13 Lucky Years

If you know me, you know I am not big into luck or fate or any of that type of stuff... I think success is created through hard work, opportunity and maybe a little good timing... but not just luck. 

March 2010 to Today
(well on a non-snowy Indiana day)

Well March 15th, 2010 is when I got my car, and today marks 13 years of ownership... not gonna lie for some reason I feel like I need to be extra careful with my baby in its 13th year with me. To say that each time I tackle a major project with the car that worry always clouds me... what could go wrong, how much more will it cost, how much longer will she be out of commission... 

Luckily, I just got one of the more major jobs done on the car I have been worried about... I got a new floor pan welded into the driver floor (you could see the street from a few spots...) and new frame rails on the driver and passenger side. They were not in great shape when I got her, and they got worse the past few years. I bought replacement patch panels three years ago... and two winters in a row had a shop back out of doing the job. Luckily this year, through a mutual friend I found someone to tackle the project for me... and it turned out great! 

Not the sexiest picture of my Z...
but a very important upgrade

While I was at it, we welded in some single point jack plates. All the parts were from Bad Dog Parts and were well made. My welder said it was not mega tricky to get it all done and got some rust proofing done and while you can't tell at all it was done... she is stiffer and a little safer. 

Coming up next? Assuming the tension rod install goes okay, I have new calipers (OEM style just rebuilt) for the front and new pads and rotors up front (OEM size but slotted). 

Well at least great so far, it looks good, and should be protected for years. Now going to mount new tension rods and finished a few suspension mods I didn't want to do until the rails were done. Ideally I get those parts in, and installed before the first few events of the year. Super pumped! 

So mostly just a short blog... and I want to tell you all I have started to think about doing some Datsun Z part reviews on my YouTube channel... Yes I made one, not much content now, but send me some suggestions I want to get that active this year! 

Me and My Z on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@meandmyz4961

Come on lucky #13! 

Ivy Tech Graduate (x2)

(Repost from my personal blog)

Introducing, Sam Centellas, certified in Automotive Service Technology AND Maintenance and Light Engine Repair. 

Me and My Degrees

A few years ago I wrote about being a college dropout (blog)... I had started my Autotech Certificate in 2012 when I worked at Ivy Tech... I left the college in 2013 and stopped taking classes. I started back at it in 2020, I figured no time like the pandemic to get back at it.

I learned A LOT. 

The biggest thing I learned... is how hard it is being an adult going back to school. WOW. Most semesters I took one class, some semester I took two, all while working a full time job, sometimes while working more than one full-time job... and the whole time being a parent, running my side hustle, trying to stay healthy and trying to stay sane. 

I'll be honest, it was harder than when I got my master's degree. Yeah for real, the time in the shop you can't BS like I could writing papers in grad school. You also have to commit the time, once you tear the brakes down on a car, you can't just shelf it for later, you got to get it done. When you break something, you have to fix it, when you don't know how to do something, just googling it doesn't fix it... you need to tell someone you can't figure it out and ask them to show you how to do it. Then you have to try it yourself, and prove you learned it. 

I also learned about not solving problems with what you think, but with what you know. Car repair isn't about guessing, if that was the case your mechanic would do the wrong repair at least 50% of the time. If when I was 99% sure I knew what was wrong, you still have to test to be sure, and yep, that 1% makes a difference. It made me think a lot about my work, we often trying to solve problems that don't actually exist and then wonder why we didn't solve the problem. We didn't actually test to see what the problem actually was... 

I got a lot of work done on the my Z which was nice... but also did brakes on the family van, my MKZ hybrid, Juan's Z, and lots of other student and school cars (changed the oil on the chancellor's car!). Link below to my Z blog with lots of the cool projects but here is a direct link to my favorite one was all the suspension work I did to get her ready for the 2022 Race Season (which then I barely raced the car...): Here Comes 2022. 

I met more great people... students who were trying to improve their life through technical skills. Students who didn't know what they wanted in life but just liked cars. I connected with former colleagues or friends in different ways... I remember when a top community leader came into the shop on a tour and couldn't believe it was me covered in brake dust tearing up a Toyota Solara with some students. He asked if I was the teacher... nope, here to learn. 

