2ManyZs

Mudge, I was surfing around the racing forums today and found this. Looks to be something that might be interesting if you are in the market for an IR pyrometer...Get your name on his list and if they get orders for 100 of them in bulk, the price is 35 bucks. http://www.sccaforums.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/000655.html

Yup, you gotta do a wee bit of trimming. Your 71 came with the early A model trans with the "monkey-motion" shifter linkage. The 72's and later came with the better B model transmission with the shifter mounted on the case itself. The A model shifter sat further back than the B models.

I have to admit, there is one 350 I would actually consider. Since it isn't available in the Us, they have no chance of ever selling me one unless they get their heads out of their rectal areas and offer it here. In Japan, and possibly other markets, they offer the Track model without the silly Navigation system, no leather interior and all the other "frills" the US model gets. If you are going to call it a Track model, then offer it as one! No frills, just a bare bones, no a/c, no electronic gee-gaws, pure sport model! I'll go buy a Z-32, and use the money I saved and build a REAL sports car before I buy something like the 350 so-called Track model! Or just add to my 240 collection!

This could be a good opportunity for someone that's looking for a Z car with a lot of parts to go along with it. Not running at the moment, but it looks like it might go fairly cheap. Reserve has been met at just over 2300! http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1874920563

Daniel, it could mean two things in respect to the rear brakes. Either the shoes are well worn and/or your brake adjuster wheels are not working on the rear cylinder....Having to manually adjust the rear brakes with the E-brake is not the solution to the problem, only an easy way to see if you need to check the brakes, easy to do while driving, but it won't solve the problem.... Sorry to misleading, it's only used as a means to see if the brakes work better after a manual "adjustment". If the pedal gets harder when you ratchet the E-brake up a notch or two while driving only indicates that you need to remove the drums and check your shoes and/or brake cylinders. When racing, and the fluid is getting hot and the pedal is getting soft, it will help bring the pedal back up some, but if you continue to run the car like that, it will burn up the rear shoes as they will be adjusted too tight.

Another big advantage of the IR type of temp sensors is that you could use them to take temps of the brake rotors (or brake drums)when you come off the track also to see if you need more brake ducting! No more temp paint! You could also use it to take temps on your headers as an "exhaust pyro" to get a good idea of mixture settings too. More than one good use for the newer style of pyrometers.:classic:

Well, if you can hear the motor running and the wiper arms are not seized, it almost sounds like the arm might have come off the motor. Guess the only way to know for sure is to pull the motor and linkage all the way out and see for sure. It all depends on where it came apart as to whether you can fix it easily or not.

As far as milling the intake/exhaust port side of the head, it probably isn't necessary. But, when you get your header, make sure there are no pieces of welding slag in the ports of the header, and using a large flat file, make sure the flanges around the port of the header are flat. If you do a search here, you should find a number of posts dealing with header gasket leaks. You might get away with re-using the gasket, but I would recommend getting another new one. No sense in finding out you have a leak because you re-used the old one to save a little money and have to tear it apart all over again. As far as the coolant passages et al, if you haven't already done it, try using a good block cleaner and flush it out again. If you don't use one of the caustic cleaners that you circulate throught the block and radiator you really will never know if the block is clean. A simple flush with straight water will never truly clean anything. I believe Prestone and a few others make a good flush kit that might make a bit of difference. Not very expensive and it's always worth a try. It might get some of the crud out on the first try, and if it does, you could always do it again to see how much better you can make it. All you do is dump out the antifreeze mix, re-fill with straight water, run the car till it gets hot, add the flush mix, run the car for 15-30 minutes and flush it out with plain water and then re-fill it with your antifreeze mix. Next idea is, have you tried a lower temp thermostat? If you can find a 160 degree thermostat, try it and see if it makes a difference.

