surface of the metal, with the slap file you smack the surface of the metal and in that moment of contact you "pull" the metal in the direction opposite the stretch, and allow the file to rebound off the metal. This is a better technique, but much more difficult to master than shrinking with the hammer or the torch. You essentially have to read the stretch of the metal in order to reverse it. Cuong, feel free to correct me as I can't claim to have mastered the slap file. Lastly, the little indentations that the shrinking hammer will leave can be minimized by tapping with a standard hammer afterwards, and filling with either body filler or red cap filler. HTH Enrique

Actually Chris, I feel that the majority of us would agree that the approach you are taking is closer to the IDEAL plan. Total tear-down, strip, replace, rebuild...those are the primary things. That it happens to fit into the scenario I'm describing is happenstance. The tail doesn't wag the dog. Those that I'm referring to are the ones that will sometime in the future post the ads I'm referring to, somehow I don't envision you posting such. But you got to admit it's a damn funny coincidence!! Ed and Ken: Excellent points! That is what this hobby can take you to. The insanely minute examination of tiny details, of interest ONLY to another addict. This one bears repeating: Its a rather rewarding feeling when someone looks at your Z and says, "Nice car!", especially when you've done the work yourself. Enrique

If you're referring to the true blue OEM Stock pressed STEEL wheels, you should be able to find them just about anywhere. If on the other hand you're referring to the "OEM" Mags (Slotted Mag) that many dealers put on the cars before they sold them, then E-Bay is a good place to start although there might be others here who have a spare. Lastly, shouldn't it be the Body Shop's responsibility to find you a replacement? The car is in their custody after all. Enrique

No Bill, your craziness has nothing to do with your car. HEHEHE I think Rick would say it has to do with handling too many "breats" and "thights". I think it's cause your hat's on too tight....... J/K Enrique

This is why I jumped on it. Not knowing your background, all I could go on was the low number of posts and new membership. That led me to believe that you were another young individual with a head full of dreams, no money, and worse, no concept of what it actually takes. I too have worked and refurbished a dozen or two vehicles (I've lost track), and I can tell you that there are times that it would be easier to just give up. Sometimes progress can actually seem to be regression before you start seeing results, then real life creeps in and you have to postpone stuff for ..... That you have experience....GREAT! I only wish some of the other guys who only wanted to "tweak" this or "improve" that had had some of that. There are several vehicles that have started out with needing some fuses changed and are now in pieces. You get what I mean? Lastly, you have to admit that the pictures in your gallery can be deceiving. The car definitely does NOT look like a basket case. Hopefully it isn't a long project before you get her back on the road. Good Luck! Enrique

emphasis mine.So let me get this straight. You are planning on taking apart an otherwise clean car with minor rust and a few dings for the enjoyment of taking it apart? And this without a plan? And you're hoping to do everything right? JP, I'll be blunt. I can see your classified ad 5 years from now: "Series I 240Z, WAS in excellent condition needing minor rework, now in pieces all over my garage and my friend's garages. Pretty much all the pieces are there (I hope), started to "restore" it but ran out of time and money. This is definitely a project car for someone who has the inclination to pick up where I left off. Best offer over $500 takes it. Will not ship, pick up only, bring 2 trailers, one for car and another for all the parts I've got stored everywere in boxes." Or in another manner of speaking.... ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR FRIGGIN MIND? Take that car, go out and drive it for a couple of thousand miles. ENJOY THE RIDE!!! Then and only then, start fixing things. Don't misunderstand what I'm telling you. It is natural to want to take a car apart, and "restore" it to your dream of perfection. The sad fact though, is that there are so many owners out there that with all the best intentions in the world started to do just that and ended up with parts cars. This is such a common occurrence with new and enthusiastic owners, and this club is no exception. I can probably name more members off the top of my head who've garnered more garage time between them, than the short term lot at O'hare. Don't fall in this trap....IF IT AIN'T BROKE...DON'T GO FIXING IT!!!! I can't say this emphatically enough. I understand your wish, and I want you to understand that it is a LOT premature. So I'll repeat myself, drive the car, enjoy the ride, get to know it's individual characteristics, tune yourself to "listening" to her, THEN and only THEN start fixing. You'll be hundreds if not THOUSANDS of dollars ahead, a gazillion times more satisfied and what's more, you'll at least have put some miles on her. If on the other hand, you are intent on tearing a car down for the sake of tearing it down, I have one that I'll trade you and toss in money to boot. Just my 2¢ Enrique

