domsgarage

So i found this Z, the body is in excellent condition, mostly restored, the rear quarters are replaced and welded onto the car, any repair work that had to be done was done with fiberglass and not bondo. The interior of the car has been started, turbo leather seats in the front look brand new, carpeting is clean, its a two plus two and the rear seats have seen better days but they still look good, the rear hatch looks good and it still has the hatch cover. Supposedly the tops dont leak, i checked it out after a rainy day and the car was dry, the hatch and hood shocks are fine.

The problem is the motor.

Upon starting the car ((lady wasnt even positive if it had gas in it)) after about a half hour i got the car started but had to constantly give it gas, like a gas, let up, gas, let up, gas sort of situation. The motor is supposedly a jap import and has around 50k on it as of now, car has 130. I dont really know to trust the lady since its running so poorly and she told me she doesnt have paper work for it.

She said she just changed the spark plugs with acdelcos and then the car started running horribly. I know in the z32 you need to use the NGK's becuase of the size of the cylinder heads and what not. On the two older z's that I had (85-86) i only used the NGK plugs so Im not sure if this is an issue on these cars.

Further more the car constantly over heats. Water pump was replaced, timming was replaced, the heater core is bipassed, no thermostat, theres a brand new radiator in the car and the coolant container was full, what could this issue be??

This an 86 model. The gas guage doesnt work, im not super positive the other guages work and it failed emissions.

The lady is asking a decent price, if the car was running. Im thinking of offering her a low price, but I want to get an idea of what these issues could be caused by.

Any help would be awesome.

Thanks ahead.

duowing

Well the fact that it's running no thermostat can cause problems with overheating anyway. I've heard people always recommend NGK's for all Zs, but I've never heard of the car running that bad from using a different brand of plug. If the car overheats, and will hardly hold an idle, there may be bigger issues such as a head gasket. Did you check the oil on it?

domsgarage

I was thinking a head gasket as well. The last car I knew of with a bad head gasket eventually had a siezed motor from driving it around. This car is driving around from time to time if the ladies kid is staying local. The plugs can cause the car to just flood a lot and have some rough starting issues, i dont know if its like that on the older models though.

Whats a head gasket job like on these bad boys, thats probably the one thing Ive never done to these cars?

duowing

It's not too bad, I've pulled the heads on a VG30E before. It took a day or two, and a little bit of work, but I was able to get it done. It's more or less your weekend project sort of thing. I've pretty much done everything on the VG30 short of pulling the block apart. If you can get the car for a decent price and you think it's worth it then I'd say go ahead. It may not be the heads, but even if the headgasket or heads are fine, if the car is allowed to overheat much you will quickly have an issue on your hands. Like I said running no thermostat isn't helping either. That wouldn't make it undriveable though.

z-hag

it takes 30 minutes of running to get the ecu to accept the car is not any longer sitting idle. same as after installation of a new battery. try new gas. after putting new gas into the tank, try letting it run for a bit. still not running at idle---try cleaning the injectors. try checking the afm and o2 sensors. you might want to check the numbers the ecu shows to see what might be the problem. get a fsm and a haynes manual. if you cannot find out the answers, call a local guru----i use z-whizz, in san diego......sdmart folks. aldso the kids from zdriver. good luck---keep us posted.

domsgarage

True. I figured a sloid day. I havent really done any work on a 31 for about 4 or 5 years or so. I can get the car at a good price, considering the shape of the body. I just want to be able to drive it home, and I live about a half hour away, with out having to stop becuase its over heating. Smell me? Thanks for the comments though, Ill keep you guys posted.

z-hag

gee----once ya beat the girl into shape, she will be fun--is she turbo or na???? turbos seem more PMS than the nas do----harder to keep 'em happy, for some reason...........when i got my piglet, there werer champions in her----get the nasty non-jap crap outta da car. the non jap stuff is excellent for our all american gotta have HOT sparkplugs cars. these need ngks.....for real.....piggy ran like hell until i changed her out.

domsgarage

Smell you. Its an NA, I had a TT and im not trying to get into that **** again. Theyre nice but too much of a trouble and when **** goes wrong, it goes wrong. Smell it.