I also learned again, and was reminded how those in trades get treated. Wearing dirty jeans and my Dickies work shirt... means I got treated differently stopping at the store after class. I wrote a blog about that a few years ago (can't find link)... interestingly I thought pandemic taught us how important essential workers are, but I realized that was a lesson quickly forgotten by our country. Also a reminder to many, that an entry auto mechanic actually makes more per hour than I did with my master's degree... 

Lastly... this was a little in honor of my grandpa. He owned a garage, and always wanted his grandkids to be "smarter" than him and make more money. I remember he laughed when I told him I had started an auto tech degree all those years ago... he told me something like you are an engineer what are you going to do with that? I told him, to try to be as smart as you and open a garage (I have a dream of opening a non-profit garage some day). 

I had a lot of stories and posts about my classes, especially on my other blog (Me and My Z). I am actually really proud of these TWO certificates, yeah I started so long ago that my credit tracking was off, and while I planned one certificate, I ended up getting two, and one semester earlier than planned. 

Now debating if I sign up to walk at commencement... 

Fairlady's New Shoes

DONE. Well kinda, still need some center caps and I will need to either clear the wheels or ceramic coat them to protect them... but they are on the car! 

What are they? 

Well these are a vintage Shelby Viper wheel... the style is most well known as American Racing Equipment (ARE) Libre Wheels and very popular in late 1960s and early 1970s and were run on Alpha Romeos, Datsun 510s and of course Datsun/Nissan Z race cars (240, 260, 280). 

Why am I so excited? 

I got these wheels from a couple that was parting out a 1973 Datsun 240z up in Grand Rapids, MI. I got them for a steal cause they were in fairly bad shape. Well, good enough shape that in my first year I threw a set of Falken Azenis tires on them and used them for racing... they held air, but didn't look 100%. 

Original Look

Sanding and sanding 

So over winter I moved the Azenis tires to my Shelby Cal 500 wheels... which meant it was time to restore these wheels... and man it was a project! I want to thank everyone who gave some advice, encouragement, or helped along the way. 

To Pilo over at Pilo's Body Shop for sandblasting them for me, to Jason at Luxe AutoSpa in Niles as an expert at finishing wheels for the tips and pointers on materials to buy and grits to use, my Hot Wheels customizing friend Diego for tips of polishing them, and Braxton over at Discount Tire for the deal on tires and understanding why I wanted to mount and balance them myself. 

This whole project was a labor of love... it also took team work, as I might have quit on them several times, and I think the color I planned to paint them (satin black) would have been a mistake. So what all did it take? 

First step was I clean them up. I did a light hand sanding on them, used a palm sander and realized these were going to need a little to clean up. So I had them sandblaster, in retrospect I should of only sand blasted the backs... but hey you live and learn. 

Second step was sanding... I originally started with 320 grit... and realized I had to start back at 150 grit... I used some grinding wheels to start. Then by hand at 150, 180, 220, 320, 400, 600, 800, 1000, 1500, and finished with 2000 grit... sounds like a lot of steps and it was. The first few grits I was doing about 20-30 minutes per wheel... and it got less and less and ultimately yhe 2000 grit was maybe 2-3 minutes per wheels just cleaning them up and getting them ready for polish. 

In the middle of that, at about the 400 grit mark (about 50% of sanding complete) I painted the backs of the wheels flat black. I did this on previous wheels, they look sharper longer like that and clean up from brake dust and track rubber sling easier. 

Picking Colors... Silver or Gray?

I then sanded the lips of the wheels to 2000 grit. Once I felt it was ready for polish and buffing, I taped off the lips, and painted the center of the front of the wheels. After much deliberating and advice, I settled on rattle cans from Rustoleum of a color called "Black Stainless Steel"... which is really more of a metallic dark gray and really made a nice contract with my body color and flat black bumpers. 

Then I pealed the tape and buffed the lips of the wheels... they looked great, and at that point I estimated I spent about 2.5 hours on each wheel. It was time to shop for rubber, get valve stems, and mount/balance them. I wanted to do this myself, mostly cause I didn't want the wheels scratched up on install (I ended up scratching them myself anyways...). 

Well there is the finished product... 14x5.5 Shelby Viper vintage wheels for Me and My Z. It was a labor of love, and there has been a cool sense of pride as a drive around town on my Fairladys new shoes. 

 

Bumpers, Fender Mirrors and Painting

Well, not a planned update for this year... as I wrote before my passenger side fender got all banged up in the garage over the winter. Originally I was just going to leave it, didn't want to waste fun summer driving time and potentially miss any races. Well with work, family and travel schedules... a 3-4 week window appeared and I decided to let Pilo over at Pilo's Body Shop have a crack at her. 