Old age? Senility? Wearing your wife's glasses and not your own? Wearing your own glasses upside down? Heck Victor, where do you want this thread to go????? LOL Just Kidding.......(donning Flame Suit and shutting off mail and pm server) E

The 72's weren't too much different from the 71's unless yours is a later 72, then it's closer to the 73's but still different. (Trust me, Beandip and I are having loads of fun with this one.) Give us the build date, whether it's an Auto or Manual, and if you've done the electronic dizzy mod. Also, take a look at your passenger side kick plate and tell us or show a picture of that area. A later style 72, not yet a 73 will have a central panel with the relays all together. An early 72 will have the kick panel look like a 71, except that there is one relay on the dash frame and another one in the engine compartment. If you have the Seat Belt Buzzer and light also helps to "date" your wiring. Hope this helps Enrique

Check NAPA for all the hoses. That's where I found all of them in stock and inexpensive as well. The Filler Hose was about $100 last we knew, maybe NLA now or more $, but if that's what's leaking.....sorry, there's no way around it. As Gary said, don't cheapen out on this piece, you might find one in a boneyard, but then again you might be buying a different headache. Enrique

That your horn honks when you press the steering wheel horn pad says that your relay is working. That it is muffled or not "loud" can either be due to a bad ground or connection at the actual horn (and actually either one or BOTH horns) as has been mentioned, OR it can be due to a corroded contact at the steering wheel. The LAST possibility is that the horn itself is becoming corroded inside and not able to resonate properly. To test the horn(s), you can connect a wire from the positive pole on the battery directly to the spade connector on the horn. Be careful as it will be LOUD if it's working properly. If it is not, then that's the first thing to fix. First check to make sure that it is grounded to the chassis properly, and that the spade connector isn't corroded. If both of these checks don't correct it then check the horn itself. Before you disassemble the horn, check to see if adjusting the screw on the back of the horn will allow it to make sound. Usually all you have to do is to loosen the lock nut and loosen or tighten the set screw to make the horn both change it's note / tone or start working again. Don't make major adjustments, usually all it takes is just a few degrees of turn to change the tone or make it honk. If the horn worked with the direct connection to the battery, then you need to address either the relay or the steering column wipe contact. The steering column wipe contact is easiest but it requires removal of the steering wheel to ensure that the copper contact that wipes the back of the steering wheel is making proper contact. Sometimes (rare though) that contact gets corroded and can heat up when electricity flows through it which causes it to bend and loose contact. Usually though, someone has gotten in there and "adjusted" the wipe and it's not making a full flat faced contact with the steering wheel. The relay? Not much to fix there, just replace it with any standard horn relay. I've yet to have one fail (they don't normally go bad from use, except maybe in Italy or ?) HTH Enrique

Are you positively sure that's primer? To my eyes it looks as though it may have been the original Red paint, but I could be fooled by the lack of shine. However, as you pointed out, it wouldn't be far fetched for someone to have taken the time to "protect" the metal with primer. 2¢ Enrique

And on the chain of good advice, you know those little chiclets that you get when you buy certain items of electronics? The ones that say "Do Not Eat"? Well, those are actually dessicants (air driers). Next time you get one, throw it in your tool box, or any box with tools that, as this thread points out, would be affected by humidity and rust. That it will eventually get saturated is irrelevant, it will have done it's job while in there. When you get another one, swap it out. Enrique

