Cleaned out the garage....found my old Z

[S30Jay]

Hello everyone! I'm stoked to finally become a CONTRIBUTING member of your community. This place is the best! Great vibe, talented fabricators, knowledgeable people, funny personalities, countless datsuns and some amazing builds. Reading all your build ups is what has motivated me to knock my Z out of suspended animation and back on to the road. Thank you. With any luck my marriage will remain in tact.....

 

I believe the rule is pictures (oics) in your first post? Hopefully this works;

 

 

 

I have more pictures and progress to report on......lets just make sure they actually load.  :rofl:

 

Jay

 

 

 

[datzenmike]

Welcome to Ratsun Jay, and a nice introduction with pictures. I see that someone had replaced the flat with roundtop SU carburetors. Great looking condition too.

[Angela]

Very cool Jay.

 

Nice ride!

 

Welcome to the family!

[Draker]

Welcome!

[john510]

Nice car,if you cleaned out the garage and found that the garage must have been a mess ! 

[tr8er]

Im going to go clean my fucking garage now.

[S30Jay]

Thanks for the welcome everyone! I appreciate it. 

 

Yeah, the garage had gotten a bit out of hand.....I've got to keep up on that. It's amazing how much crap I accumulate. Even more amazingly almost none of it has any value ha ha. Oh well.

 

Mike, you are correct. Those carbs are Z therapy round tops I installed back in 1998 to replace the original flattops. Those flattop carbs had to be spraying as much fuel into the air cleaner as they were into the engine, I still can't believe it was able to run like that! I also can't believe I didn't catch it on fire. 

 

THE BACK STORY (for those who want to hear it)

 

I got this Z from the original owner (yup, I'm owner #2!) with 60k and change on it. He and my dad grew up together and he had bought this car during their senior year in high school. My dad remembers driving this thing back then.  From what I've been told it almost never left town. In the time the original owner had it the headgasket had been replaced 3 times (you read that right), also the lower front fenders had been rust repaired, poorly I might add, and at some point the exhaust had been replaced with an old monza system. Everything else was original. By 1983 it had developed a number of mechanical issues coupled with the need for floor pan/frame rust work....and more fender rust work as well. So into a barn it went. And it stayed there until he offered me the car for free (you read that right too) as a project....strangely enough during my senior year as well. 1998 for those keeping track.

 

I really wish I could post some pictures of the rotten floor pans and what the car looked like when I first took it out of the barn. I used to have some but they were polaroids (younger members may have to google that) and have since faded to the point of being almost blank. The floor was gone. Really. From the firewall to the front hat section where the seats mount there was NO metal. None. Weeds had grown up through where the floor should have been and were actually taller than the dashboard. It actually was kind of cool as I had never seen anything like that before.

 

I dragged it out with a winch from a rollback and noticed that none of the wheels would roll, brake pads/shoes were sort of fused to the rotors and drums. Another first for me. Whatever, lets just say it needed work.

 

I spent 1998/1999 getting it running, having the metal work done, and ultimately learning to how to paint on it. I learned quite a bit about troubleshooting and repairing, made some nice repairs, and made some crappy ones too. I'm looking forward to righting those this time around. I had it on the road for two summers, and covered about 2,500 miles with it. Why only 2,500? Well just about every drive I took resulted in the need for more repair. Things that were still "OK" would fail after coming up to operating temperature a few times, or once I started using it again. It got expensive. And frustrating. So when I enrolled in college I put my z in storage. I figured I'd get to go over it properly after I graduated and was making better money, had a garage of my own, etc. So I was thinking like 4 years or so. 

 

That was 14 years ago. 

 

Life threw me a few years of downs right out of college before it started throwing me some ups. We'll leave it at that. 

 

But I kept the car, and I think the time has finally come.  And I want to put miles on it. Lots of them. 

[S30Jay]

So last July I decided to get back on it. 

 

The first step was going to be cleaning the carbs. (Necessary since the rear carb wasn't supplying any fuel the last time I ran it, about 5 years ago)

 

 

 

While I was at it I figured I'd hit the fuel pump too

 

 

And like a snowball rolling down a hill the momentum just kept building......

