2ManyZs

No kits for a Z engine specifically that I know of. You could probably get something to work, but you would be limited somewhat in the fact that without major upgrades to the fuel system you would need to stay near the 100hp kits. 50-100hp kits should be available for a somewhat resonable price and shouldn't require too many modifications. Anything more than 100hp and you would need to supply more fuel and that means a larger fuel pump, possibly a seconday fuel injector etc. Not that an extra 100hp at the touch of a button wouldn't be a blast. There are kits up to 300+ hp but they probably would require internal as well as external modifications to the engine. One goof and it will go up in a very loud bang.

I used the R-4's on my 280 years ago and the biggest thing I found is they ate up rotors and didn't last very long. Not sure about the glue you are referring to, it could be it is some kind of heat barrier also. All the Z racers in my area went to the Carbotech pads quite a few years ago and quit using the Porterfield altogether. The Carbotechs are much better in the long run, they lasted longer, and they were much easier on the rotors. I think the Spirit of DC 24 hour team was one of the first to try them. They must work pretty good considering their record in the 24 hours of Nelsons Ledges. Just be sure to bed them in as the instructions say and you should get decent results. How much bleeding you do will depend on how hot you get the brakes. The unvented rotors don't dissipate the heat like a vented rotor and will boil the fluid easily. Be sure to get as much ducting to the rotor/caliper as possible. Anytime you finish a session with a mushy pedal, it's time to bleed again. The inability to upgrade the brakes according to the rules is one of the reasons Z's are becoming less popular in ITS. Of course you can upgrade them, but then it's into EP and a more expensive class.

If it isn't leaking at the joint, it may be a good idea to leave it as is. Since you have the rest of the exhaust welded you have no other place to allow for a little movement from expansion/contraction or the movement of the motor in the mounts. If you have everything solid in the exhaust you may stress the header mounting flange when the engine twist in the engine mounts. I'd leave it the way it is.

Had to rub it in didn't ya. Guess it's time to start looking at a trailer. Start my own Z car garage............. Car looks good no matter how much you paid for it.

More than likely it is blowby. First thing to do would be a compression and leakdown test to find out where the problem is. It could be in the valvetrain or rings or a little of both. Until then you could run the breather hose to a catch can until you get the problem diagnosed and/or fixed.

After all that you scored a 71 that looks like that??? Geez, some people have all the luck. Guess I'm going to have to buy one of those big 3 or 4 car trailers to put behind my pickup and start making some trips to the west coast so you guys don't have so many to choose from! Hmm, not a bad idea.........

Well, the price is fair. I wouldn't go much more than 200 for a used head since you have no way of knowing exactly what condition it is in. Z heads were susceptible to warping and cracking from overheating so you might ask if you can have a machine shop check the deck on the head for straightness before you pay for it. Sorry to say this but with the compression you described you may have more problems than a head. Sounds like the rings may be one thing you need to check over, when you have the head off be sure to check the cylinder walls carefully for any galling or scratches. You might want to borrow an inside micrometer if possible to check the bores while you have the head off. No sense in wasting the time putting a different head on with a new gasket set only to find the compression isn't much better.

There is a way to remove the muffler without ruining it, but it's kind of a pain to do unless you can find a shop that can do it for you. You'll need a cut off tool and an abrasive wheel, take the clamp off, and put three slits in the muffler inlet pipe from the clamp crimp to the outside edge. This will allow the pipe to expand and hopefully slip off even though it is crimped.Try not to get into the inner pipe, when you have three slits somewhat evenly spaced you should be able to work the muffler loose and turn it around. The slits shouldn't cause a leak unless they had to be cut too long. Best thing to do is to get a couple of the stainless steel band clamps to put it back together with, they will seal over the slits to prevent any leaks. I get mine from www.summitracing.com. They are $8.50 each, but IMO they are worth it, no leaks, no crimps, no rust.

I've got two or three of the A types out in the shop, let me take a look in the morning and I'll see if I can come up with an idea.

Maybe we missed something, is your shifter sitting high above the trans case with a nut on the bottom holding it into the shifter mount?? If it is you have a type A trans, if not you have a type B. From your earlier description I thought you may have had a type B. Type B transmissions had the shifter mounted on the case itself with the shift rails all being internal to the case. A type A transmission is going to have a lot more play in the shifter compared with the type B. It's just in the way it was designed. There should still be some bushings that could be replaced that may help. Just need to know for sure which trans you have. I am not sure by your VIN number but it seems to me you should have a B type. My car is a late 71 and yours is about 4,000 later so you should have a series 2 240 if I'm not mistaken. If it is a type B there are 3 bushings, one that goes into the shifter rail itself, and two that go into the shifter where the mounting pin goes thru. The type A transmissions are quite a bit different, I'd have to go look at mine to be sure I'm giving the right info.

I e-mailed the guy and asked him if he thought about the fact that scams such as his are illegal. Let's see if he has 'cojones" enough to reply or if he closes his page down.

What do you expect from a bunch of Z "car nuts"????:tapemouth

If the rust hasn't spread to the floor pans themselves and is only in the rails it you are looking at a relatively easy fix and not too costly. The hole in the front could be patched easily enough. Check under the battery, check the rocker panels with a magnet for signs of bondo, check the inner and outer rear fender lips for rust or repair and under the hatch above the taillight panel. Looks like it might be a good buy as long as the rust is confined to areas you have shown. Also check the front frame rails around the swaybar mount and look carefully at the inner front fenders around the strut tower bottoms and above the lower control arm from underneath. If you don't find too much more rust hiding somewhere it looks pretty good in the pic. Good luck.

