zack_280

Thanks for the information. I am thinking that I will keep the MSD ignition (for now) and just get a ZX distributor. Anyone got one for sale? Any thoughts on buying a Beck Arnley from Autozone? Zack

Ok, The mechanical advance is not working on my distributor. I see no advance at 3500RPMs. None. I just finished rebuilding my engine. Before I knew about this problem I set the timing to 10 degrees BTDC with no vacuum and then drove it for maybe 50 miles. It didn't seem to be running right. So I checked the timing and found out that the mech advance isn't working. Well, I decided that I should probably do a compression test and make sure that everything is ok, just to be sure. When I removed the spark plugs I found that they were very sooty. When I installed them I had them gapped at 0.050" (suggested by MSD). I'm thinking I may reduce that to 0.040". In addition to the sooty spark plugs the exhaust tip has some soot built up on it. The exhaust also has a little color to it (as it should with all that soot in there). Well, my compression was ok. All cylinders are between 180 and 190 PSI. Here's a little history...I have an MSD ignition and coil with a points type distributor -I checked the float level and it seems ok -I synced the carbs and checked the mixture setting. (The mixture seems like a bit of a mystery to me, but I turned them a half turn in and the idle seemed to get a little rougher and then I turned them a half turn out and the idle seemed to get rougher, so I left it at 2.5 turns, which seemed like a safe setting. Why do I have so much soot built up on the spark plugs and tail pipe? Is this from the timing/distributor or could this be from a rich mixture from the carbs? I obviously need to get a new distributor and I think I'm going to get a Unilite. Is there anything wrong with advancing the timing to some magic number (between 25 and 35 degrees) and driving it as is? Thanks in advance. Zack

Take the valve cover off. Then jack the car up a few inches and using a 1 1/16 inch socket on the nut on the harmonic balancer pulley rotate the engine until the timing mark on the timing chain sprocket is lined up the with mark on the cam tower. If you really want to be sure you are at TDC you should remove the no. 1 spark plug and stick your finger in there (I had my wife do this once b/c my fingers are too fat) to feel when the piston is at TDC. You can also use a tie wrap or something but it's just not the same as actually feeling it. When you are sure you are at TDC you can use a red sharpie or some other marking device (perhaps a dremel with a grinding tip to make a notch) to mark the harmonic balancer pulley. Then put the valve cover back on, connect your timing light, start the car up and let it warm up to normal operating temperature and check your timing. This is as dumb as it gets I think. Good luck.

Thanks, Daniel. I'll try that this evening. I'm definitely not seeing 20 degrees of advance.

I hope this isn't a stupid question, but I gotta ask and I can't seem to really find the answer. I set my timing to about 13BTDC at ~900 RPM with vacuum advance removed. I would have lowered the RPMs to about 700, but it seemed to be running rough, so I left it at 900. When I rev it up to 3000RPMs (still without the vacuum advanc) and check the timing with a timing light the mark seems to be in pretty much the same position. It should be advanced somewhere in the range of 11 degrees, correct? Does that sound right? Does this mean that the mechanical advance isn't working properly? I have a D611-54 dizzy with an MSD6 series ignition and an MSD coil. I am running an E31 head on an L28 block with an ISKY stage III cam. Thanks for any help.

If you do need a rebuild and you want to learn something about your car (and if you plan to tune it and work on it yourself). Do the work yourself. You should get the haynes manual and "how to rebuild your nissan/datsun OHC engine" at the least. I am just finishing a rebuild (head, carbs, and block) and I just put everything back together and it fired right up. I just have to get a Unisyn from Bruce at Ztherapy to finish the tuning. I can say that it is already running much better than it was before and I know a lot more about the car and I feel a lot more comfortable working on it (and diagnosing problems). If you do do it yourself. Be careful to label everything when you take it apart and read your manuals thoroughly. Good luck. P.S. Be prepared to replace things like the clutch and harmonic balancer. These are two things I was hoping to reuse, but it just didn't work out.

Thanks for the suggestions guys. I was out of town this weekend. I will have the head off again this week. Hopefully I'll get this figured out pretty soon. I'll try to keep you posted on what I end up doing to solve the problem.

Nixcars, I am afraid of the same thing. I think the way that I will go is a 2mm head gasket, rather than fly cutting the pistons. I don't need a performance monster. Note that this is basically the engine build from the PO. I'm just somewhat stuck with what I have.