[S30Jay]

Ok, we'll see how many pictures I can post tonight.  :devil:

 

With the carburetors and fuel pump clean and not really feeling like dropping the fuel tank to clean that mess right away, my plan was to simply run a fuel hose from the inlet on the pump into a jerry can. Of course I'd make the hose long enough to reach through the passenger window so jerry could ride shotgun, this way I could verify the tires still roll  :rofl:

 

But first I wanted to check the valve lash before I fired it up. Saw this;

 

 

 

 

Hmmm......

 

Checked the spark plugs. 1 - 5 were nice. Cylinder 6 looked like this;

 

 

Scraped this crap off the piston

 

 

At this point the logical part of my brain and the illogical part were at war. I half wanted to fire it up anyway and see what happens but I couldn't help thinking I probably shouldn't. There was still alot of crap in that cylinder that I didn't want scoring the walls.....assuming it hadn't already. The crud was gritty after all and seemed to be metallic. Also the cam oiler was bent and loose in the rear and while the lobe showed no damage I didn't want it becoming damaged. Any ideas how it bent like that? Idk.....weird. 

 

So while I was trying to decide what my next move was going to be I started looking closely at other things in the engine bay. Spotted this;

 

 

Realized it was going to be a bit before she was going to run.

[S30Jay]

Thinking about the engine further, I remembered running a compression test on it back around 1999 or so. I remembered one cylinder (pretty sure it was #6) having 85psi. while the others were all in the 115psi range. At the time I didn't run a wet test for comparison.

 

Anyone know the stock compression reading on a 260z? I'm thinking 150psi or so?  :confused:

 

So I made a set of lugs up

 

 

and this plate

 

 

and did this. 

 

 

 

[S30Jay]

Random other stuff

 

 

One ugly bay

 

 

[exit64]

Just like picking a scab, feels great at first and the next thing you know, blood everywhere.  Been there more than once with the Roadsters and about to start another one.

[S30Jay]

Ha, never heard it put like that before. Good analogy though, hoping to avoid a bloodbath on this. Time will tell.

[Ratwagon1600]

Hmmm.

 

Nice car, great intro post.

 

Welcome to the zoo.

[S30Jay]

Thanks!

 

I love this place, been lurking for a few years.

[S30Jay]

So after I pulled the L26 out I considered going the L28 route. A lot of pluses for sure but I really wanted to wake that old L26 up again instead. Kinda felt bad for it after it sat for so long waiting, didn't seem right to dump it. Decided I wanted to get that running as good as I can.

 

Dropped it off at the machine shop for a rebuild. After they tore it down my machinist told me it had a lot of internal wear (not surprising), cylinders would need a rebore, valves had excessive play, crank needed grinding, etc. Nothing unusual, but it was tired.

 

I stopped in to see it around the end of November and it looked like this

 

 

 

 

 

[S30Jay]

Just before Christmas it looked like this

 

 

 

 

Looking forward to hearing it run!

[paradime]

Hey Jay, Welcome to the rat trap.

 

Man, what a great way to start your build thread. That car is lucky it owns you. 

[KoHeartsGPA]

Beautiful, keep up the good work and welcome to Ratsun!

[S30Jay]

Thank you for the kind words and encouragement! I've enjoyed so many of the builds here...I'm really glad to be able to share mine here too.

[The Taterhead]

Welcome sir. Love the car and I'm so glad you can type a coherent sentence.

[soundboi]

engine rebuild looks good

[Draker]

Very clean! Love it!

[Busta Nut]

:thumbup:

[S30Jay]

Small update for you.....the engine is DONE. I'm planning on picking it up next weekend.

 

Specs on the build are +1mm bores (.040"), moly rings, all new valve seats, springs, guides, etc., mild comp cam, stainless high flow valves (unsure of brand - stock size) and lots of machining to true things up.

 

Also just wanted to note this; when the head was being reassembled my machinist determined that .230" lash pads were needed to complete the setup. He ordered them from MSA and after waiting two weeks called to check on the order. He was told they were on backorder for 5 years! After calling a few other suppliers he asked if I knew where to get them. I didn't but made a few calls.

 

I found them at Datsun Spirit. The owner, Eiji answered the phone and was very helpful. He stocks lash pads in .5mm increments and got them right out to us.