DJ's 280ZX

Restores, Revamps and Repairs
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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Mon Jun 01, 2015 6:14 pm

While on the NZ Datsun Southern Cruise I started noticing a noise from the right rear especially while rolling at slow speed, thought I'd investigate it so I jacked up the car and ran it in gear and it looked like the brake caliper was moving in and out slightly. I pulled the wheel off and took the caliper off and oddly the brake pads are worn on a taper but top to bottom rather than left to right.

I had to space the caliper out when I put the Z31 rotors on it and it's possible the spacers were too small in the outside diameter which might be letting the caliper wobble a bit. I made some new caliper spacers on the mill that are much more substantial, bought some new brake pads too. Haven't quite got it back together yet but I'll do that over the next couple of days. I've got some new wheel bearings just in case I need to replace them.

I thought while it was sitting there I'd try and swap the engine mounts for the Castlemaine Rod Shop ones and urethane mounts with safety interlocks in them, the drivers side mount isn't very easy to get out and after getting it out and getting the new one in I found out they aren't going to work, they are made to sit the motor back about another 25mm and I can't do that as the plenum won't clear the clutch master cylinder. I'll use them on the white car instead.
Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Mon Feb 13, 2017 9:10 pm

Thought I'd resurrect this thread and the other one or two that I've got on here. It's been a while and quite a lot has happened, got married, had a baby, bought a house, changed jobs, spent about 7 months working on a mates car in my spare time. This thing has been in pieces since October 2015 so this will be a bit of a picture dump with some words.

Fitted a Fairlady Z rear bumper to it, have a front one as well which hasn't quite made it on to the car.


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Failed the last warrant on a front wheel bearing which I had to replace, they're a hub unit so it was bit spendy but they would have been original to the S14 they came off.

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The car started smoking at a grasskhana so that lead to the motor being pulled apart again, that block was rebuilt so it could be sold, I also started building another RB26 with some better bits and pieces than the original motor had.

The head came off a motor that came from NZeder, I pulled a valve out to have a look at how it was set up, it's got big cams in it and usually this requires special lifter buckets but this particular head has deeper retainers and quite thick shims which I think are Tomei items.

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The new block has coated CP pistons, Eagle rods, ARP main studs, ARP head studs, NDC bearings, an R33 crank, the Tomei oil pump from the old motor. I've had this plenum set off an R34 that had done 15,000ks around for ages so that will be going on it.

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The head has been ported, the cams are Tomei items, 290 11.5 on the exhaust side and 280 11.5 on the inlet, the inlet valve guides have been cut back which is a bit annoying but I'm not going to worry about them right now. It's getting viton stem seals and I've got some Jun cam gears for it too.

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I've decided to go back to coil on plug as well and ditch the twin post Mitsi coils I was running, these are some coils from another recent purchase that you'll see in my other thread. I've got to make up a mount for them which I'll do on the water jet cutter at work, they have the same plugs as RB25 Neo coils so I bought a new coil loom from Amayama and bought a matching loom side plug from NZEFI.

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Also bought a fibreglass bonnet the other day which will be on it's way down to me soon.

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Got an air temp sensor which is a direct fit into the plenum as well so I don't have to run one in the intercooler piping.

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Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

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nustad
Z Club Member
Posts: 551
Location: Auckland

Post by nustad » Mon Feb 13, 2017 9:40 pm

Awesome to have updates on all three. Keep em coming! Cool projects.
72 240z plus bits

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A280Z
Posts: 139
Location: Auckland

Post by A280Z » Tue Feb 14, 2017 4:38 am

Nice one man, top work.

What air temp sensor is that? Locally sourced?

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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Tue Feb 14, 2017 10:18 pm

A280Z wrote:Nice one man, top work.

What air temp sensor is that? Locally sourced?
You can buy them from NZEFI for $100, I got the same one they sell from eBay, it ended up coming from Lithuania but was only $50 odd. It's a Beru ST005, they are factory fitted to some BMWs and Landrovers.
Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

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A280Z
Posts: 139
Location: Auckland

Post by A280Z » Thu Feb 16, 2017 4:04 am

djz wrote:
A280Z wrote:Nice one man, top work.

What air temp sensor is that? Locally sourced?
You can buy them from NZEFI for $100, I got the same one they sell from eBay, it ended up coming from Lithuania but was only $50 odd. It's a Beru ST005, they are factory fitted to some BMWs and Landrovers.
Cheers man

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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Sun Mar 12, 2017 3:08 pm

The bonnet has turned up in Christchurch, just have to figure out a way to get it home from my old work. Motor is almost ready, I had to buy another set of oil squirters as I could only find 5 out of 6.

