I have a race car now!

[entirelyturbo]

I call it The Spectre.



At least this time, I'm out of college and am single. So I have more time and money to devote to it.

The scariest part about it though is what I paid for it...

$500!

That's with three spare engines, three spare transmissions, spare EFI computers, a spare rear end, spare axles, calipers, taillights, and more.

I do plan on resurrecting it, but if worse comes to worse, I can probably take the whole heap to the scrapyard and come close to making my money back.

The rust is what scares me the most. I can replace mechanical parts all day long, but that rust will never go away completely.

Wish me luck!

[nistech414]

Awesome, I love old Datsuns. Good luck with the resurrection! I have subscribed for updates so keep us posted! And whats the story on the AE86 Corolla in the background?

[Mattheww044]

Damn, thats a steal for $500, well it seems like. He must have been desperate or somethin.

[206er]

looks like fun! are you planning to race ITB or?
good luck with getting it going.

[evolutionmovement]

A friend in college had one of those. As an aside, he designed the interior of the new Camaro (a dubious claim to fame as that is). As a former Datsun owner, the rust really never does go away. It gets into everything. Maybe by that point they figured out things a little better (Micah's was in pretty good shape and was a MN car), but the Zs were absolutely terrible—not just poorly treated steel, but as an early unibody, didn't take into account proper drainage or protection from kicked up dirt and such. Made my GLs seem like they were made of zinc-chromate treated aluminum. But a race car doesn't need to look good. Should be fun to drive and those L-series engines were tough. Manual steering?

[206er]

steve that one has a Z series. twin plugs

[evolutionmovement]

I thought those were L20s. IIRC, Micah's car had an L20 with a crossflow head. Maybe his was an anomaly or swapped or something. I don't know anything about those engines, then.

[entirelyturbo]

Yeah, Z20 engine with twin plugs and twin coils. More for emissions and fuel economy than power from what I understand.

I almost wish it was carbed, which would allow me to ditch the EFI computer and go with a Weber or something, but the rules don't allow for that.

ITB is primarily about suspension tuning.

Steve, yeah, manual steering box. I've only steered it while pushing it , but it seems to be decently responsive. But I'm sure some fresh tie-rod ends will help out a bit.

The worst rust seems to be in the hatch, which at least can be removed from the car and worked on separately. But the passenger footwell is rusted through as well. That will get hairier.

Nothing structural though.

The car will never be on the road again, so I'm not all that concerned. If it gets to the point where I can't fix it, it will simply be time to put it out of its misery for real.

[nistech414]

Just got the first update, looking forward to seeing more!

[evolutionmovement]

I looked up the engine because I was bored and according to Wikepedia, the Z engine had an almost identical block to the L, but with the crossflow head so my observations were correct, but I didn't know they gave the engine a different name. The useless crap I remember, but I know the crossflow head struck me because it was something that always bothered me about the L-series, which could have had so much more tuning potential.