GTR-240Z 2012 Refresh

[tel240z]

Well these diffs can be 33 odd years old and all probably well ove 100 thousand miles even with new bearings in they need setting up right the crownwheel and pinnion will never be in exactly the same mesh pattern as before, guess i must be lucky mine just makes a quiet whooshing noise at speed but i must admit darrens diff was silen t

 

[Ian]

Any more updates?




Apart from the ****** pads how do you find the AZC front brakes?

I want to fit an LSD to my 260Z but I want something that will still be suitable for when(or if) I put an RB26 in her and theres no point in me putting a Kazz or something into my R200 (I'm assuming my car has R200 being a late 260Z) if thats going to have to be changed for another diff later on. Would you definitly reccommend not using an R200 or would it be ok for me as I don't plan to run as much power as you (I'd be happy with 350 - 400hp)

Do you know how much heavier the R230 was over the R200?





Sorry for all the questions.

 

[GTR-240Z]

Lots more updates done to car I just have not updated this thread as pretty much all the interested people see the car regularly anyway or will see it at the pod soon enough. I suppose I should really update this thread.

AZC brakes are great even the **** pads they supplied are good just noisey and create alot of dusting but the car does now stop as quickly as it can accelerate.

Not sure on the weight of an R230 over an R200 it's definetly a big heavy thing but I think a little increase in weight at the rear is not necessarily a bad thing. I went R230 to allow me to beef up my stubs and driveshafts which is really where your weak spot will be, the R200 is more than strong enough and is used in Skyline GTR's upto the R34 in short nose form so its more than upto the job. I think if I was building another car I would look at using the R200 short nose from a GTR or similar with the Technotoy kit and use the strongest shaft/hub combination it could provide which will mean using a 5 lug hub as the 4 lug stuff all have a lower spline count to make it not worth the effort in my opinion.

 

[Ian]

Please update this thread, I'm interested in what you are doing but can't see the car in person.


Good to hear the AZC brake setup is good as I'm definitly considering getting it. What pads are/have you upgraded to?




I think I'll plan to use an R200, I'll only upgrade if I have breakage problems. My diff has low milage on it so it should be good but do I keep this and get the parts needed to convert it to cv's and install an LSD or do get a short nose R200 from a R33/R34 and the parts needed to fit it?

 

[Alphabettispaghetti]

+1

 

[Ian]

Any updates?




Saw a photo of your car on Speedhunters:

 

[GTR-240Z]

Just got back from a long drive from Germany and not taken any pictures of more recent mods. When I'm refreshed in the morning I'll take some pictures and update my thread.

 

[tel240z]

The oil burner made it then

 

[GTR-240Z]

The oil burner made it then

Yeap 1400 miles in total without a hicup including about 180 miles each way on the A2 at a nice constant 115mph it even managed to get better MPG than I ever got driving in blighty

 

[GTR-240Z]

Right been ages since I actually updated this thread properly and to be honest forget where I left off. I think the original plan was to have the car done ready for summer but after rushing the larger parts of the project like the diff, steering etc it was apparent I would not be finishing the large list of stuff I wanted to do and saving for a house has meant I have had to budget any bits for the zed so progress has been somewhat slow.

Here is what I have done since the last update some of the pictures are not great as they were done on a mobile phone camera.

Fuel Tank:
Fuel tank was replaced with the help of Terry the old tank was sound but I really didn't like the swirl pot setup the lift pump was noisey and when at brand's doing a track day I could actually drain the swirl pot and cause fuel starvation when entering the straight which is not ideal .
I decided to have an alloy tank made which would have internal baffles to restrict fuel slosh and a lower sumped area in the bottom which within an ATL surge tank can be mounted with a fuel pump then mounted inside this.

Here is the outside of the tank showing the sumped bottom which can hold about 4 litres, the whole tank holds approx 70 litres.

Here is the internal baffles to prevent sloshing of fuel

And here is the ATL surge tank which can hold .6 gallons and has trap doors to keep the fuel inside. It's been modified to fit to the top of the tank's lid much like a modern car.

The fuel pump is a Walbro 400LPH fuel pump, at the time a fairly new pump but I have been very happy with my previous Walbro pumps and this flows 400 litres per hour which meant I could keep a single pump setup and mounted inside the tank its whisper quiet.

The tank uses a VDO dip sender and will work with a programmable autometer fuel gauage which I still need to buy so still running the older one at the moment.

 

[GTR-240Z]

Battery:
Battery had to be mounted to rear of car as the original space was now taken by my power steering pump. I decided to use a traditional battery mounted in the rear passenger side just behind the wheel well. I really didn't like stories of the gel type batteries not liking slow drains like car alarms as I need to have an alarm for insurance purposes so went to Halfords and found the smallest battery I could find on the shelf which I think is an 063 commonly used on BMW E46 316i/318i so should be easy to replace in the future.

The battery was mounted in an alloy frame I bought from ebay, It's mounted at this angle so the battery is easier to remove from the frame without having to remove trim or hit against the body.