Got a couple of 150 psi pressure sensors, will be using one for oil pressure and one for fuel pressure. The rail has a port in the centre as it can be centre fed but I'm not going to put it there as I don't think it would look right so I'll have to get a tee and put in at the end of the rail.

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After a month or so of trying to get this done I finally managed to cut out the coil mounting plate on the table cutter, it's just cardboard to see how it's going to work, I might narrow it and shorten it a bit as it looks a bit big I think. I'll cut one out of aluminium this week but might make the final one out of carbon fibre as we've got lots of small offcuts at work. Have to make the stand offs as well, I see a lot of the mounts you can buy use all 7 mounting points but I don't think it's really necessary so I'm just going to use 3. Also started on the wiring for the coils, there isn't enough room in the terminals to loop the wires over so I'll have to splice them before the plug.

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Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Sat Apr 08, 2017 3:51 pm

Made the new coil mount, everything looks good apart from one hole which didn't go all the way through which was my fault for trying to run it too fast, the coil bolt holes line up better than they did before, just have to get some 6mm rivnuts and make the stand offs and spacers. I've been thinking about making the stand offs out of titanium as we've got some 13.5mm round bar but it might be more trouble than it's worth.

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Took the oil pump apart to prime it, gave it a clean and ran a tap through the sump bolt holes at the same time and put it back together with loctite on the screws. Pulled the pressure relief valve apart to check if had any shims in it which it didn't, also removed one of the springs.

Just have to find the bolts for it now, not sure where they ended up when we moved.

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Got the rest of the head apart and pulled all the stem seals off. Got a tee for the fuel pressure gauge and an in hex bung for the remote oil filter mount as the sensor wouldn't clear the male squared bung that was in there. Haven't managed to get much else done in the last week.

Been working on the engine dyno rig at work, it's almost ready to go, the engine on it is a GM/Vauxhall X20XEV out of the Formula 3, once that's tuned I can start getting it ready for the RB.

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This is the car the other engine is in, it's a Dallara F305, we're trying to buy another one the same but Dallara don't have any new monocoques.

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Put the bell housing in the mill at work to measure the bolt pattern to make up a plate for the dyno, I forgot to get photos of the RB one but I did the VK housing at the same time.

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Got the engine on the dyno running at about 4:30 on Friday, so the guys should get it tuned next week so the dyno will be free after that.

Today I removed the original bonnet and test fitted the fibreglass bonnet. Removing a Z bonnet by yourself is an interesting task.

I haven't weighed either of them by the fibreglass one feels at least 50% lighter. The bonnet springs are actually pushing the bonnet open (hence the weight to hold it down) so I'm going to try removing one of the springs. It just touches on the front bumper but it isn't adjusted properly. The hinges are just touching a little bit so hopefully one it's adjusted that will clear, if not I'll have to remove a little bit of the fibreglass.

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Mocked up the fuel rail and fuel pressure sensor, I'm not 100% sure I'm going to use that fuel rail, it came from Aliexpress and the quality is okay but it's made for 11mm oring injectors where the ones I've got are 10.5mm and it looks a little ugly.

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Put the water pump on and started to put the cam belt drive bits on. I also removed the bumps from the exhaust ports on the head, need to find a couple of my sanding roll bits and pieces so I can finish it off, then take it down to work for another clean then reassemble it.

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Last edited by djz on Sun Aug 13, 2017 6:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

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HasMilk
Posts: 171
Location: Wellington

Post by HasMilk » Sat Apr 08, 2017 4:26 pm

Dude where do you work?! Awesome photos
In a long distance relationship with my 260z

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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Wed May 31, 2017 9:45 pm

HasMilk wrote:Dude where do you work?! Awesome photos
I work for Rodin Cars.

Fitted some new breather fittings to the rocker covers.

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Mocked up the head with one of each valve in it to check the piston to valve clearance with the 1mm head gasket. Fitted the Jun cam gears for the first time, I like them better than the other ones I was running.

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I've had this RB25 block sitting at work for ages to measure the sump bolt pattern off, finally got around to actually doing it, was easier than doing the bell housing patterns as I didn't have to drop the probe into holes each time. There were 30 holes in totally including the oil pump and rear main seal housing.

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Made up one post for the coil adaptor, haven't quite decided whether to make the proper ones out of titanium or just stick with ali.

