-Strike-'s 1978 280Z Project

[-Strike-]

Picked this car up in Ontario, it's already had pretty much all of the body work done to it, and it's almost in a stage for paint. Insides of doors/under hood/hatch and engine bay have already been sand blasted, primed and sprayed. Just needed a small patch or two on the floor pans of course, but not bad at all.

Been working on getting the motor running, which required a new fuel pump at first, and now an alternator to keep running. The car has 87000 miles on it, and has been off the road since 1985. Pretty solid project to begin with. Car came stripped down, and a truck load of parts.

There's a ton of mechanical work needed to be done, such as brakes/front suspension, and all that jazz, but it'll keep me busy for a while. Did the water pump and flushed the block out. Runs pretty good. Also has a header that came with it to be installed, and source out an exhaust system.

The rear has been shaved, marker lenses removed/shaved. Running a 240 front bumper, and on coilovers. Working on lining up the ZG flares before paint, and have an air dam and rear spoiler to pick up from Whitehead sometime in the next week or so. There will be a bunch of random little parts I'll need here and there to get it completed.

My ultimate plan is to go for more of the "JDM" look, which will be rather unique around my area. Since there is practically 0 Z's kicking around.

Anyways, onto some pictures, if you have any questions, feel free to ask. I'll try and remember to update this as I have progress.






























And that's it for right now. It's like Christmas every time I walk into the garage haha.

[grannyknot]

Very nice! Looks like someone else did all the hard work and you get to do the fun stuff.
Having just finished my restore in the spring I would recommend you don't skimp on the sound deadening and quality thick underlay. You'll really appreciate it once the windows get rolled up.
What colour are you thinking of?
Chris

[-Strike-]

Yes, the car needs a new carpet kit for the interior to start. I will lay down some deadening, and maybe have a mass backing for the carpet . My 84 was stripped down, and I think there's 0 padding or deadening left under the carpet, it's quite loud. haha. That's why I loved this project, the hard work has already been done. I just get to play around and finish it up. It's a shame the previous owner had to give up on her, he was quite financially invested in it, and was pretty devastated to let it go, but with work and school, there was just no time or funds to continue on the car.

I'm thinking of going with the 40th Anniversary Graphite as seen on the 2010 370. I think that color would look sharp with some matte/semi-gloss accents such as the rear wing, ZG's. Previous owner was going to go with the matte black hood, but I'm unsure about that right now, not sure if it would give the car an unfinished look or not. It does look pretty mean on some cars, but I'm on the fence. I will probably get it painted to match the car, and if I change it in the long run, I could get a hold of another hood

[Six_Shooter]

I agree with the statement of adding sound deadening.

My car has very little in department, and on the highway is quite loud.

On the flip side I added a lot of sound deadening to Jerryb's 240Z and it's quite quiet to drive, and makes the drive pleasant because of that. I first sprayed it with Lizard skin on all the interior metal surfaces, including the firewall, except the roof, because the headliner was already installed. After that Jerry wanted more deadening, so we followed that up by a layer of stick on deadening material, I don't recall the brand off hand. The firewall and cowl are covered in this right back to the tail lights and on as many surfaces as we could get to. Worth all the time to do so.

My car will be getting lots of sound deadening when I re-build it.

[grannyknot]

I agree with the statement of adding sound deadening.

My car has very little in department, and on the highway is quite loud.

On the flip side I added a lot of sound deadening to Jerryb's 240Z and it's quite quiet to drive, and makes the drive pleasant because of that. I first sprayed it with Lizard skin on all the interior metal surfaces, including the firewall, except the roof, because the headliner was already installed. After that Jerry wanted more deadening, so we followed that up by a layer of stick on deadening material, I don't recall the brand off hand. The firewall and cowl are covered in this right back to the tail lights and on as many surfaces as we could get to. Worth all the time to do so.

My car will be getting lots of sound deadening when I re-build it.

That sounds like my build, homemade lizard skin painted on all inside surfaces, MurderMat on top of that then 1/2" thick underlay, then MSA carpet kit. On cool mornings when the the windows are up the music sounds good.

Strike, has the engine been worked at all, any plans?

[-Strike-]

As far as I know the engine is pretty well un touched and mostly original. I want to get her up and running for right now to see where she's at motor wise. Do a quick tune standard tune up and run it for a bit, I haven't really looked into too much performance/modification motor wise just yet. See if I can't get it up and running solid before I consider digging into anything like that. I will probably end up leaving it N/A, as I already have two turbo Z's, as much as it'd be fun, I think a stock-ish L28 could be just as fun. May see about doing the cam/header/fuel/tune type stuff and keep it simple.

