bobc

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I've got the same brochure that kats posted, so I went and took a look at it with a magnifying glass. Can't say about the back hose, but the front one is definitely not braided.

I could swear my 72 had braided lines on it. I remember removing them. (Ok, it was like 38 years ago!). My Vintage car used rubber lines without braids. I also went back and looked through my Datsun maintenance manual and found one picture of a rubber gas line in it. I went through all my other books and the best pictures I could find are inconclusive. Bob

Arne, pretty sure the gasoline hoses were cloth braided from the factory too.

Robb, What the other posters are saying is they don't believe it's your heater core. It could be the control valve, a broken or stuck cable, or someone blocked off the water flowing through it (usually because it leaked). Go through trouble shooting before you fix something that may not be broken. First check to make sure that both sides (inlet and outlet) are hooked up on the engine side. Second, pull off both hoses and pump some water through it, with the heater controls open and see if it comes out the other pipe. If so, then nothing is blocking the water and it should work. If nothing comes out, try changing the heater control and see if you get the same results. Then, look at the heater control valve and see if it's moving or stuck in the closed position. I'm not a pro on 280's, but this should get you started. Sure don't want you to go through all the effort to replace the heater core only to find out that a previous owner blocked off a hose or something similar.

Rich, You crack me up. How far you have come since the first time I met you at the Western show and you were detailing your dad's car. The silver car looks great and I hope you have it finished by the Empire show. I'll try to drop by to say hello, but I'm not going to enter. Couldn't beat you if I tried now! You've gone way past my level of obsession!!! BTW, may have a new wax for you to try. Will know more in a few weeks. Bob

I think the prior poster meant 303, not 302. Here's the link: http://www.303products.com/ I use it on my dash and it seems to work well. I also always have on a dash cover, even at shows. If a judge or someone wants to see my dash, I just take it off, but other than that it's always covered. Bob

Pretty sure motorsports has them. Give them a call.

When you get it back together, if after a hot CT test you have the same problem, get a helper to keep the motor running and squirt some automatic transmission fluid in each carb. It's an old mechanics trick, but really works. Don't panic at the big white clouds coming out the exhaust! The fluid burns really hot and will burn off any deposits on the valves.

If you search the archives you should be able to find some info on this as it comes up from time to time. One post I recall was similar to the problem I had with my original Z many years ago and sounds similar to your problem. Somewhere there was a loose ground connection that was causing the problem, but I just could never find it. This poster in this case added a ground cable directly from the alternator and it solved the jumping ampmeter problem

It's on the left side (drivers) of the block towards the back. It just looks like a bolt screwed into the side of the engine block. I wish I had a clear picture, but unfortunately I don't.

This place is in your area. Members of the Z Car Club of Inland Valley highly recommend Bryan's work. Vincent Foreign Car Svc 1061 East Arrow Highway Glendora, CA 91740-6137 - (626) 335-3800

If you're pretty sure the drill bit isn't under the timing cover have you tried draining the oil? Wouldn't it be your day if the drill bit just happened to slide out with the oil? Sounds like you maybe too far down the road for this option, but good luck anyways!

Best way is to pull the number one sparkplug and look inside the piston to find TDC. Distributor rotor should be on #1 cylinder. Now, the question is, did you mark everything before pulling out the oil pump and turning the crank? If not, you're going to need to line everything up again.

I'd bet money, the parts are not in the pan, but stuck behind the timing chain cover somewhere. There's not a lot of room where the cover meets the pan for the parts to slip through and there's lot's of stuff (chain tensioner, chain, guides, gears, etc) for the parts to hang up on before getting to the small gap into the oil pan. Bob

The car came from the factory with a gasket, but no one sells one and the replacement part doesn't come with one. I asked around because I had the same concerns and everyone said, it would be fine without one. Best, Bob

A universal joint for the socket set is nice to have, but isn't a requirement. you can get to all the bolts/nuts with either a socket or a box end wrench.

It's turned darker because it has absorbed moisture over time. With brakes, it is important to flush out the fluid every two years or so to prevent rust from forming in the system. The same rust can form in the clutch sytem, but you're really only talking about the clutch master and slave cylinders versus all the components in the brake system. Although, manuals will tell you to flush the clutch system on a regular basis too, if all is working correctly then I would leave it alone. I know that advice is contrary to what the manuals will tell you and maybe even members on this board, but it's good advice. My experience has been that if the fluid hasn't been changed in a long time and you decide to flush it, that's when the problems start. I got this advice from a very knowledgable Z mechanic and it's worked for me.

Rich, I know this isn't an "original" car, but that's not the OEM stripe. I think you can get one through mally002 though. See my picture for what the OEM stripe looks like. Bob

Sounds like it's either out of align or the pressure plate wasn't torqued properly. Just a guess. Did you use an alignment tool when you put it together?

I've restored black and yellow plates before for my Mustang. I'll see if I can find the yellow paint I used and get back to you. It matched perfectly. As far as the blue, I would try another paint shop and have them match it and mix up a spray can for you. When I did mine, I chemically stripped off all the originally paint so all I had was a steel. Then primed and painted the black. After that, I hand did the numbers. Wasn't that hard to do and they came out great and a lot cheaper than $200! Bob

Hey Rich! On those doglegs, I would recommend you cut out the entire panel and put in a new one versus brazing and grinding down. There's bound to be more rust behind there that isn't through yet. Don't want you to go to all the work of painting the car to have new bubbles form a year or so later. In fact, they might even form sooner when they wet sand down the car. Try tabco for the replacement dog legs. Not very expensive and well worth not having to worry later. Bob

Suggest a few things: 1. Change back to 10W30 or whatever you used prior (oil filter too) and see what happens. As noted, could be coincidence, but this would help rule the weight change as the culprit out. 2. Check valve lash again. and while you have the valve cover off, take a couple of pictures. 3. No oil spray bar? Are you sure? I'm not an expert on this one, but I thought all L24's had this. Do you do your own valve work or does your mechanic do this. Any possibility that he took off the oil spray bar to adjust the valves and forgot to put it back? Good luck, Best, Bob

Andy, Congrats and good luck with it! Bob

Datsun came out with what they called the V3 kit to "fix" the vapor lock problem on the 73 cars, leading me to believe that the 73's did not come with it or at least didn't until later in the model year. The kit had an 8 blade fan, pump, relays, wiring, and insulation for the fuel lines under the hood. I installed one on the 72 I had many years ago. Your car didn't come with an electric pump, but was probably wired for it. When you installed the V3 kit, the instruction pointed out where to find the wiring as it was already there. In fact the frame was already tapped for the screws that held the electric fuel pump. You just had to mount the pump, run the lines, plug in the relays and you were good to go. Best, Bob