The negative battery cable is grounded against rear body and then a 2nd cable goes along the inner rear wing down the inside of the sill and is grounded a 2nd time on the bulkhead where most of the wiring loom and engine get grounded to prevent any issues with poor grounds throught the shell.
The postive cable goes to a 200A maxi fuse ontop of the battery tray which protects the circuit incase the battery cable gets shorted with the body. The postive cable then runs the same way as the negative cable and then onto a bulkhead terminal. From the otherside of the bulkhead terminal it goes to the starter motor.

The fuel pump relay and fuse box is also mounted here so any voltage drop to the pump is minimal, The only fuel pump wire the runs the length of the car is a white wire used by the ECU to ground the relay. I still need to make a battery cover to hide this away.

 

[GTR-240Z]

Wiring:
Removed all the wiring and gave it a good overhaul with hindsight I wish I had just made a completly custom loom as I could have made a better loom from scratch but I will save that for the next project.
Things I did to the loom include:
Remove insulation tape, clean off gummy ****

Remove unused wires

Repair or replace damaged wires so no more scotch locks, insulated crimp connectors or two wires just twisted together and wrapped in insulation tape!

Placed loom in convoluted tubing which I prefered the look off and was easier to position in the car using the tubing.

Fitted modern fuse boxes that use blade fuses, one inside the car to replace the old fuse box and another in the engine bay which powers the fan, power steering relay, alternator sense wire, headlights, and ecu.
Also replaced the fusable link from the starter with a midi fuse box this then feeds the 2 fuse boxes and power steering pump.

Completly redid headlight wiring with new beefier wiring, no more scotchlock heaven there.

Replaced older style relays with modern style ones also added in relays for gauages, flashers, and junked my old ACC relay harness which was a complete dogs dinner and is now feeding seperate relays for the wipers, blower, and rear demister circuits. Also replaced the flasher relays with modern electronic versions.

Got everything electrically in the zed working I now have a working map light, demister, even the interior light comes on when I open the day

Dash harness during the refit

Everything got its own nice little sub harness with a proper multiconnector etc

Part of front harness mounted as cleanly as possible

Tidy the engine harness

Even got it looking alright under the dash, dropping resistor for the injectors is also hidden hear but will be removed when I replaced the injectors

 

[GTR-240Z]

Interior:

Removed the old carpet and decided to fit some heat insulation to cut down on heat coming into the car from the transmission tunnel. It should also cut down on some of the road noise.

The decided to reupholster in black alcantara as I was not that keen on vinyl or carpet on the transmisison tunnel or sills. The cloth is black but in bright light and from camera flashes does have a purplish/grey hue which is a shame as a like my interiors dark dark black but I'm still happy with the end result.
Never done anything like this before but was pleased with the result, I tried to cut the material in such a way the joins where typically under things like the seats and at the ends I folded edges over and glued to give the impression of seams etc.

Picture showing sill

Drivers footwell

another picture of drivers area and also showing most of wiring etc back in car.

Passenger side, also shows cigerette lighter socket I have mounted for powering sat nav etc

Then redid doors as these were looking dog eared in the corners, may only issue is it really needs something to break up this large area like the chrome strip or a line sewn in. Also replaced the brush along the top of the door cards with window felt material as I broke the brush strips when trying to remove from the door.

 

[datsun dave]

Looking very nice Darren.

 

[GTR-240Z]

And the rest of the smaller jobs

Tried to relocate as much stuff from the inner wings as possible, the fuel filter was relocated, and the boost solinoid and alarm were tucked up out the way.

Moved the screenwash bottle to the otherside as my power distribution box, fuse box, and boost soliniod took the space up.

Fitted a coil pack cover, I've bought some 3M scotchpads just need the bottle to rub all the polished bits and go for the brushed aluminium look.

Also upgraded the coolant system by fitting a header tank which is in the bottom right of the below picture. This is now the highest point of the coolant system so makes it easier to bleed and has had a noticable improvement on cooling as it now runs about 10 degrees cooler.

Replaced my tach as it didn't match the rest of the gauages and redid my warning lights. Since my cowl was in poor condition I decied to recover using the alcantara I had left over

Also redid the oil cooler pipework which now runs low along the chassis rail as before it was bit too long and took a poor route throught the engine bay.

Still need to replace the injectors, air flow meters, get it retuned, and possibly do some upgrades to the diff. Unfortunately all this is on hold while I wait to buy a house but am visting the bank on Monday to see if I'm worthy enough so hopefully progress will resume in the next couple of months.

 

[Rob Gaskin]

That's a very impressive 'refresh' Darren and I like the fact that most of the work is to make the car neater and reliable.

Congratulations, a great 'mini' project, well executed.

Good luck with your house purchase.

 

[Mr.G]

Very nice Darren I especially like how everything's been really well thought out and executed.

 

[Ian]

Great work, nice upgrades. Fuel tank should work well.

New trim looks good but I think something to break the door up a bit would improve it.

 

[GTR-240Z]

Thanks for the comments guys

Great work, nice upgrades. Fuel tank should work well.

New trim looks good but I think something to break the door up a bit would improve it.

I think your right, I was thinking a few double rows of stitching running diagonally in the top left area would break up the large blank area here.

 

[IbanezDan51]

Unfortunately the fuel tank pictures arn't working and it was one of the main interests of mine!

Can you get them uploaded again? Would be a great help!

Who made the tank for you?

Regards,
Dan