Try out snow bowling! Just place your cursor on the horizontal lines on the bottom and line up your shot, then right click your mouse when you are ready to fire one off! Bonus points when you get two with one shot! http://www.orisinal.com/games/snowbowling.htm

How about one other choice? Like, "Only if I won the Lotto and had more money than I knew what to do with?":devious:

As you can see by Rick's settings at Gateway and my settings at Summit Point, every track will require a completely different set-up. At Summit Point on my 280 I ran 2-2.5 degrees negative in the front and only 1-1.5 negative in the rear. Can't remember which side was which, but it wasn't the same from one side to the other. I ran -2 on one side in the front while -2.5 on the other. It all depends on the track layout, which is why I suggest a tire pyrometer. I ran 0 toe in the front, and 1/4-1/8th toe out in the rear as I had a locked rear, which required a lot of help with turn in. Which leads us to another item that has a large effect on handling and suspension settings. A car with a locked or welded rear will need different settings than a car with a LSD or even an open stock rear. This may seem a bit confusing, but if you take your time and use the pyrometer you can get it right if you take your time and do small changes at a time.

Could have been heat, stress, or just plain old age or corrosion that cause it to crack like that. You could have it welded, but you will need to find someone that can weld cast iron. Cast is one of the hardest things to weld correctly. You might be better off either finding another manifold, should be quite a few up for grabs since so many people have already replaced them with headers. It would probably end up being much cheaper in the long run if you replaced it with another used manifold as the cracks are so large. The MSA headers are fairly good if you want to go that route, it's all up to you and how much you want to spend. I've used them in the past with good results. If you do get one, I would suggest going the extra expense of the Jet Hot coating as it not only will prevent it from corrosion, but it helps control the heat to a certain extent as well. Rust is one of the biggest enemies of a header as the tubes are fairly thin wall steel. Try hooking up a mechanical water temp gauge temporarily to get a more accurate reading on your engine temps if you are still relying on the stock electrical gauge. The stock gauges are notorious for not being very acurrate, the same as the oil pressure guage. You can pick up a cheap one at most any auto parts store and just run it through the firewall and lay it on the console while you drive it a bit, you might not have as bad a tamp problem as you think, considering all you have done previously to correct it.

I guess it all boils down to what you want and how much you want to spend. The 5 speed will cost nearly the same if you buy one from a scrap yard as a 4 speed would. It might be a bit more expensive to re-build the original than buying a good used transmission as the new parts are going to be a bit pricey, of course it all depends on what the transmission in your car really needs to begin with. The rear diff with a lower gear will cost as much if not more than a used 5 speed. If you want quicker acceleration, and still have a decent cruising RPM, you could find a decent R-180 differential with a 3.90 or 4.11 and use a 5 speed from a 280ZX (79-83) and have the best of both worlds, quicker acceleration and decent cruising gear for on the highway in 5th gear. If money is the biggest object, there's nothing wrong with just re-building or finding a good used 4 speed and leaving it as it is. Not really an answer I know, but the final answer is one only you can answer......

The 5 speeds that are available to fit in the 240 from the later 280's and 280ZX's have nearly the same gearing in the lower gears. They only offer the overdrive for cruising on the interstates. However, with the overdrive you can then change to a lower gear(higher numerically, stock is 3.36 and you could go to a 4.11 with no trouble) in the rear differential which will give you even better acceleration in the lower gears, and with the overdrive, the car will be able to cruise at a decent (read lower or closer to the stock) RPM on the interstates. The main benefits of a 5 speed only show up after you change the rear diff ratio. There are no dumb questions, but you might get an answer that doesn't make much sense sometimes...... You can see the gear ratios in the tech articles, as you can see the gear ratios didn't change much between the 4 speeds and 5 speeds, or at least not enough to make a very noticeable difference in say, 1st through 3rd gears. Actually, your ex was a bit off the mark with his answer, as with a 5 speed and the overdrive, it would have made the car have a higher top speed.....if you could hold it to the floor long enough that is....The main reason it was a bit quicker than his 944 is simple, the 240 weighs a quite a bit less with very little HP difference.

