Between 485 & 705 SQ/FT Rudi's Datsun resto and late nights shed in Australia.

[OutlawDrifter]

Congrats, beautiful addition to your family!

 

[hewey]

Congrats on the new family member mate, and all the best for your wife's recovery. See you in a few months!

 

[takai]

Nice one, congrats.

 

[Bob Heine]

Rudi, welcome to your new life. Congratulations and good to hear your wife is recovering. You now live in a new time warp. Things will happen so fast and yet you will live at a slower pace. Alexis is beautiful so I assume she takes after her mother.

 

[Finallygotit]

Congrats Rudi!

 

[Jyzze]

All The best you and your family!

 

[T-handle]

Congratulations Rudi and new Mom! Super cute baby girl!

My oldest son was also born by caesarean section. It was scary indeed, I was there to calm my wife and I almost fainted

Take your time, Special times to be enjoyed

 

[odj]

Rudi - Congrats, brother. The first four to five months are pretty brutal, after that things get easier. I'm eight months in myself. It's a life-changer for sure.

 

[cros13]

Update 1 week in.....

Thanks for all the kind words and support guys.

1 week in.

Bub is pretty good, we can usually get 5 to 6 hours sleep per morning, but usually broken up into 2 blocks or so.

But i feel the wife and i have not left the bedroom or the living room in a whole week! getting cabin fever!

I Introduced the future apprentice to the "ongoing project"

Also won a second pair of long champs from a Japanese auction, so waiting for that to get air freighted here.

https://flic.kr/p/2jKES4D


Rudi.

 

[cortina64]

Congratulations Rudi to you and your wife!

 

[cros13]

Updates end of September

Hey guys, wish i could say things were going great but really they aren't.

Wife has had some complications with her health the last week, and will possibly need another surgery. Not related to the cesarean, but possibly brought on by the pregnancy.

Not really sure if it needs to be immediate, or if we can delay until she recovers from the cesarean first. waiting to speak to a specialist and get a few more tests.

So its been a extremely stressful 2 weeks for the both of us all around.

I needed to take my mind off everything and rest tonight, we both did, so some family came over to stay with us a while, and help with everything.

Bub is doing fine. Keeping us both up at night and on our toes, when all we want to do is sleep!

Rudi.

 

[OutlawDrifter]

Prayers headed your way for a successful surgery/recovery!

 

[cros13]

Prayers headed your way for a successful surgery/recovery!

Thanks for the support brother. Its nothing life threatening, wife had a gallbladder attack the other day going too crazy with the garlic fried rice and fried egg... was enjoying eating whatever she wanted again after the pregnancy haha!

Just waiting to see how bad it is, and when we need surgery, now or if we can wait.

Just the last thing we wanted to have to deal with right now.

Rudi.

 

[cros13]

Datsun update video- End of september


So i was able to score some free rims from a friend, funnily enough, the wheels i was always going to run on the car. Here is the video i made fixing them up. This video took me near 1 week to edit and get ready due to the little one keeping us on our toes.

Rudi.

 

[Terrick down Under]

Mate. The joy of a little person is immense. WE now have a grand daughter 6 weeks ago. The miracles of birth do sometimes have side issues, We almost lost our DIL after the birth of our grandson..she hemorrhaged 3 liters of blood and spent 5 hours back in theater. The our daughter was induced 4 times in three day and failed, so she got a C section two days later also. But the doctors are good and you have to put your faith in them.
Kids are great ....but grandkids are even better...just saying hahaha.

 

[Boosted1]

Congrats on the new baby!

 

[hewey]

All the best for your wife's surgery and recovery mate.

 

[cros13]

Update early October 2020


Once again, thanks for all the kind words and support everyone, really means a lot to me, i really love my garage journal family!


So its been a extremely busy week for us.

Specialist appointments, hospital visits, and to top it all off, photo shoots!

We have some answers about my wife. Yes she will need her Gallbladder removed in 2 months or so.

She had a MRI and there were 2 stones stuck in the duct, which can be really bad.

She had a procedure today to remove the blockage. so far so good.

Alexis has been having a great time with her grandparents, who have all been more than happy to babysit her for a few days and a few nights while we have been in and out of hospital.

In the midst of all this heath stuff, my wife organised a professional photo shoot for us at home, and NOTHING was going to stop my wife getting her newborn photo shoot. It went great... i took a few sneaky snaps in the middle of the pro shots.

Wife organised it, so of course the first photos that were done were garage related, (ie: me butting in and taking over the shoot, to my wife rolling her eyes! HEY! who's photo shoot is this mate!!) :

Here she is sleeping with my overnight parts from Japan:

https://flic.kr/p/2jQ5yzG

.

