280z questions

A forum for owners of S30 and S130 Datsun Z's... 240Z, 260Z, 280Z and 280ZX!
6lucario
Posts: 1
Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2015 6:43 pm

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So I'm thinking about getting a 280z I found 2 hours away from me, car is a 1978 280z with auto transmission, I think it has original paint but not entirely sure, I'm told the car runs good and it's had a few places that had rust removed and patch
Is $3000 a good price for this car, and is there any "small stuff" I can do to get a little more horse power out of the engine?


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evildky
Posts: 14713
Joined: Sat Jan 31, 2004 9:23 pm
Car: 71 240ZT, 87 300ZXN/A-T, 06 350Z GT, Tundra TRD RW
Location: Louisville, KY
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Welcome to Nico. When it comes to S30 Z cars it generally pays dividends to buy the best chassis you can find/afford. You didn't fill in your location but in the rustbelt it's almost impossible to find a chassis that isn't rusty os was repaired, in the southwest virgin chassis are readily available so the market price will vary location to location, craigslist can help shed some light on what other models in your area are listed at, keeping in mid sell price will likely be a bit less. Automatic cars will bring less money than a manual car and later cars will bring less money than earlier cars. The quality of the repair work done will also greatly affect the price, if they "fixed" it by slathering it in fiberglass or pop riveting metal on walk away, it's not worth putting the money and effort into fixing someone else's mistakes. As for making power most people swap the fuel injection in favor of carbs, a megasquirt will free up some power over the stock injection, header, exhaust, cone air filter are all available and fairly cheap. Assuming your 78 has the stock block and head you can swap to a flat top block form an 82-83 280zx for increased compression or to the head form a 75 which also raises compression but also has better flowing head. Lots fo choices just have to start with a good foundation, then figure out where you want to be, getting there is the easy part.


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