It is a very good Idea to get the clutch centering tool. It may come in whatever kit you buy, if not, I recommend buying it. It will save you some struggling with reinstalling the engine. Trust me. I did mine last week...Well, kinda, but it's a long story. The tool made it much easier.

Thanks for the info. I have heard of the modeling clay idea, but I wasn't sure I felt comfortable putting clay on my piston. I'll probably try this and just be careful. Jeff, What exactly are you saying about counting the links? What is the significance of the wire? Is it just so I can keep up with my starting and finishing link? If the links line up correctly the timing should be fine, correct? How would it be one link off? The chain is brand new.

I'm having a little trouble with my engine rebuild. The block is an N42 and the head is an E31 with 2mm oversized intake and exhaust valves. I had the engine bored out 0.020" (.5mm) and installed new pistons and rings. The pistons are flat top. When I was installing the head it looked like the metal ring that goes around the piston bore on the headgasket may interfere with the valves. I have installed the head on the block at TDC. The cam timing mark was exactly where it should be and the bright links on the chain were in the correct position. However, when I try to turn the engine over by hand after roughly a quarter turn it is binding. It is relatively easy to move for a quarter turn (or so) and then all of a sudden it stops dead. If it's not the ring around the headgasket then it could be the block. So perhaps I should notch the block a little more. I'm thinking the safest bet would be to go with the 2mm gasket and suffer any lost compression (which might be good as I am going to be in the 10.5:1 or 11:1 range). Before I pull the head and have to get another head gasket, I would like to get anyone's input on what else might be going on here. Thanks for your time.

When you say 'broke' do you mean physically broken or electrically broken? If it just isn't working any more, but is still in tact, you may want to try cleaning off the contacts. If it is broken, well I have a '70 240 and I installed a different switch. Not sure if it was a '72 or not, but the angle was slightly different (now it sometimes bumps my leg while I am driving). Other than the annoying angle the different switch works fine.

Thanks for the info Daniel. That's what this forum is for. To follow up, I was told that the piston I was purchasing was a flat top. I called ITM and was told that the 75-79 piston is a flat top. So when I talked to them today I asked what the difference was and I found out "the 81-83 piston is really flat". So I guess I took someone's word for it only to find out they didn't really know what they were talking about. ITM is still out of stock, so I'm still looking. The reason I'm so adamant about an 86.5mm is because the machine shop has already bored the block and I would rather not have to pay them to do it again. I just asked VB a question about the '81 pistons. Hopefully they can answer it quickly.

If you are going to rebore your engine, I advise you go with a 1mm bore. These are impossible to find. I have ordered two sets; one the machine shop ordered from Liberty, the other from Victoria British, almost ordered another one from somewhere in Washington. To make a long story short all of these places claim to have the flat top piston, but all of the pistons they stock are dished. That's right even the one's that are supposed to be for the '75-'79 280ZX are dished. So, after about $150 of shipping and handling (I'm estimating since I haven't sent them back yet and assuming there is no restocking fee) I still have no pistons. If someone knows where I can get 86.5mm pistons (+.5mm/.020"), please let me know. At this point I'm willing to buy a set of 87mm pistons and have the engine rebored. I'll take suggestions on that as well. Thanks and good luck to the rest of you in the future. I hope my experience can help someone from making the same mistake.

I have had a puller fail. The lug on the puller completely stripped. It may not always be possible to get the pin out with a puller. I 'spose not all pullers are created equal, but I endedup using the drill-it-'til-it's-thin method on one of the pins. It wasn't cheap. Especially after buying the puller.

The band is Hinder and the song is "Get Stoned". They just played in Chattanooga a few weeks ago, but I missed the show. It would have been a good one.

See pic. (I think I attached it. I haven't done that before)

I bid on it and the seller sent me a pic of the inside. The seatbelt was rusted and the carpet was removed and it looked like the floor pan was rusted. There was also rust on the door sill. Couldn't really tell how bad from the pic, but it was definitely not 'rust free'.