Got some really cool photos with the 3 of us and my car, waiting to see how they turned out:

.

https://flic.kr/p/2jQ6tid

.

First time we kinda dressed up in a long time (ie: not in pajamas!)


.

https://flic.kr/p/2jQ6tiy


.

And I'm always husslin' no matter whats going on in life. I've been looking for "new" tyres for the new rims.

The Tyres on the front rims were badly dry rotted and cracked. Would never drive on them, so they needed to be replaced regardless. They were a 205 wide tyre on a 7 inch rim.

To give you some context, the 280zx rims had a 215 Tyre on a 6" wide rim. I actually like the old school bulged out look, fat rubber.

The rears had nothing. when i bought them from japan, they had a 185 wide tyre stretched on a 7.5 inch rim. They were new, and a good brand, but it would have nearly doubled the cost to post them with the rubber on them, and they were not even the right size, so the rubbers were stripped in japan before shipment.

Like i said, the 280zx rims were 215 wide. no scrubbing anywhere on suspension or what not. I'd really like to go a 225 on the back, so wider rubber, and a 7.5 inch wide rim opposed to a 6 inch wide that was on before. Not sure if it would scrub the shock or spring, and not really keen to spend $140 per tyre for 2, only to find out they dont work.

So i went on facebook marketplace, and found someone selling 4 brand new 215/60/15 goodyear tyres.

The advertisement had been up for ages, because that is a odd size for a 15 inch rim, really wide. a more common size would be a 175 or 185 by 15, something for a small hatchback. So i knew he was struggling to sell them.

Lowballed him and got all 4 for $80. They sell for $100 each new. score! They will be a good replacement for the front tyres, and get some on the back for now, if i got room to go wider ill go 225 later on.

https://flic.kr/p/2jQ6tgV


Also getting a bit of routine down with the little one. She wakes us at 5am, i can feed her while watching a episode of Star trek, burp her then i can put her back to sleep, and she will sleep for another 4 hours until 9 or even 10am.

So i quickly have breakfast, and head into the garage to get some work done. Nearly have the rear drum brakes re installed, just need to polish and fit the 2 hardlines for the drum and the 2 hoses.



Rudi.

 

[OutlawDrifter]

Thanks for sharing the pics Rudi, beautiful family!

Nice score on the tires(tyres)! I'd say you came out all right on that one!

 

[cros13]

Update 17.10.20 - TOUCHDOWN!

So my daughter is 1 month old today!

What a blur and whirlwind the last month has been.

Due to that, it dam near took me 1 month, but i was able to get the rear drum brakes assembled and back together, and got her back on all 4 wheels for the first time in over 5 years!

https://flic.kr/p/2jVpqKY

She is sitting HEAPS high at the back, which is strange, as i put in the 240z strut top mounts at the back, so it should be sitting about a inch or 2 lower.

Is it because its still a empty shell, and when i put some weight in her, the rear will come down?
I'm not convinced, because what is there to go back in there really? a fuel tank? some glass?
The rear shocks were blown out when i removed them, so maybe it just sat lower before due to the blown shocks, and now because i have fitted new KYB Excel G shocks, maybe that is contributing to it sitting higher?

I have the standard rear springs in it still, I didn't fit the lowering springs at the back, maybe i should.....


https://flic.kr/p/2jVt3Eq


We also got our professional photographs back from the baby shoot at 2 weeks.... WORTH IT!


I like this photo:

https://flic.kr/p/2jVpqJR


Oh, and this one!:

https://flic.kr/p/2jVt3D3


But i think this one is my favourite! gonna get this blown up and framed for sure!

https://flic.kr/p/2jVtPdu



Rudi.

 

[OutlawDrifter]

Cute baby, tons of hair!

Car is looking good my friend!

 

[Finallygotit]

I agree!!

 

[cros13]

Video Update #22: Drum Brakes.



So finally finished off editing the latest video, where i tackle the drum brakes, enjoy!

next on the list is repairing the broken interior trim pieces... its ALOT of work.

Rudi.

 

[cros13]

Update end of November: Interior trim


Work has not stopped on the Zed, although it has slowed down. I have been tackling some interior trim pieces.

I was putting this off as I had hoped i could go and source some second hand parts off a few wrecked cars, and save myself this trouble of having to try and repair what I had, but alas i got jerked around for 2 months by the guy who had all the parts cars and i gave up.

So it was time to fix the junk I already had.

Mind you... this is the first time i have ever plastic welded, or used fibre glass.


So this is what we started with:

https://flic.kr/p/2kb6EBX

I stripped the Vinyl off the rear quarter trims to find the plastic absolutely destroyed. broken in multiple places, huge cracks all through it, i would have said it was not salvageable... But when you have no other choice, you can perform miricles!

https://flic.kr/p/2kb9TpH

.

