300ZX parts, to do lists, and transport vans

A delivery arrived. I was looking around at people breaking cars and found a 300ZX twin turbo that had been wrecked in the front passenger side. After some discussion, I purchased the entire rear end, and front end corners. This included all suspension, breaks, hubs, differential, axles, even the sub frame. I think that was just to reduce their labor hours in removing the pieces I wanted, however. 

This is the differential, an R230, that I will install into my 240z. It's much heavier than the current R200 that is in it, still limited slip, and has a larger ring gear than a Ford 9", but is independent.

While I was inside waiting for rain and deliveries, I re-did the to do lists entirely and checked off what I had already done, which of course makes you feel instantly accomplished. It would get re-done a few more times before this was over.

Everything under the line would be stricken. At this point I was still under the delusion of removing the engine from the bottom of the car, which is a real option, but in the end seemed like more work than it was worth. I was trying to make this a one person operation and the less hoist motions with loads the better. I originally thought lifting the front end of the car with he hoist would be easier, which it still might, but there was a significant amount of work that would have to be un-done to get the car rolling again without the engine. This seemed like a waste without putting an engine back in at the same time, and I was willing to put in the seemingly additional effort if it meant reducing the length of work by half.

I also didn't like the idea of pushing the engine /trans /front suspension around on wheel dollies even though it minimized the weight and motions in the air. People have suggested it, but I've never removed an engine this way and there were too many unknowns for me to plan it quickly. How high does the chassis need to be raised initially and how high does the front end need to be hoisted to clear? More importantly, how do you clear the hoist legs to roll the engine /trans /front suspension out while its holding said chassis? I came to the conclusion one needed a lift for this operation.

Quickly diverging off topic, this was the van I rented several times in London. Once for delivering goods to the port, once for picking up crate pallets from the shop, once to help a friend move.

Old Ford Escort sighting in the UK during a jam.

r2oo lsd ripped apart

Came back to the states for a few weeks and made it to the track the first week. Picked up the z and went over to Haydn's to reset the clutch release point. After some strange results which we blamed on the over-sized master cylinder, the pedal release point went from being barely reachable on the floor, to requiring barely any throw at the top.

I confirmed the slave cylinder was releasing all the way from under the car, so there wasn't risk of the throw being set too high, but it was definitely different driving home. If it were set too high, the clutch might not release completely while in gear, which would never be good for anyone, or the throwout bearing may drag on the clutch causing other issues. The super high release point also wasn't very good trying to stage at the track, but I'll get to that later.

Haydn's car the night before, relaxing on stands, floors still taped from last Halloween. Greenville was getting a lot of rain so it was iffy until the day of, but turned out sunny.

I have videos of both run's, or should I say 1.5 ...  <que ominous music>

The first run Haydn fully staged and I ran out of time, red lighting, not being able to inch the car forward easily with the previously discussed crazy clutch release point. I was very easy on the "launch," as to ease into the whole thing. There was some wheelhop and I could feel the rear breaking loose at the top end of the gears under boost. I was running high boost, 17#s.

The second run I staged first and Haydn followed. I was a little harder on the launch, but not by much, you can hear the turbo spool a bit at idle but the rev's drop considerably as I release the clutch. Even so there was still some loss of traction off the line. There was even more wheelhop and lack of traction when boost kicked, and at the top of second the rear end completely let go and I pulled out of everything.

I thought the halfshaft broke, or maybe the companion flange. As it turns out, the differential broke in half, bits of the rear cover still bolted to the mustache bar studs, the rest of the housing and the gear carrier hanging from the front mount and driveshaft.

Based on how the RLCA's potato-chipped, or taco'd based on food preference, it looks like the LSD broke first, dropping onto the inner arm rails, bending them, the driver's side considerably more affected. The driver's side halfshaft pulled out of it's outer joint, and presumably then out of the differential.

At the end of the track, I reached under the car to see the halfshaft hanging from the ebrake cable, and I simply pulled it out from under the car as it was no longer physically attached to anything. Surprisingly the halfshaft looked to be in once piece, if not possibly bent in the middle. The companion flange was over the stub axle, the outer joint of the cv still bolted to it. This assembly looked a little off-axis as compared to the one on the other side and its own hub center.

Because of the massive force against the RCLA's, the rear drop mounts rotated forward. So much force in fact, the bushing almost pulled out of the lower drop mount, completely bending the lower U mount.

The inner and outer rails of the RCLA that run inline with the differential front to rear both bent in the middle. The outer rail is actually more of a gusset, but the 3/4" sway bar held tight, possibly assisting in this bend.

If the halfshaft had let loose first, it would have spun around, hitting the front rail of the RCLA, potentially bending it downward. Assuming the bushing stayed in the front mount, this would have pulled the forward, outer joint at the wheel inward, cause serious toe-in. This could then have caused the LSD to rip apart if the cover was as weak as it apparently is, but the RCLA's would have bent in the opposite orientation. With the taco being on the inner rail, and the rear suspension points of the drop mounts shifting forward accordingly, the culprit points back to the finned-LSD cover.

Ideas are welcome.

It was 5o$ to get the z towed back home. I was asked several times why I wasn't more distraught. Aside from my car having enough kick to literally rip it's diff out, I see this as troubleshooting. If the 24o can't pull a run down the track without exploding, then it's not done. I was surprised we found the weak link this quickly, but here we are. The clutch held, the gears held (otherwise the differential casing would not have broken), and the tires held enough to cause the above reaction.

Assuming root cause of wheel hop and 100% torque load on and off at high boost, how do you fix this?  I don't want to put everything back together to have this happen again. I've asked around and this seems to be a rare event. Friends more into suspension geometry than I have suggested creating anti-squat by moving the suspension pickup points as compared the front. I think this sounds a bit much at this stage of the game and point towards the 4o year old chassis instead first. Also, this isn't a drag car, but I don't feel like it's too much to ask for her to not rip apart at 4oo wtq.

