Getting my Dad’s 1979 ZX running again and driving my dream car.
Back in 1978, I was a freshman at Ole Miss and the Datsun dealer in Tupelo Mississippi had a new 280ZX on Display. I fell in love. I managed to talk the salesman into letting me test drive it. It was so much better in every way than my Datsun 710 that I thought was pretty sporty.
I made what I thought was a great plan to afford it but thankfully my Dad taught me about the financial woes of taking out a huge loan to buy a depreciating asset. So I kept modifying my little 710 and got my engineering degree instead. But I always wanted the ZX, the shiny blue and silver special edition that I got to drive.
Many years later my Aunt asked my dad if he wanted their ZX 2+2. It needed some bodywork and paint but he agreed to buy it so we made a trip t Nebraska to pick it up.
I was still very excited to drive the ZX home. But after spending all day in the slow bouncy old car with a broken driver seat, my dream was more of a nightmare.
I donated the seats from my old 510 project car and dad cleaned up the roust and sprayed a fresh coat of silver paint on the body. The car now looked good again and was a bit more comfortable. But it was still slow and bouncy. It did take it on one trip to the tail of the dragon but one trip was enough. Dad drove it occasionally until the fuel pump failed.
He replaced the pump but a few months later the engine refused to fire up. Since it had a new fuel pump, he assumed it was an electrical issue and parked it away. That was over five years ago.
I recently started bugging him to let me take a look at it and see what was wrong. I was assuming it was a distributor problem based on what he told me.
We finally loaded it on the trailer and brought it home to my shop.
I hooked up the spark tester to the coil wire and gave it a whirl. There were multiple huge blue sparks, so I knew the distributor was working.
Next, I disconnected the fuel line planning to hook up my fuel pressure tester. But I decided to see what the fuel in the tank looked like so I switch on the key.
Nothing came out. I checked the factory shop manual and it recommended disconnecting the oil pressure switch to test the fuel pump. So I popped off the wires and tried again.
So I pulled the carpet in the cargo area and found the wires to the pump. I hooked up a test light and found that I was indeed getting power to the pump, but there was no noise or fuel pumping going on.
I removed the wires from the pump and connected it straight to a battery. I made a small whir then nothing, It was dead, The new fuel pump he had put in had failed shortly after it was installed.
So, I ordered a new fuel pump. FED EX tracking showed it made an around-the-country trip before it finally arrived in Cleveland a week late. But once it was here, about 30 minutes later I had it installed and the engine running. It just did not run very well.
I used a stethoscope to check each of the injectors and found three worked and three were silent. I checked with an LED test light and found they were all getting power they just were not clicking.
I assumed they were stuck, but when I pulled the connector loose it was obvious the problem was with the connectors. After the application of some Deoxit and some work with a brush, I had all six injectors working.
While I was waiting for the fuel pump to arrive and since the car was on the lift, I replaced some worn front suspension parts. The strut bushings were crumbling so I replaced those. The sway bar bushing also crumbled when I took them loose so I got new ones for that place as well.
I also replaced the strut cartridges as well. The old ones had no resistance at all and allowed the long nose of the car to bounce horribly when driving.
Now with all new suspension in the front, it drives much better. Certainly not like a modern sports car but fine for an antique. It is still underpowered compared to anything modern or even our 1979 RX7. But it is great to have the old car back driveable again.