If You Give A Mouse A Cookie...

If you don't know the story.. google it. If you know me well, thats how I live my life... while I am doing something, might as well do it right and get some other items done as well. So a quick fender paint turned into... 

Sandblasted my Shelby Libre vintage wheels (still working on refinishing them)
New rear bumper (Skillard)
Got a new Xenon front air damn from a car club member (thats Kurt!)
Fender Mirrors (Z Car Depot)
Also painted rear deck lid, so of course also got a new deck lid cover (Skillard)

Since I didn't find a new front air damn until we had nearly finished... I splurged and ordered the Skillard.com front Type 1 Air Splitter... it was originally to help off set the sagging front spoiler (from going off at the track two years ago) and gave me an excuse to splurge. I still haven't mounted that as it is fairly extensive... 

Anyhow... the paint match on the fender, deck lid and front spoiler is awesome. Not perfect, it never is on spot repair (I skipped on blending since I want to fully rep
aint the car someday), but man its so good I bet hardly anyone will be able to tell. The best part is that Pilo let me work on the car a little, I learned some painting tips and helped with the front spoiler. 

I made some good decisions on parts, and some bad ones, let's break it down. 

Fender Mirrors - I got the grey plastic ones, they were on clearance (still are if you want a set) and I figured for the savings I can paint them black quick. However, the black ones are also now on sale, and I spent more in paint, sand paper, and time than I saved. I mean it was fun sanding, and I went above and beyond and since I had to paint, I sanded off the flashing lines (plastic mold lines) so I feel like they look more high end... but I know they are cheap, and I shoulda of just bought black ones. 

Rear Bumper - they sell it in raw aluminum, or black powder coat. I am glad I went cheaper here, cause it was easy to paint, and we ended up custom cutting a notch in the bumper near my tow hook. That would of ruined the finish on the powder coat. The real mistake here though was not buying a bumper in the first place, and trying to jury rig an old bumper that was in terrible shape to the car... that was last year and now my rear fenders look like swiss cheese. Fix that another day... the new bumper looks nice and I need to adjust them a bit but looking good. 

Okay so what is next? Well I have some autocross events, a track night at Gingerman Raceway and lots of other projects around the house and garage to get done. I need to find time to finish the rims, no real priority on that, but man I can't wait to see how she looks on vintage rims to complete the look. 

August 6th Cars and Coffee, August 11th Gingerman, then September and October autocross events... maybe sneak in a Z car show and a track day with the Corvette club... who knows. Glad to have my baby back! 

Here comes 2022

Well the 2022 season started... I got the suspension installed in the car and done barely a week before the first race. It was a labor of love... and a longer blog will be coming on what all it took to get it all installed and the work we did, but for now I wanted to note all the work that was done to the car and how she is riding. 

Z Car Depot: www.zcardepot.com
Adjustable Lower Control Arms - 800-890
Bump steering spacers - 650-259
Stainless Steel Brake Lines - 800-193

The Z Store - Motorsport Auto (MSA)
Front Street camber kit from MSA - 23-4188 
Rear Camber Adjustment Kit - 23-4171
Koni Yellow Adjustable struts - 23-1032/33
Eibach progressive springs - 23-4042
Steering Rack Bushings - 23-4151 
Steering Shaft Coupler -  23-4160

Apex Engineering - Quick Steering Knuckles - S30 280z

Techno Toy Tuning - Custom Control Arm Bolts - S30

Also new inner and outer tie rods, new lower ball joints, and tons of new bushings and new rear bearings, mostly from Z Car Depot. I did 90% of the work myself with other students at Ivy Tech Community College. I am two classes away (I think) from earning my technical certificate. 

Lot's of special thank you's to people for the help. Special thanks for all the members from the South Bend Region SCCA (SBR) who help with leads on parts, experts to help, and general encouragement. I have struck up a great new shop relationship with Direct Performance Solutions and hoping to find some time at Pilo's Body Shop to get my fender repaired... see my previous post on that poor fender. 

Want to see my baby on the track? Check the SBR Facebook page for events, hopefully I will be at most of those (fingers crossed). 

There Goes 2021

 Well... I guess I was worse at writing on this blog as I was on my personal blog. So let's see what did we miss since Feb 2021. 