Mike makes a couple of excellent points. If you aren't driving the car hard, there really shouldn't be a need to be re-tightening bolts/nuts that often. Properly torqued bolts/nuts should stay put! And if there is, then you have a completely different problem...why is that happening? A torque wrench and your FSM will allow you to tighten down just about every nut/bolt you find. Granted you might need more than one torque wrench, but that's how the engineers designed the car, with torque tolerances on the fasteners. Why do you think it's such a bear to find the right size bolt head for the strength of the bolt used? (Hint: Datsun did not use standard head sizes for the strength of the bolt) But a final note on torque wrenches regardless of size or range, make sure that when you put them away in their protective case (and get one if you don't have one), you ZERO the wrench. Don't just turn the setting until it clicks at the bottom of the scale, put it at ZERO. (This is from my days as a CTK Supervisor in the Air Force.) The reasoning for this is simple, the torque wrench has in it's internal workings a spring that has been calibrated. If you maintain the pressure on this spring when it is not in use, you will eventually change the calibration on it. Conversely, if you loosen the wrench below the 0 mark, you could loosen components that need to be precisely aligned in order to read properly. Although this may seem nit-picky, don't forget that in the AF you are dealing with aircraft where the tolerance factors are very strict. We used to send our torque wrenches out every quarter for certification. FWIW Enrique

I disagree. If you are NOT going to tackle the shell IMMEDIATELY after it gets blasted, get it Epoxy Primered. By immediately, I mean the next day or two. If you are going to be more than a day or two----primer it. The amount of surface rust you will develop, and the hazzles to remove make this a no-brainer in my book. The amount of headaches, hazzles and problems you will save are well worth whatever inconvenience you might have when effecting repairs over the primer. If the media blast does the job it's supposed to do, you won't have ANY surface rust afterwards. Actual rust-through will be plain as day, and even heavily pitted rust will be obvious, those are the sections to worry about. When you have those areas addressed, whether by cutting and replacing with new metal, or grinding and brazing/welding an overlay patch, the primer will just be ground away from the repair area. Weather strip glue, tar-paper, etc., you'd be best off to remove as much as possible before you go to him, and then let him know where you couldn't remove so he could pay special attention to. Lacquer thinner, MEK, are but two solvents that will literally dissolve weatherstrip adhesive, tar, and most of the gunk found on the car. If you have areas that you already know are problems, rust-through, bondo, prior metal repairs, etc, point those out to him. He can then make sure that those areas get cleaned up well. 2¢ Enrique

These are not the best pictures but hopefully they'll illustrate what's being discussed. Sorry about the focus, it's darn near impossible to focus in the dark! If you look at the 2 "lobes" of the latch, you'll note that one of them has rubber on it. At least on one that hasn't lost it's coating. I think I erred in saying it's the first lobe, it's actually the one in the "6 o'clock" position. Hope this helps. Enrique

Pennyman: You're absolutely correct. The difference in name may be simply due to different teachers or ...? But the fix is still the same, sand, seal, re-paint. I've not used a water based sealer/primer so don't know about that. I was taught to use a REDUCER based primer/sealer or EPOXY based as opposed to LACQUER to correct the problem. I've not had problems resurface afterward, even years later. THE73Z: The magnet "trick" can be very deceiving. There are fillers with metallic content that will "fool" your magnet and you. Additionally, the magnet is effective only in determining whether there is a THICK layer of bondo. A thin layer won't be noticed at all unless you are using a magnetic meter of some sort, and then could be explained away as "thick paint". 2¢ Enrique

Check where the wires that were connected to it lead to. 2 sets of wires, going to 2 different location...WAG aftermarket cruise control. Enrique

Ah, a SHOW vehicle...well that does make a difference. Although I do take mine to shows, and do show it, it is primarily a vehicle to enjoy. I can understand your retiscence in getting the undercarriage dirty. E

