My RB26 260Z Project

[EF Ian]

As theres been some interest here I thought I'd put up my build thread here. It won't be the fastest build ever as I spend most of the year away from home with my job, but while away I plann everything for the next time I'm home.

The other car there is my 91 Civic, with a built B20 VTEC with around 245HP.


1978 Datsun 260Z

I bought this last year with only 28480 miles on her (Now only a couple of miles off 30K) Built in 1978 but only first registered in 1979, going by chassis numbers shes one of the last to be imported from Japan. She was in great condition (not perfect) but I'll be sorting out anything that it needs to make it perfect. From before I bought this I had planned to put an RB26DETT into her. I plan to get the chassis, suspension, drivechain and brakes all sorted out before touching the engine side of things, as power is nothing without control.

I love her, she drives beautifully and handles nicely, the carbed straight six sounds lovely and is super smooth.



Some photos from when I first got her back home:

 

[EF Ian]

On top of the below I also searched for rust as these things just love to rust, I found a few tiny areas in the rear wells, so I ground them back to clean metal, primed, painted and sealed them.

Wire brushed my calipers and disk bells on the front ready for painting:

The way the finish in there looks isn't acceptable to me, so that will be sorted out in due time.

Its pretty clean in the wheelarches and I didn't find any rust, however to make sure and also make the finish look a bit neater I'll also strip it back to bare metal for a respray at the same time as I do the bay, I'll also be seam welding around that area.




I polished and waxed the front end and the roof, just hoping for a dry days so I can finish the doors and rear quarter panels:

 

[Deemc]

I hate you... That is all...

 

[Deemc]

Lol.. Absolutely awesome!! These can look so so so well with very little work!!!

 

[EF Ian]

First parts to turn up were my Cusco strut braces

I tried to fit the rear one first however it didn't fit, turns out that the 260Z's have a very slightly narrower gap beetween the struts and I only found this out after I had bought the braces. I can get one which will fit however I prefer the Cuscos design so I'm going to cut the brackets and weld them further in so it fits.


Front Brace fitted perfectly and looks great, if perhaps a little out of place in the not yet blinged up bay, once I get to work on it before next summer it should fit in perfectly.

 

[Woodcutter]

Brilliant. Looking forward to seeing how this turns out.

Between you and Alan G, I am sure this will be fantastic when complete.

 

[EF Ian]

My next lot of parts turned up while I was home at Christmas:

Airdam

Jap Style Indicators for the Airdam

New PCV hose, bonnet adjusters and some new fittings for the inspection panels.

Carbon Fibre BRE style rear wing, very lightweight and rather nice looking:

Custom Coilovers, should do a nice job, fully adjustable and the quality looks very good.

Cut off my stock shock and weld this part on

Camber plates to weld in, only fitting these to the front for now:

New fuel filter and thermostat, hood prop rod (will get this chromed) as mine is missing and second hand dome light as my switch is broken, will swap internals to my unit as its cleaner.

Relay to wire into headlights, should improve brightness and save my switch as at the moment power runs through the stalk switch to the headlights.

Red stiched gear gaiter, thought mine was a bit tatty:

Oil and Filter:

Very expensive hock: hock: Billter adaptors allow me to run a CV joint setup and get rid of the U-joints:

Z31T CV driveshafts, very beefy, should handle loads of power:

Billet alloy lock pulls:

 

[EF Ian]

Some recent photos taken 4 weeks ago:

 

[stevyg]

Amazingly cool! Hats off.

 

[karron]

i would just get a set of wolfrace wheels and a wee ducktail boot spoiler on that and leave all that other stuff in the boxes. its far too nice to be butchered.

 

[EF Ian]

Big Update Time

So I arrived home to find a room full of parts awaiting me, it was like Christmas but better.



Heres most of the parts ready to get sorted:

Got my parts back from getting chromed:

Stainless steel and chrome bolts/nuts/washer for the whole front end:

A selection of paints:

Solid front diff mount to replace the crappy strap, I can use the black bushing fitted as a snub so it only tocuhes when the diff moves up under power, if I find this not good enouth once I run more power I can fit the red bushing and have it solidly mounted.





Ok, so I blew way too mich money on my battery setup, but I just love it Guess I must have a bit of carbon whore in me.

Battery through bulkhead fitting, as battery will be mounted behind the passenger seat:

Big electric fan to replace the viscous one, should make for quiter running, better cooling and better looks, electric thermostat and fitting kit also:

Most of the car is poly apart from the steering rack and arm bushes and the front anti roll bar mounts so as I'm going to be stripping the front end I'll finish it off, got some anti-roll bar mounts arrivng any day also:

Steering arm boots:

New CV boots for my driveshaft setup:

Custom made shorter and stonger shafts for the Z31T cv setup:

Billet stub axles with longer ARP stud bolts:

To go with the billet cv companion flange convertors:

4.11 Final drive for longnose R200, this is a very rare ratio for a longnose R200, hard to find and expensive, but worth it as it will work grea with the RB25 Gearbox:

No LSD yet but I will be getting an OS Giken 1.5 way CLSD:

New Wheel bearings:

New alternator with internal voltage regulator so I can get rid of the external one and tidy up the bay:

Some wiring covers and heatshrink:

Will make all my wiring look much neater (will use black heatshrink on the rest rather than red)

Billet alloy shorter steering arms to quicken the steering with built in bumper steer spacers:

TTT Tension arms:

My gearshift boot was looking to tatty so I changed it to a much nicer one (from an ITR):

New Mats:

Fitted:

 

[Stuart]

this will be epic! rivet on arches FTW!