Autocross - The Z did nearly a monthly autocross this year! Well I think I only actually got to 4 or 5 events but I felt like I was regular out there with the car! I started the year on my stock suspension and crappy tired but ended up upgrading to my Falken Azenis and dropped in a used set of Tokicos/KYB suspension. 

Track Days - we did three! I feel good abut that, I did two last year and this year more. So she is getting her workouts. We chewed up the Azenis pretty good, and luckily no major issues this year on track. I did have one big spin out in the middle of the track and luckily everyone dodged my car and we stayed safe. If you want to get out on track... following the SCCA Track Night in America program, great price and great way to get safely on track. 

Wrenching - well we were less than productive in the wrenching department this year. Installing my rear bumper the fuel tank neck got drilled into... nearly sidelined me from an event. Luckily the part was $65, unluckily it took way more labor than I care to admit dropping the tank, putting it back in, dropping it again (long story) and re-installing again. Whew. Also, the used set of shocks/struts I put in... one strut straight up blew out at my track day, and one was leaking pretty badly so I bit the bullet and bought all new (more on that later). 

Scarwars - I wrote a blog (One More Scar) about my new scars... new knee surgery, eye lid surgery, and a big scar to the Z. When I took my Z up to Ivy Tech (I am working on my auto tech degree) I was quickly backing out to pull into another lift and BANG CRUNNNNNCHHHHHH.... I hit my passenger side fender into a big commercial truck. Luckily no damage to the truck, luckily I have a spare fender already, but unluckily really no time/money to do body work on her right now so it will have to wait. 

So what is next? Well this 6 month recap will hopefully not be the last post for 2021. The Z is on a lift now and I am working on putting in new Eibach progressive rate springs and new adjustable Koni Yellow struts. This upgrade is considered way easier than the challenging coilover install on these... but man this "easier" job is proving very challenging. Wish me luck... and if you follow this and I haven't posted about the suspension being done... HMU. I need to update the page more. 

Glove Boxes, Tow Hooks and AFM

Well as usual... long time between posts, and this blog will end with a promise to post more... but hey we all know how this will go by now. If not, welcome to "Me and My Z"... a now quarterly blog about my 280Z. I do have a few more months before April and when I need her back on the road, back to autocrossing, and back on the track. 

Recap - I started classes again at Ivy Tech, partially so I am no longer a college drop out (Blog - College Drop Out), but also for some shop time, access to a lift, a warm spot for working on my car, and the chance to learn more skills as a mechanic. 

 

We finished the fall semester with the car in parts. We did finish the valve stem seals, and adjusted the lash while in there and worked on timing and ignition but the Air Fuel Meter (AFM) was completely taken apart. The lock screw was stripped and we couldn't get it back together. So January couldn't come soon enough to get back in the garage and finish it. We have to jury rig it but we got it all together, tuned, and even took a very cold January drive (with a driver side window, and no heat).

New Items - over the holiday break I ordered some Skillard tow hooks, and I worked on a custom mount of the radio bracket into the glovebox. I snagged a cheap deal on a Bluetooth radio, so I figured while we are re-wiring things lets put the radio in the glove box to free up space for more gauges in the dash. I also thought, hey lets fix the horns, it can be that hard... typical Datsun owner, who hasn't learned that nothing is easy... like trying to fix the map light switch to work... another story for another day. 

So where are we? 

Well the radio works (I need some mounts for the speakers still), the horn works, most interior lights have been converted to LED, and the AFM works. BUT, we took apart the air intake, and in mid conversion to a cold air intake style filter... ran into fitment issues. So she is filterless right now, but luckily not going anywhere so its cool. I ordered some parts so hopefully we button that back up soon. 

So what's next? 

We are going to rip out the AC parts (she doesn't need AC and none of it works anyways). Then we need to get it to the body ship. My man Pilo is going to help with getting a rear bumper mounted and we are going to tackle replacing one of the frame rails (maybe both). 

If that all goes well and doesn't total drain the car piggy bank I hope to get a new exhaust for it (I think suspension will wait until next season). Then I need to finish restoring my set of Shelby Libre Wheels... and she will be looking fresh, smelling cleaner and if I am lucky with a driver window in case it rains again while I am driving her. 

Thanks for checking in y'all. Me and My Z are nearly ready for 2021!