In that first photo i have repaired the cracks with a plastic welding kit, it came with wire mesh re-enforcement, which i melted into the cracks and into the piece, then plastic soldered over the top.

This next photo you can see the hardest repair to do, where the hinge for the rear quarter window sits.

https://flic.kr/p/2kb9ToA

I plastic welded the centre hole where the hinge goes, then fibre glassed over it and outwards to re make the edge lip.


In the next photo i have used fibreglass to remake a corner edge broken off:

https://flic.kr/p/2kb66Ph


This is looking at the hinge area from the front side once the fibre glass and plastic weld has dried.

You can clearly see the original damaged panel. Well i had to now use the plastic welder to melt this busted part back down into my newly repaired area and fuse it all together:

https://flic.kr/p/2kbakE9


Now i could sand it all down flat:

https://flic.kr/p/2kbakDn

Now i could take the vinyl trim and re trim the panel in black. I had issues in the deep pocket where the seatbelt mount fits into. I used a heat gun but still could not get the vinyl to stretch down enough to the pocket. So i had to make relief cuts into it:

https://flic.kr/p/2kb9Tn3


I bought some ABS sheet, cut it to match the shape, heated it with a heatgun until it was as soft as wet spaghetti then pushed it and formed it onto the pocket. it came out ok i think, also fitted some speaker covers as new speakers are going in too.

https://flic.kr/p/2kb66Ku


Both sides are done, as is the top rear trim piece that holds the interior light, i had to re make that panel out of Masonite. Just need to re wrap the factory harness, and maybe re pin it, or atleast clean up all the terminals, then it can all go back together!


Rudi.

 

[racingtadpole]

Good work, premium result.

 

[OutlawDrifter]

Great job, Rudi, that looks fantastic!

 

[hewey]

Nice work

 

[rixtrix1]

Nice work on the interior panels, Rudi. Baby sure is cute!

 

[cros13]

Thanks for all the kind words lads!

Nice work on the interior panels, Rudi. Baby sure is cute!

Thanks brother! You guys have kinda only seen photos of her from when she was 2 weeks old, wait until the next video is out (soon) there is some footage of me walking around in circles in the shed trying to get her to settle, she is so big now!

Rudi

 

[cros13]

VIDEO UPDATE CHRISTMAS 2020! Dyeing interior and repairing plastic trim


So here is the latest video update on the zed. In this episode I tackle all the work shown above, I repair the plastic quarter trim, and try my hand at a colour change too!

Rudi.

 

[cros13]

Update end of December 2020

Did a few garage related projects over the last few weeks.



Firstly I mounted my race ramps onto hooks on the wall.

https://flic.kr/p/2kmV2fV


and ordered some more wall art, and fitted it!


https://flic.kr/p/2kmVAcs



Lastly, went for a drive in this animal. A friend came over with his LS2/T56 powered zed, and we went for a coffee....

Not that I needed any convincing to LS swap my Z.....but I think I'm converted!

https://flic.kr/p/2kmVPLG


Rudi.

 

[OutlawDrifter]

Cool wall art Rudi!

There was a guy just south of me about 50 miles that built a mean 280Z with an LS swap and an 8.8 IRS setup.

Here is a video of the car.

 

[Theodulf]

Just keep in mind... an LSA crate motor isn't all that much more expensive than an LS3!

 

[Bob Heine]

Just keep in mind... an LSA crate motor isn't all that much more expensive than an LS3!

Good point Theodulf! On the downside, the LSA requires a liquid intercooler somewhere in the front end of the sleek little Datsun. A cam, some bigger injectors and a tune could bring the NA engine close to the blown one. It's 525hp vs. 556hp so if the weaker one isn't enough, there's always the bottle! "Say hello to my little friend!!!"

Some days I wish my LSA was in the '87 Corvette. Other days I am glad it's in the big sedan with ventilated Recaro seats. You would understand if you saw me falling into or climbing out of the Vette.

 

[hewey]

Your mate's Zed looks good, but I reckon the colour on yours will make it even nicer! Hope you enjoyed your first Christmas as a dad.

 

[cros13]

Cool wall art Rudi!

There was a guy just south of me about 50 miles that built a mean 280Z with an LS swap and an 8.8 IRS setup.

Here is a video of the car.

Cool Car!! Sounds and looks like it goes like an animal! That has a really nice exhaust note too!

Yeah it seems the ford super 8.8 is the way to go with a V8 zed. I am somewhat lucky as i have a 2+2. a 240z or 260z has a R180 diff in the back which is quite weak, most people put in a WRX STI Diff as it nearly bolts in, and it gives you a LSD. But at the end of the day its still a Subaru diff. }

2+2 came with a stronger R200 diff, and from what i have seen and read, they can handle about 400hp or so before they quit.