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Got some new drain fittings for the turbo, going to do it in braided line this time instead of rubber hose, when I took the turbo off the return like cracked in half.

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Ended up having to replace the valve guides, thought I'd give it a go myself. Made some drifts.

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Heated up the head in this dryer thingy we've got at work.

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Old guides out. Put the new guides in but I ended up wrecking one of them so had to change one twice.

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Decided to change the vacuum setup on the engine as well, I had a spare vacuum plenum thingy so I pulled out the original tubes and bunged them up and also bunged up the other holes, I also spun down a -6 fitting and pressed it into the end of the plenum, I'll probably make up a new vacuum tank to run the brake booster off.

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Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Sun Sep 10, 2017 12:22 pm

Head is at Flemings, he's going to vacuum test the valves and recut the seats if necessary, at least 3 of them will need doing so I told him just to do them all if that's the case.

I bought a valve refacer, not sure if I've mentioned that yet. The 26 heads are shim under bucket and instead of having to buy 24 new shims I'm going to grind the ends of the valves to get the clearances back to where they need to be.

I started cutting the vent holes out of the bonnet as well, they were just glassed over when the bonnet was made. Cutting fibreglass is pretty messy but the Dremel worked pretty well on it. I've been looking at flush mounted Aerocatch latches but the push button ball locking ones look quite interesting as well. It's a little bit annoying as with the standard catch you can open the bonnet from either side of the car but with one catch on either side I'll have to walk around the car to open it, just a minor annoyance. I thought about just putting one Aerocatch in the middle but it might look a bit stupid.

Here's something cool that was made at work, it's a 3D printed titanium merge collector.

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Here's a picture of the valve refacer.

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Here's the left hand bonnet vent mounted into the bonnet.

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Here's both vents mounted, I'm going to paint the inside of the bonnet black and will probably put some heat shielding on it above the turbo.

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The push button bonnet latches I bought are actually quite nice quality but are huge, I've ordered some small ones to see what they're like.

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Made up the braided oil return the other day, this stuff is from a place called Torques in the UK, I think it's probably from China though, it doesn't go together as nicely as the Speedflow stuff but it was free. It's a reasonable distance from the manifold but I might end up putting heat sleeve around it if it's a problem.

I did a bit of searching as to whether -10 is going to be okay, I have a feeling that it's a bit on the small side but I couldn't find any suitable flanges in -12, I'll make some if I have to.

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I haven't made much more progress as we've been really busy at work trying to get two cars ready to the Dubai Motorshow in November, this is what one of them looks like - this is our test car so not the actual one going. The boss bought the ex Lotus T125 project which we're changing and upgrading. We have a few Cosworth GPV8 engines left but after they're all used they'll be getting a V10 powerplant. This is what the 3D printed merge collectors are going on.

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Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

badhabit
Posts: 330
Location: auckland

Post by badhabit » Tue Sep 12, 2017 10:37 am

yikes! is that your day job??!! :shock: WOW jealous much! Sighhhhh.....Back to my desk.... :cry:
1973 240Z - NZ new - RB25det build in progress
1973 240Z - USA new - 1 owner! In the drivers seat right now. Home soon.

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bernjean
Z Club Member
Posts: 1709

Post by bernjean » Wed Sep 13, 2017 12:30 pm

Now that is what I call a work place. Thanks for taking the time to post up on the Forum, I really love looking and reading this sort of stuff. Anyone else doing any builds, feel free to post away. Keep up the good work.
Bernie Kant
Club President

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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Wed Sep 13, 2017 8:46 pm

badhabit wrote:yikes! is that your day job??!! :shock: WOW jealous much! Sighhhhh.....Back to my desk.... :cry:
Yup it is, I mostly stand at a lathe or the mill all day but we're doing some cool stuff.

Used the mill tonight to mark out the RB bell housing pattern on the dyno engine plate, one hole was where the starter cut out for the Opel motor was so I'll have to run the plate backwards which should be okay except the braces might interfere with the sump.

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The insert I ordered for doing the pulleys was the wrong one so I had to order another, gave it a quick go tonight and it's much better, just need to play around with the depths a bit, not that it would really matter for the valve refacer.

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Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

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djz
Posts: 849
Location: Christchurch

Post by djz » Wed Sep 13, 2017 9:51 pm

Oh I got the new bonnet catches too, they're much smaller, just need to have a bit more of a play with them to make sure they're up to the task.
Nissan 280ZX 2 seater RB26 powered.

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