I'm 6'4" to 6'5" and I fit ok in my Z. My head was just about touching the liner with the worn out old seats it came with and there was plenty of leg room (I have a 36" inseam). If you have less than a 34" inseam and you are 6'4" headroom might become a problem, but the seats can be adjusted. Unless you have a 37" or greater inseam, legroom shouldn't be a problem. On a side note. I just installed Corbeau A4 seats (the wide version b/c I have a 36" waist). The headroom disappeared and I had to remove the slider and modify the bracket on the driver's side, but I am very happy with the results. I was worried that I might have to fabricate my own bracket but the one that came with the slider bolted pretty much right up. I just had to bore out the bolt holes a little with a Dremel to fit the larger mounting bolts in. It was a bit of a pain to install them because there was no room to turn a wrench, but I'm happy with the finished product. Note that these seats barely fit in this car. If anyone is thinking about adding aftermarket seats try not to get anything wider than these. Check out www.corbeau.com for dimensions.

I just went with the Illumina kit (progressive springs). It's still being installed...Dang spindle pins. I thought about other combinations, but this seemed like a reasonable setup for street/autox.

Thanks for the info guys. I just typed a longer message and then accidently hit refresh or back. Long story short. The machine shop got one out yesterday and the other wouldn't budge. They are going to drill it out today. I have now spent a total of about $200 on these spindle pins. Pretty ridiculous. I hope I can "shave a couple of tenths off of my 1/4 mile time" as mentioned in the Ztherapy vid. Too bad I don't know what my 1/4 time was before the install. (or maybe that's good because now I can convince myself that it was worth it without having physical evidence to prove otherwise.) I mentioned the "use progresively longer bolt method", but they said it wouldn't work. Later.

I'm having trouble removing my spindle pins (big surprise). I have tried everything I can think of and had no luck. First I bought a puller from one of the members here. I soaked the pin area in PB every day for a few days. Then I applied the puller and a fair amount of pressure with no luck, so I heated the pin area and applied a little more pressure with the puller and hit the other end lightly with a hammer. So I applied a little more pressure with the puller and it stripped the nut and didn't budge the pin. Next I went to the machine shop and asked them to press it out. They have a 25ton press and I felt like this would do it. Well, they said they couldn't because it bent the bolt they were using to press it out with. (I still have to go pick it up). Does anyone have any words of wisdom for me? There is no chance of using a puller now. I called the junk yard and they are asking $250 total for both of the control arm/strut housing assys. As far as I can tell I have 3 options...Try to have it drilled out ($100), take it to a different shop with a bigger press (this will probably be cheapest and is definitely the preferred method, but I don't know of any other shop with a press that will do it for me), or buy the parts ($250). Thanks again guys. I'm not sure there's much you can do, but thanks anyways.

Thanks for all of the info guys. It really is helping. I'm still trying to get all of the paint/rust/gunk off with a wire wheel. It was my best bet since all I don't have a sand blaster or a battery charger. I'm starting to think that it might have been work the investment, but I'm pretty sure that my wife would disagree. I try to pick my battles carefully and I think the trade was worth it. Anyways, everything is getting pretty shiny. I think I'll be finished stripping everything tomorrow and then hopefully finish the painting before Tuesday. Then it'll be the same thing for the rear suspension...I have a spindle pin puller tool, so hopefully that won't cause too much trouble. Thanks again. Zack

I am looking changing my bushings and ball joints and replacing the springs and struts. Since I have the suspension taken apart I also would like to paint the parts. My goal is to do something that looks nice for the short term. I only need this to last 3-5yrs because I will be doing more extensive resto work in the future. So, I'm looking for a fairly easy way to apply the paint to the parts so that it hold and look decent for a fairly short period of time. I just finished taking everything apart and tomorrow I am going to start working on cleaning up the parts and stripping them down to the bare metal. I have the basics: a wire wheel, a few wire brushes, some degreaser, some anti-rust primer and some flat black paint. Looking at these parts I'm thinking that it may take more than these tools to completely strip them down as there are many years grime and light surface rust. Are there any other tools or chemical treatments I should or need to be using? The way I see it I am looking for advice on the following steps. 1. Stripping parts...What chemicals/tools work the best (or should I say the best for you)? This is the important one, I think 2. Prepping parts...Can I just spray primer onto the metal or is there more that I need to do (keep in mind that this is short term, and hopefully fairly easy and cheap) 3. Painting parts...Do the break calipers/hubs need a differnet type of paint than the suspension parts? Thanks in advance for the advice. P.S. I know there are a few topics that loosely cover this, but I couldn't find anything that would really help me.

I'll try to make it...If the car is running. I'm working on front and rear suspension now and then I need to take care of a low compression problem in one cylinder. I think I can, I think I can.