When I explode the old R200 i will get a kit off a "friend" from Nevada who pioneered the conversion kits, was the first one to make them.

Issue is a complete mustang rear end here is pretty expensive, well, just like everything else here. The same with a LS actually, they aren't a $500 pick and pull down here from the wrecking yard.

Believe it or not, prices for a LS have gone up heaps over the last 2 years.

It will probably cost me between 6 to 8k AUD to get a LS1 with a T56 from a wrecked car with everything needed.

I've been looking to either buy a complete car like a VY SS ute, or look at the auctions for a salvage titled vehicle, but they still go for 6k or so on there.

Just keep in mind... an LSA crate motor isn't all that much more expensive than an LS3!

I think a crate LS3 can be had for 13k? cant put it in legally though!

In NSW the rules for engine conversions have to meet a capacity to weight ratio. if the car is over 1200kg (which the 2+2 zed is) I can go 5x the weight of the car in Litres for a N/a engine conversion, when you put in a boosted engine it drops to 3 or 2.5 or something like that.

So a 2+2 weighs 1250kg X5 = 6250cc. So i can legally go a 6.2L LS3??

A 240z or 260z just tips shy over 1000kg. If the car is between 800kg-1200kg the multiplier is 4. So for a 2 seater the limmit is 4000CC or so, which means NO V8 FOR YOU! not even a 308 or 302

Good point Theodulf! A cam, some bigger injectors and a tune could bring the NA engine close to the blown one. It's 525hp vs. 556hp so if the weaker one isn't enough, there's always the bottle! "Say hello to my little friend!!!"

Oh man, I'd just get a big cam, LS edit and a OTR and I'd be happy with the 270kw (350hp) or so it would have. Friend did all that in his SS commodore and ran a 12.5 down the quarter mile, and that land barge is easily 500kg more than the Dato would weigh.

Your mate's Zed looks good, but I reckon the colour on yours will make it even nicer! Hope you enjoyed your first Christmas as a dad.

Thanks man! I sure did have a good Christmas with the family! Mates zed is a 10 footer, once you get up close its rough as guts.

https://flic.kr/p/2ko11h3

Rudi.

 

[jctaylor]

WOW! I just finished running through this entire thread. Great build, both of them. Man that work bench is awesome! So many great ideas from your work and the car is looking great. congrats on the little one.

 

[OutlawDrifter]

Great pic of the family Rudi! Happy New Year!

I'd love to have a 6 speed ute...I daily drove a 1978 El Camino SS with a 305 and a Saginaw 4 speed for a couple of years.

 

[cros13]

Update end of January 2021:

Actually did a little work garage related. I cleaned out my garden shed and fit some racking to organise it abit more:

https://flic.kr/p/2kuSCmk

Also, a few weekends ago, we had a wedding to go to up the coast at Gosford. The venue was a little off the beaten track and it was on a 4wd track. They all seemed to think that i would be fine as i had a "4wd". Well, i did ruin it by lowering it on coil overs and shoving a cold air intake right near the bottom of the engine bay!. So I was worried about ripping off my sump or Hydraulic locking the motor, but she made it!

https://flic.kr/p/2kuNsii

.

https://flic.kr/p/2kuSCnn

.

https://flic.kr/p/2kuNsjA

WOW! I just finished running through this entire thread. Great build, both of them. Man that work bench is awesome! So many great ideas from your work and the car is looking great. congrats on the little one.

Thanks for stopping by mate!

Great pic of the family Rudi! Happy New Year!

I'd love to have a 6 speed ute...I daily drove a 1978 El Camino SS with a 305 and a Saginaw 4 speed for a couple of years.

That woulda been fun! I nearly bought a engine combo that came up for sale a little while ago, 350 Chev 4 bolt main, fully built engine, high rise manifold, Dyno'd at 490hp built by a very reputable engine builder here in Sydney. Also Came with a built Muncie 4 speed.

He wanted 9k for it firm.

I think the LS route will be more reliable.

On that front, speaking to a mate who works at a engine shop, I'm gonna buy the LS1 out of his ute. he pulled it at 160kms (90k miles) to drop in a Turbo built LS3. The short block has been sitting in his workshop for 2 years on a pallet. It has new bearings and a Comp cam. He wants $300 for it. (Now for perspective this ISNT America, on bookface, a LS1 will sell for 2.5 to 3.5k on average.

Mates LS is just a short block, so say I'm saving $2700, I'm sure i can get some heads and piece together everything i need for the price of getting a complete engine, and i will hopefully have some performance parts on it to boot once i reach 3k.

Rudi.

 

[OutlawDrifter]

That's still a great price for even the 90k shortblock!

I wish you were closer, I've got a set of cathedral port heads you could have!