I'm open to any suggestions and ideas. Not sure I want to go full out, want to keep it reasonably reliable

[510longroof]

Had an orange 710 with a matte black hood once. The PO had done that. Of all the cars I ever drove for long distances that was by far the best. No glare from the hood meant less eye strain on the bright sunny days.

[jerryb]

Other than the sound of the exhaust my car is very quiet. All exterior panels have a dynamat type deadener and the doors have another layer on the inside panels. Its well worth it....doenst sound like an echoey tin can!

[-Strike-]

Other than the sound of the exhaust my car is very quiet. All exterior panels have a dynamat type deadener and the doors have another layer on the inside panels. Its well worth it....doenst sound like an echoey tin can!

Duly noted. It should be fairly easy for me to do, and I might as well do it now while the interior is stripped out of it. Thanks for the heads up and idea to add that guys, something I probably would have overlooked.

Had an orange 710 with a matte black hood once. The PO had done that. Of all the cars I ever drove for long distances that was by far the best. No glare from the hood meant less eye strain on the bright sunny days.

Good to hear there is a little more function, rather than just form. I'm still playing with that idea. As I said, I will more than likely get the hood painted to match, and work from there, just so I don't have to visit the paint shop twice if I don't like it. It is quite a unique look, and I do like it, and it may look good with the dark charcoal color and other matte black accents anyways.. we'll see

[Dr.Diesel]

I was glad to read all the tips on the sound deadening everyone provided. All the metal work is done on my 73 240z and will be painting it in a couple of weeks. So, sound deadening was on my mind. Geez you got a nice project there. Your a lucky guy to find that one. Congrats. Lookin forward to see it when you get it rollin,

[-Strike-]

Not much really going on right now, still kind of in the discovery/planning stages. Started making my list of replacement parts and doing odd things to play around. Worked on putting on the header that came with the car, looks to be an older pacesetter/msa style unit, fairly clean, just brushed it off and laid some high temp paint on it, should hold up, same stuff I painted my turbo with on the Shiro, and it still looks good, so heat shouldn't be an issue.

Figured I'll end up replacing the studs while I'm there, just wanted to see how things fit.

Looks like I'll be needing a whole whack of bushings, they've pretty much all dry rotted from sitting so long, tension rods, control arms, sway bars, you name it. Then I started looking into the adjustable custom stuff, such a can of worms! hahah

May try and source out a N42 non-webbed/non-egr manifold later, and also may end up doing the throttle body swap. I have a bunch of spares from my Z31's. Not worried about any cold start/emissions stuff as this car probably wont be drivin much, nor be drivin when it's cold. I'm still so stoked about the availability of aftermarket for the S30, something the Z31 really lacks.

Such a fun project

The car is really low right now, 3 inches of clearance from the rails to the ground, will probably have to adjust it up a bit when I start looking at wheels/tires

[Speedtospare]

Car looks very straight. Nice find.

[-Strike-]

Haven't really done much yet, just little bits while I wait to get the paint done, work has been a little busy. But, part of the fun is the little things

Decided against trying to source out an earlier manifold and cut the webbing/egr out of this one. Was rather simple to be honest



Then I was like; hey, I have some time; and cold start/idle controls have never been my thing, so away with those...





Just doing little things to satisfy my Z addiction. Not sure about the black paint yet, not sure a colour scheme yet for the motor. See if I can't get it running again today, to see how well it runs now with all emissions removed and blocked. Should be fine as all my other Z's are the same way. The next big step will be doing the front brakes so the car can move under it's own power, then I'll be sourcing a welder, and cutting the arches out for the flares, pre-paint. I'd hate to cut into new paint! hah. Will also need to find some plug wire looms, as having them flapping around like that kind of bug me

[-Strike-]

Haven't really done too much, trying to recover some funds from buying the car before I begin ordering tons of parts. Doing little things to occupy my time.

Since the car never came with the original radio, and I would like one in there for some tunes.. I got thinking; I do have my spare unit I took out of my Ford Explorer before I sold it, only down side is it's a double din unit...

I looked into it, and I cannot really find anyone who's modified the console to fit a double din unit.. so I began playing around.. I think I figured it out.. I had to cut out the area that housed the seat belt light and the fogger lamp.. I wanted to retain these some how, as they're quite unique to the car, and I love the look of them.. so, I made them fit a little lower in the console just above the shifter.. Almost looks factory.

Preliminary fitment on the unit, still need to do some trimming, and mounting. I have a dash trim ring for a double din unit that I ordered for my Explorer, it fits around the unit, and helps close the gap, I can use that and modifty/shave it to give it more of a finished look I am hoping. But, I am amazed. It really fits well in that space!

[-Strike-]

Test fitting in the car, powered it up to see how the tilting/opening fits within the console, everything clears. Yay!