What a load of bull----. Sounds like an internet scam if there ever was one. 50 bucks and I'll tell you what a sucker you are if you haven't figured it out already. I'm surprised he doesn't have one of those ads you see on TV at 3 am. Guess the internet is cheaper. You can tell he's full of it, an L engine will pull 7k rpm without any of his crap. He says he lowered the nose of his car 7 inches to knee level? Well, duh, that's where it is stock. Look at the pic, doesn't look modified to me. The only type of "atmospheric supercharging" that I know of is nothing more than a ram air induction system. Unless there is a nitrous bottle hidden in the spare tire well. This guy is full of you know what! Even if he can prove he's a mechanical engineer, I'd still want to make sure he isn't on some kind of medication for delusional schizophrenia.

Kinda what I was afraid of, once the old style clamps are tightened down they crimp the pipes so much you can't do anything with them. That's one reason I won't use them anymore now that they have the band clamps available in sizes for cars. They have had them on tractor trailer exhausts for years, don't know why they took so long to get them on cars. I think if the muffler is a offset inlet/center outlet that that is where they ran into alignment troubles. All the MSA turbo exhuasts I have used and seen all had the mufller mounted vertical so the outlet was low enough to exit. This brought the pipe down the tunnel away for the differential to keep it from banging against that.

I think it might be best to go through the whole procedure again. One adjustment affects the other so to get everything right it probably would be better to start from scratch. Might be part of your backfiring problem too. Just don't "screw it up".

The differences would probably almost hard to tell by the seat of the pants method. The early version had more compression, and smaller valves. The later version had larger valves yet had slightly lower compression. On their respective engines it would be hard to differentiate between the two. The only way to tell would be to put both styles of head on the same short block and test it that way.

You can use a 240 driveshaft with the R-200, as long as the flanges are the same. 280's had a slightly different flange than the 240's. The length is close enough that either should work, and since the 260 was sold for a number of years after they discontinued the 240's the 260 driveshaft should work.

If it does it only after the engine warms up and not when it is cold, I would guess the water control valve is stuck open and over heating the carbs causing vapor lock.

Not sure what the exchange rate is now, so I'm not sure what that converts to in US funds. If the chassis is in really good shape it may be worth the money, but not knowing what a good Z in your area goes for I'm just guessing. What is reasonable in one area isn't always what another person would be willing to pay in another part of the country.

I am quite sure ATK is a Japanese company, but they may have facilities here in the US to save on shipping costs to keep their prices as reasonable as they are. I bought one of their crate engines back in 88 or 89 for my then street 280, and then raced the car in ITS with the engine in it. Never had a minutes problem with the engine in 9 races and through 3 drivers schools. I couldn't run with the 240's because of the weight of the 280, yet there was only one 280 that could beat me. Back then ITS was almost all Z cars so I had plenty of competition. I still have the car, and even after sitting for over 5 years it still started with just a fresh battery, and will usually start on the second time I hit the key. This should give you an indication that the ATK engines are well worth the money. If I were in the market for a remanufactured engine for a Z, ATK would be the only one I would buy.

No offense, but I think you should look at another car. Sounds to me like he is in way over his head and want to dump his problems on someone else. If he has gotten this far into a project and says it will only take a couple hundred to finish and he wants to sell, I believe it will cost you ten times that much at least. You can figure it will kill a couple hundred just to have a driveshaft made up. Not to mention the wiring nightmare he may have on his hands if he is trying to keep the EFI on the 5 litre. I would also check his fabrication skills on such things as motor mounts and transmission mount, good way to see if it's a nightmare waiting to happen, or a job worth finishing. Sorry, but since it's an unfinished project I think the best thing to do would be wait till he gets it in running condition, or else wait till the price is reduced a lot, when he realizes no one wants to finish what might be his nightmare, he may end up selling it for half what he is asking now. Or if the chassis is in really good shape, you might talk him into taking the 5 litre out and re-installing the stock engine and selling it for a more reasonable price. Then you can do as you please once you have the car.

Front drive offset would be positive offset, you want negative offset. I have plenty of 7 inch rims with zero offset and they fit great, you might be able to go another 1/2 to a 4 inch backspacing and still be OK.

Before you drill out the broken bolt and re-thread you could try soaking it with a penetrating oil, and getting a good set of extractors and then drill out the center of the bolt and try to turn it out. Eastwoods has a good set for a decent price. Always easier to try to remove it before you drill and re-tap the threads. Be carful you don't break off an extractor though, they are tough to drill thru if you do end up drilling it out and re-tapping. That's why it's better to spend a little extra on a good set of extractors instead of the cheaper ones that will break with little force. You might want to ask or look in the for sale forum, you might be able to get another set of hinges from a car that's being stripped. I'll have a set later in the summer when I ever get time to start gutting my parts car.

Well, I haven't had it get up as far as the speedometer, but most of the cars I have had leak a lot around the cable where it mounts to the transmission. It probably needs the seal replaced in the end of the cable. You might want to try to remove as much as possible before you replace the seal. You might try to remove the cable from the back of the speedo and spray some brake cleaner into the housing to help get as much grease out of the upper end as possible, while leaving the other end off the trans so that it might drip out on the bottom. You could just remove the cable from the car and try the same thing, might be a little easier not having to work under the dash in a contorted position.