I did, but then again I have and will drive in the rain again. After all I'm in the Pacific Northwest. You'd really be limiting your use of the car if you insisted on totally dry weather. The vapor barrier also works to keep dust and dirt out of the cabin, as well as fumes and noise. 2¢ Enrique

I'm vague on the 280's, but as a rule of thumb on most cars, you need to make sure that the window crank, courtesy lights, and any type of "fixed mount" item as well as the door lock pin (the one at the top of the door to lock the door by). Then you usually start at the lower edge of the panel and start pulling the panel clips out of the door body (not the panel). These are typically wire or spring metal clips in the shape of the letter Omega (for lack of a better term), that is, the clip must be compressed in order to be removed from the hole it fits into. Lastly, you LIFT the bottom edge of the panel and disengage the part of the panel inserted INTO the door by the window. This can be a real bear to do with the window rolled up. As a final note, if you can roll the window down, you might be able to reach inside the door with a long straight rod and push on the door lock mechanism and get the door to open. HTH Enrique

I'd forgotten that you have a 280. On the 240's there are 3 levers. If the topmost one is set to VENT then the other two are rendered null. The other two only apply in the HEAT position. E

You don't mention what position you put the TOP lever in. It MUST be in the HEAT position for the DEFROST Lever to actually send air to the defrost vents. If the top lever is on VENT, then that's all you have...a vent and the air comes out the center and side "eyeballs". HTH Enrique

Candy is dandy.... but it's a real b!tch to make sure it's even everywhere. And forget about touchups. Lance: Custom paint jobs, IMO, are normally done on vehicles to highlight or emphasize specific body lines, features, or ..... Flames are usually done to emphasize a car's "speed" or the look of speed. Again as you pointed out they're common and almost mundane unless you go for that "real fire" look that one painter has devised. If you're really looking for something UNIQUE, you need to step away from all the "typical" looks. This is where the true artist can emphasize...well, that's where the artist steps in and describes his idea. Remember this though, a CUSTOM paint job will have as an inherent fault, the problem of "repairability". As you know, it's almost impossible to repair a candy paint job. Special colors are also bad, especially if they've aged or been damaged by UV. Any kind of air brush art....again, you normally can't "fix" it. As a suggestion, look at the colors that are available TODAY over the colors that the cars was originally and choose one that you feel will really set the Z off. Personally, I like that Metallic Sunset Orange (Name?) on the new 350Z, and have seen pictures of that on a 240....that does look extremely nice. 2¢ E

Helldog: Are you sure the cracks in the paint are due to flexing and not CRAZING due to incompatible paint base? Post a picture of the cracks, a lot of times a poor base will result in the final paint job showing "cracks" when in reality it's crazing. Sounds similar, but the causes are completely different. Usually when you repaint a known crazed surface you sand down as much as possible and then paint with a primer sealer to prevent future crazing. Doesn't sound as if your painter applied sealer before repainting. If you had your paint job done at a Custom Body Shop, they might guarantee their work. Worth checking into. Tomohawk: As Lance mentioned those cracks are on the join line between the roof and the fenders. That you are cracking the paint there points to a couple possible items. You might be flexing the body very hard. Whether by hard cornering, Auto-X, riding hard over bumps AND there's another part of your uni-body that has also been tweaked allowing that part of the car to twist more than usual. The other is that when the car was last painted, or on one of the prior paint jobs, they uncovered the lead filler. Lead is used due to it's malleability (as Lance mentioned), what's not commonly known is that it doesn't like the standard primers used on cars. The primers will stick, but eventually they'll start to "dry" and cause the paint covering it to become brittle. That's when you get your cracks. Lastly, it could be a combination of the two. Enrique

G U L P!!!! Would someone please pass the salt? Maybe that way I can stand the taste of my nasty feet!! Lance, I apologize. For some reason or another my Alzheimers or whatever must have kicked in extra hard! :stupid: :stupid: :stupid: Enrique