NismoPick and Shady280 have a good thread going on with the front control arms. The rear cross member is a source of concern for a non-stock suspension (eg lowered, etc). PPK has a build thread with his sloted rear cross member which is a mod that's been around for a LONG time with these cars. I though we could have a thread that brings a lot of this stuff together.

In the early 80's there was a company in California that went by the name of Kontrol that had a modified rear cross member. Does anyone have any info/pictures? I'm trying to dig some up but if anyone else has anything it would be great if you could post it here. I know that they were selling Tokico stuff rebranded as Kontrol (struts) in the late 70's/early 80's.

There are a few possible alternatives to the sloted rear cross member since the Datsun 510 from '68-73 had basically the same rear cross member setup. I'll post a couple of those (links on my other laptop).

 

Some more info on Kontrol:

"In the U.S., Tokicos were first brought in with the Kontrolle name (said Kontrolle by Tokico on shock body). I am not sure what happened to the company, but they were in California."
"I asked him about the Kontrolle crossmember and he said that it was relocated semi-trailing arms by Truesports (Indy car engineer) and sold by Kontrolle. He drew me a picture of the modification and it looked like the pivots for the semi-trailing arms were moved up about an inch. The modification was supposed to decrease/eliminate the zx rear squat/bump steer."

Here is a nice kit from Australia for the 510 with installation instructions here




Here's a kit from a friend of mine in the 510 club. Build thread is here and the install thread is here

 

Time to fab up a set!

 

Byron gave me a call this week as he was over on the Island for business and we got to talking about his adjustable x-member kit for the 510. The long and short of it is he's offered to fab up a kit specifically for the 280ZX hoping he'll get enought orders in to make it worth his while. He said he's sold 40+ of his kit which sounds to me better than then Penultimate and Datsport ones that are available for the 510. It will probably be a winter project but this would be the first kit that is easily installable for the 280ZX rather than the band aid sloting of the rear cross members. I'll keep you posted when he gets started on the project. Anyone interested please let me know. I think the 510 kits were around $300 so I expect the 280ZX would be the same. A must have if you are lowering your car and want to bring it back to specs or for adjusment for racing, autox, etc.

 

Would the kit include new control arm bushings? And would the kit still require slotting the subframe / arm ears?

 

^+1, I'm in for this.

 

Im game for a kit deffinately....

Please keep us up on updates

 

neat stuff fricfrac, i know byron as well, really cool guy. have seen him numerous times at the autox track. he might remeber me from days of the old z club but who knows. i was the last one to organize and hold a cruise but that was back a while. his may benefit from having an adjuster bolt that allows the mechanism to be moved via threads like the kontrolle kit. plus that would help lock it in place for those who have wide tires that could potentially move the adjustment under hard cornering and accel.

 

You have to remove the stock brackets and weld in the new ones. It would be the same procedure as the 510 as it's virtually the same setup.

510 Installation thread

 

Byron is a Champion of the Datsun cause keeping many of these old cars on the road. I'll pass that on to Byron - I'm not sure what he had in mind but if you've seen Byron drive the Bronze at the AutoX that's peace of mind for me

 

i have seen byron drive many times. usually the car to beat out there. after being a suspension guy for some time ive seen some parts move in unwanted circumstances. it seems that tightening a bolt in a slot or even a cam just doesnt fully secure parts but a bolt that goes across the plane of force holds up kinda like a belt tensioner system

 

Any updates on this FricFrac? I'm interested.

 

Nope but I did see Byron a couple of weeks ago. He stuck his head in at the local Datsun club Christmas party to drop off a set for one of the guy's 510's. He only had a minute to talk as he was on his way to the ferry. I'll send him a message...

 

Byron said he's got some time to work on this so I'm working on getting the sub frame over to him.

 

Cross member is out and ready to send to Byron

 

Good news - just got a text that the prototype is done and being welded and test fit on the car this weekend

 

Version one had some clearance issues so we'll be test fitting version two tomorow. Here's a teaser for version two:

 

well any updattes???

 

Byron is in the middle of moving. He'll be back on it once he gets settled in

 

Any updates on this? I'd love to have a kit!

 

I'm in the process of rebuilding a suspension from the ground up. Very very interested

 

I guess this thread has died ????