 

[mk2driver]

Simply awesome

 

[EF Ian]

Brake Setup


Going to be running these bad boys on the front:

Painted the unswept area of the disk so it won't go rusty:

My Rear Setup, Lincoln LS calipers, 2005 Mustang GT rotors and pads, brakets and custom handbrake cable for this setup:

Painted up:

The pad will leave this with a nice clean edge:

Wilwood 1" Master Cylinder, reservoirs can be remote mounted but I won't be:

Brake Bias valve:

Good quality fluid:

And so they can fit under my wheels, some new wheels, will run these until I fit arch flares and then I'll move to wider Watanabes. They don't fit yet, but they SHOULD once I have my coilvers installed:

My door pulls looked really bad, so I had to sort that:

Much better:

And finally a boring one, changed my thermostat yesterday:

Thats most of the parts that arrived, still a few more to come also, including my new custom built alloy fuel tank.

 

[mechanix]

Class project! Some money bein spent, fair play to ya!

 

[PacMan]

The project has come a long way in half an hour!

 

[EF Ian]

Changed my crappy old alternator for a more powerfull one with an internal voltage regulator, its a much better job, my interior and exterior lights now work better and brighter and I've got rid of the ugly external regulator:

Old One

New One:

Conversion Plug:

Gets rid of this thing:

Also changed my sump gasket, oil and filter:

And some more parts arrived with the sump gasket, bushes for the front anti-roll bar, new ball joints and a SS braided clutch line

 

[EF Ian]

Had a rather nice item turn up today.

My custom built Alloy Fuel Tank, built for me by Pro Alloy. Fits in the same as the original, I have it setup for use with carbs while I'm still running carbs but its also setup for a fuel injection setup and should be good to flow enouth for 600HP. Its got a proper intenal collector, baffles and is also filed with tank foam so I won't need to run an external surge tank. Its got a DeatschWerks DW300 fuel pump installed which can flow more fuel than I'll ever need.

Had to change my fuel sender type, this should be more accurate and takes up less room but also means my stock fuel guage won't work so I will use this:

 

[EF Ian]

My Nardi Classic Steering Wheel turned up today Along with a few fancy bolts:

This is actually nice to drive with, but it just hasn't got the looks of the Nardi:

Matches my red stiched gear gaiter perfectly

Also since my new rubber arrived yesterday I went and got it fitted to a rim so I could test fit it on the car, using Toyo R1R's in 225/45/16. Test fitted it up and they fit the rear fine, doesn't fit the front yet but it will with the new coilovers so I've ordered another 3.

Quite a cool looking tyre:

Definitly looks better than the old rubber:

 

[EF Ian]

Been busy doing the wiring for my new fuel guage, takes a while to locate the correct wires and then do a neat job of running the wiring. One of the pistons on the drivers side caliper was sticking on, so I ordered up a new seal kit, took it out and gave it a good wire brushing, should do until I get my new setup on.

A few more parts have arrived:


New dust boots for my TRE's and new wheel nuts in 12x1.5 size to fit the new wheels and new wheel studs:

Switch for the fan, a few wiring connectors and crush washers and the fittings for my fuel tank. New clutch slave cylinder also as no sooner than I fixed my brakes than my clutch went, seemed it had been leaking for a while but only failed completly when I ran out of fluid, so got a new one ordered and fitted:

ARP Extended wheel studs for the front Hubs:

These fittings allow me to use 5/16 fuel line for the carb setup, once I start using the pump I will use braided SS AN type lines.

Installed and wired in switch for the Manual override for the electric fan:

 

[EF Ian]

Got the fuel Tank out, didn't get round to fiting the Pro-Alloy tank as I am going to get some stainless tank straps made up:

Got the engine out:

Front end is mostly stripped:

Won't be using most of this stuff again:

How I left her at the end of today:

Still loads to do, but its a start.

 

[EF Ian]

Bay is completly stripped and all unwanted brackets cut off;

Removed the battery tray as I have something much neater planned but also because its a well know place for rust, just as well I did as that was one of two places where I have a rust problem:

End of the day, on trailer ready to be taken for blasting tomorrow:

Engine is looking a bit cleaner also:

Managed to find time to polish an Evo X also, came out nice:

 

[EF Ian]

The car is away getting media blasted today, will either be back tomorrow or on monday.



I finished cleaning up the carbs, they are not great, but better than they were. Did a bit more work with the engine, the block seems to have changed color.

I took the steering arms, balljoints, brakes, discs and backing plates off the hubs ready to fit my coilovers, none of which will be going back onto them:

Got the new threaded tubes welded onto my hubs:

 

[EF Ian]

How the car is sitting, metalwork, welding and painting should begin on Monday, slower than I'd like, but what can I do:

Repainted the new shafts as I wasn't happy with the paint on them, also painted the cv's in a funky blue:

Bought some nice wheel nuts, they have to be open as I've got extended wheel studs all round. I had bought some cheap chrome ones but not all of them threaded on nicely and they galled badly on the wheels. These ones are very light (only 26 grams each) look great and the top of the seats spin freely from the main body so that they don't damage the wheel and allow equal torqueing all round:

New clutch master cylinder as my original one had seen better days, works fine but was quite corroded at the back:

Battery cable cut to the correct lenths, battery mounted power shut off switch, some more random wiring and a steering wheel cover to keep my new wheel clean:

Rebuilt my steering rack today and mounted it on the crossmember:

Got the engine built back up:

Started rebuilding my hub/suspension/control arm:

Couldn't resist trying a coilover in it:

 

[Gavlar]

Thats beautiful! Please keep this thread updated! What are you going for exterior style wise? OEM FTW! lol