The best advice I can give is to purchase a tire pyrometer and set your camber according to your tire temps. You can now buy the hand held non-contact pyrometers for less than I paid for the "old-style"probe pyrometer. Just point it at the tire and you have your temps. It's one of the best investments you can make. There are so many variables in tire selection, track layout, tire pressures, wheel offsets and widths, spring and shock package that no two cars will ever run the same settings. Do a run, then check your tire temps in three places across the face of the tread. If the outside edge of the tire is hotter than the inside, then you need more negative camber. If the center of the tire is hotter than both the inside and outside, you need to run less pressure in the tire. Also your toe settings will have a small impact on the temps, so with a little tinkering you should come up with something that will give you the turn in, over/understeer you want while giving you good tire wear. I always ran with 0 toe in the front, but you can run either + or - 1/16th depending on your track. FWIW, you will normally run quite a bit of negative camber in the front, and probably only about half that in the rear.

Well Daniel, St. Stephen has already explained it. It was a trick we used when racing, as the fluid got hot and the pedal started getting a bit soft, pulling on the e-brake would tighten the rear brakes and give you a stiffer pedal. Hard to heel and toe when the brake pedal was going almost all the way to the floor. Didn't really give you any better brakes, but it made you "think" you did....:cross-eye

You can get a new master cylinder for your 71 from MSA for a little under 200 bucks (142.95 US in their new catalog). The 70-71 master is different from the later ones in that the reservoirs are reversed. Should be a few other suppliers that can supply one, might possibly try Napa or one of the chain auto stores, might save a few bucks. Or if you are so inclined, you could buy the cheaper 72-on master and then reverse the lines, little more work that way but with a tubing bender and some care it's possible. For a couple other things to check, first verify you have no leaks. One of the main areas for leaks is in the rear wheel cylinders. The only good way to check them is to pull the rear drums, could be a pain to do, but it's the only sure way to check them. Second, check your pads and shoes to see if they might be worn to the point where they really ought to be replaced. One trick is to pull up on the emergency brake one click at a time and see if the brake pedal becomes "harder", if it does, it's time to replace shoes for sure, and possibly pads..... Third, if it hasn't been done in a while, you could try a proper bleeding, starting with the master cylinder, then moving to the wheel the furthest from the master cylinder and working your way to the left front as the last one (RR-LR-RF-LF). I would try all these things first, and then if it doesn't help, then change the master cylinder as it would be one of the only things left that could cause your problem.

Well "Tater", I can't open the page for one thing, my Flash 5 plug-in or whatever isn't working..... Besides, I already know that I would be considered lesbian....

Hmm, seems to be a few here with some insecurities....... :stupid:

Torque is 116-130ft/lbs. As stated, don't drive it until you get it fixed.

Double check that the plug wires are in the right order and the distributor is in time. Other than that, you could possibly try to advance the timing a bit to see if it will at least idle long enough to get a timing light on it. Remember the firing order on the distributor is counter clockwise.

If you drain the trans and find a lot of metal shavings, it might be an internal trans problem, perhaps the bands are shot. But if you only find burned fluid, it could possibly be just a torque converter problem. Either way, it sounds like you might have had plans on ditching the auto anyways.....

One way to find out something real quick is to pull the dipstick on the tranny, and if the fluid smells burned, you might possibly have a torque converter that is locked up. Or it could be in the trans itself, but it will at least point you in the right direction. Better yet would be to put the car up on stands, and pull the transmission pan, burned fluid and lots of metal shavings spells trouble.

Mine are used also. If you can't find any close to you, let one of us know and we'll try to send a pair. I think I have at least one or two sets, maybe more, so I should be able to come up with one decent set....

owenk, they are talking about the chrome rails above the door that fit over the rain gutter. Another place to look for them would be Andy Russell, at emailus@zcarsofarizona.com if you don't want to try used ones.