Currently there are no body mod's, no over-frame rails, no rear connectors, no upper strut bars, no cage. It's my opinion that the aft half of the car was just flopping down the track under load.

Again, ideas???

The funny part about this whole thing was the slip on the second run. Haydn pulled a 9.6 at 73 mph flooring it the whole way, beating me to the 6o' mark. The z was flying though, coasting from half track to a 9.9 at 56 mph without a driveline. Until next time.

Go team.

fuel lines twos

I realize the naming convention of these recent entries may not be up to par, I've been busy and havent had time to deal with it. I'll try harder.

To pickup from fuel lines ones, I went to the hardware store with Giffin. While we were inside it decided to rain, significantly. Like most afternoon storms, it cleared up quickly and we were on our way.

Back at the house I sanded down all the loose paint from the tank and painted a few layers of clear coat to seal it in my usual fashion.

 Looks perfect to me.

Halfway through our wet trip to Home Depot, which smelt amazing as hardware stores do, a light bulb or two went off and I realized exactly what I was going to use for the new fuel pickup design. Previously I had simply attached a submergable -8an hose to the bulkhead fitting. Normally pickup's like this simply dangle in the aftermarket tanks and are cut to length just above the base. Since I was reusing my oem tank, however, I had a horizontal run over a bulkhead and idealy needed to secure the line inside the tank from moving where it was originally intended to be placed. It was very difficult to cut to length while test fitting and get it to sit where I wanted it, let alone stay there with no way of ... securing it. Based on how easily it moved around looking at it this time, I am hard pressed to believe that it got past the last install without completely shifting off kilter, let alone while actually driving, cornering, or the simple act of filling her with fuel.

I was imagining some sort of hard tube, and purchased a straight copper tube, 1/2. This of course needed to be bent in some fashion, so that it would clear the inner tank bulkhead. If this first bend went ok then maybe a second bend could be added to bring the end of the pickup more towards the rear of the tank.

It wasn't. Wasn't ok that was. Sorry, don't have any photo's of this demoralizing attempt. It instantly kinked. I tried several times with the same insufficent result each time. The epiphany I had, however, while wondering the isles of the good smelling hardware store waiting for the skys to shut down was brilliant. I still had the 1/2" hard aluminum tubing that is going to be used later to plum the hard lines for the rest of the new full -an system in the 24o. When I bought it it was rolled up in a flat spiral, the arch of which I thought would be perfect.

It was.

Just as the -8an hose was tight enough to use on the fitting sans additional clamps, it fit VERY snuggly over the 1/2" tube and would work very well to secure it. After a few test fits (more photo's to follow) and some fine tuning of the lenth and curve, she was done.

With the welcomed break over, which I won by the way, and a few hours of sleep later, the tank was completely dry and ready for final installation.

The final product with all pieces mocked.

I purchased aluminum washers to help seal the bulkhead fittings. This is another failed attempt. I ordered them based on line diameter, obviously the fittings are a different size than the lines.

Duely noted.

Good thing I also purchased nylon sealing washers, in the correct -8an fitting size.

I'm not going to rehash the entire install process, but if you're really compelled, go back and find the previous entry covering the fuel tank mods. And yes, it's still just as much of a pain.

I gooped the threads and face flanges and sealing washers with ample amounts of rtv. I was doing everything I could this time around to prevent leaks. Looking back I'm suprised it didn't leak more than it did.

With both fittings installed, I went back over them with even more rtv. You can never be too sure.

This is where the fuel pickup sits now, just above the bottom center of the tank, about three quarters of the way back. The curve and length was such that it cleared the bulkhead and angled down, placing the end exactly where I wanted it. There is nothing to move or shift, nothing that needs to be secured to stay in place, nothing that rubs or touches anything so no possibility of wear, and installation was a breaze with the short, cut to length, hard line pickup.

When I removed the tank from the car I simply cut the rubber fuel line connections as this was much <much> easier than attempting to extract them from the barb fittings or even unbolt the fittings and deal with twisting the lines in place.

This process took longer than expected, but most things do when it's in the middle of the night. The rain was still going outside, which was nice with the open garage.

With the barb fittings cleaned, it was time to move on to the fuel sender. Note, that a future project is to replace all the soft lines with hard lines and -an fittings. This will be the first major project once I'm residing in the same country as my car again.

I coated the fuel sender unit with a healthy amount of rtv to be sure. Again, this was tank was getting sealed one way or another. Installed the rubber gasket, installed the sending unit in the correct orientation, locking it in place, and filled in the installed connection with more rtv.

Finished, sealed, tank.

Prepared for installation, and BAM, she's in there. Again, if you wish to read a step by step process of this, look back at the first tank install entry. It is all in there in excruciating detail, I promise.

Note the frayed sections of the filter -> pump -an line. I taped and secured the damaged sections and tucked it behind the inner wheel well fender this time during installation so that it would not risk rubbing against the wheel during operation. This line will probably be replaced when the rest of the fuel system lines are created and plumed, but for not it's very much intact and viable.

And I got distracted. It happens. Enjoy the mm brakes, hoosiers, coilover, shocks, RLCAs, mustache bar, finned cover lsd, techno toy tuning suspension shots. There's a nice homemade exhaust against some clean oem floor pans and rails in there somewhere too.

Back on task, the tank leaked when filled.

I was initially very disappointed, but as usual I jumped the gun and quickly realized it was the tank drain that was actually leaking, not the fittings.

Torqued and leak mitigated.

Back to taking pictures of suspension and fuel prons.

because racecar?