New to the club and to Z cars

Nick Hedges

Club Member
Hi All,

I have just purchased a 72 240Z. It certainly will require work over the coming months however it is usable.

The car is an Arizona import so fairly rust free but terrible paint etc.

I would like to convert to RHD, while I appreciate parts to do this are rare and expensive if anyone has got anything they would be willing to sell I would be extremely grateful. The car is also automatic so will possibly be looking to convert to manual.

Any help with getting these parts would be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks

Nick
 

richiep

Club Member
Welcome to the club and the Z experience Nick!

For RHD conversion, the main difficulties are around sourcing the bolt-in parts, e.g. steering rack, pedal box and accel. pedal, heater and blower, wiper mechanism (if you decide to convert that), etc. It's a matter of seeing what people here have or keeping an eye on eBay, FB Marketplace, anywhere else, etc.

For the panels, have a look at what Andy Plant offers:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/cate...Service/Auto-Panel-Solutions-418351785395614/

He has an extensive and continually expanding portfolio of repair and conversion panels that he makes - and is also now branching into trim. He sells a full bulkhead, but have a search here on the forum and see my "Project Dixie" thread in the restorations section. I used a sectional kit (left and right sections to be let into existing bulkhead) to swap my 72 ex-CA car. A bit less involved than doing the whole bulkhead, but still plenty of work.

Ditch the auto! Going manual is easy and there are plenty of boxes around (there's been a couple of 5 speeds on eBay recently). FYI, the upgrade of choice that many of us have done is using a box from a Nissan 200sx, known as the "71C", which is effectively the next gen transmission to the Z's 71B. This requires a bellhousing from a 71B with a little machining to be swapped onto the 200SX box and a modded gearbox crossmember, but is pretty straightforward and offers a stronger box with better feeling shift and the option of using aftermarket short shifter kits. Aim to ditch the 3.35 diff at the same time; UK/Euro/JDM cars came with a less lazy 3.9 ratio.
 

Nick Hedges

Club Member
Hi,

thank you for such a quick reply and the information, looks like I have a lot to learn. I am very keen to convert to RHD so it makes sense to change from auto to manual at that time. What area of the forum do you think would be best to ask about parts for the conversion?

Many thanks

Nick
 

Mr Tenno

Digital Officer
Staff member
Site Administrator
Welcome Nick! Is this is the silver car with the red interior? If so it's been discussed a couple of times already on the site - along with a list of manual conversion parts I think!
 

Ped

Club Member
Hi Nick, welcome to the club. On sourcing RHD part you may also want to consider looking further afield eg: New Zealand and Australia where they got RHD cars.
 

richiep

Club Member
Hi Nick, welcome to the club. On sourcing RHD part you may also want to consider looking further afield eg: New Zealand and Australia where they got RHD cars.
Or maybe even more usefully Japan - you know, where they came from and the largest RHD market for them still today? ;P

Seriously, start to familiarise yourself with RHDJapan.com and it’s Yahoo Auctions Japan proxy bidding service BidJDM for accessing the local auctions (eBay isn’t a thing domestically in Japan).
 

Ped

Club Member
Or maybe even more usefully Japan - you know, where they came from and the largest RHD market for them still today? ;P

Seriously, start to familiarise yourself with RHDJapan.com and it’s Yahoo Auctions Japan proxy bidding service BidJDM for accessing the local auctions (eBay isn’t a thing domestically in Japan).

Fair point re Japan, but a bit easier to engage with forums down-under, eg: zclub.nz I found these guys very helpful, and found what I was looking for there.
 

Robbie J

Club Member
Fair point re Japan, but a bit easier to engage with forums down-under, eg: zclub.nz I found these guys very helpful, and found what I was looking for there.
I purchased a 240z RHD dash (before I got the 260z one) for about £300 in Oz then shipped it, took 2 months and cost +£450 inc. tax

I found it on gumtree BTW. It needs a lot of work but was nearly complete
 
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