Z Car Garage had a blast at GRIDLIFE Laguna at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca. This was the final festival of the season held on October 20th, and Rob Fuller raced his B-Sedan Datsun 510 in the Touring Cup group. Enjoy our race report with commentary from Rob, photos and video below.

 

ROB: “I am fortunate to be friends with Larry Chen. We were chatting about Z cars, vintage racing, and our obsession with Datsuns when he mentioned that GRIDLIFE was coming to Laguna Seca for the first time. Thought it would be cool to bring a vintage car there as Seca is my home-track. I didn’t know anything about the run groups/classes, only what I’ve seen through Larry’s lens. Since Nick and Cooper did so much trackside support I called out the OG’s…Joshua and his father Keith Corwin. Josh went down on Thursday, loaded us in to the paddock and I arrived Friday in the New Z.”

 

“Tech inspection was quite stringent with check off items like do you have aero? dox bog? weight? We had to add about 150lbs of ballast to our Bay Area Datsun Dealers 510. Gridlife also specifies racing on a 200 treadwear tire. Since there are no 200TW tires in my size we went with a Toyo RA-1. Toyo has been very supportive of my club racing and vintage racing. They wanted to place the BADD 510 in their Toyo booth which I was really excited about.”

Photos by Larry Chen

Racing in GLTC

The GRIDLIFE Touring Car Cup (GLTC) is a wheel-to-wheel sprint racing series that focuses on single-class sprint racing. Typical entrants are modern cars like the S2000, Miata, Corvette, Cayman…so we were really excited to throw our hat in the ring and show everyone what a 50-year old Datsun 510 can do. It was a great opportunity to introduce this crowd to vintage racing!

 

ROB: “In Race 1 I was pretty out-gunned. At ‘Seca when I am on the tire we run and weight, my car is usually running 1:40.2 or 1:40.4. With the added weight and tires I was running 1:44s while front runners were at 1:39 and 1:40…so the first time in a long time, my little BADD 510 was in the back. I gridded and started 29th and made it up to 25th. Starting position is determined by your fastest lap in previous race. They are really strict about the rules so they impounded me and weighed me…I was flattered that they picked me being the smallest, oldest car in the field!”

 

“Race 2 I started 25th and made it to 17th in the first couple of laps…but with with their wings, big tires and hp, aero etc. I couldn’t hang. We finished 23rd. Race 3 I had another good start and made it to 17th again. Two laps in unfortunately my transmission failed. I did a really good job of getting off the race surface, so no yellow flags or race stop. Had the best seat in the house watching the drivers cruise around. All in all really cool to be a part of something different. It’s funny it almost felt like the Sesame Street Song..one of these things is not like the other…the 510 looked out of place in the field but right at home as usual on the track.”

   

Video

Enjoy this video with in-car footage from Rob’s 510, paddock and drift and action:

Good People. Good Vibes.

“Absolutely adore Larry Chen’s staff and the Gridlife folks were super generous. So many people came to see the 510 in the paddock and it was endearing as always to hear “My dad had a 510”. I think we accomplished the goal of showing people that 50 years ago a Datsun 510 was competitive and even today, out-gunned, it is still competitive. 

 

We were stoked to see local ay Area gearheads like Ali and Lane from Driving While Awesome and Radwood fame. B-Sedan Racing also showed some love. Shawn’s Time-Attack S30 was also in the field and nearby in the Toyo Tires booth…

 

Drifting Up-close

 

“I missed the afternoon’s Race 4, kind of a bummer but Larry Chen asked me to be his assistant in the chase car for the drift exhibition…he didn’t have to ask me twice and it was F’ing rad! Watching Larry do what he does…to be inches from a drift car and capture that perfect action shot…in the Corkscrew with the car completely sideways on front of us and Larry is creeping up to it. Just brilliant. He’s an incredible driver, I wasn’t nervous…I was pumped.” 

 

Thanks Gridlife!

 

“If you haven’t been to a Gridlife event I highly suggest it. I’m already planning to attend the next event and bring a car that allow us to be competitive. Great job and welcome to West Coast, Gridife. Super shoutout to Larry Chen, Tyler and Spicy Luis you made me feel right at home.”

All races were livestreamed, you can watch them HERE. Don’t forge to check out Rob’s full in-car racing videos over on his YouTube channel and give him a follow!

Coming up next will be our race report from the 2023 Velocity Invitational at Sonoma Raceway!

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This 1990 Diamond Black Pearl Z32TT has been maintained and modified by Z Car Garage since acquisition in 2008. With 50k miles, original paint and interior it is ready to be enjoyed.

 

Performance upgrades include JWT clutch/flywheel, 550cc Nismo injectors, JWT dual intakes, Specialty-Z 3″ down/mid pipes and dyno tuning. Clean interior.

 

See the full listing on our FOR SALE page. For pricing and more details please contact Rob at the shop: 408-452-0350 or e-mail robATzcargarage.com

 
We met Bill in 2019 when he came to Z Car Garage on referral from our local Z Owners of Northern California (ZONC) club. He’s owned this pretty 1973 Datsun 240Z in Brown Metallic (code 114) for many years and had a list of small things that he always wanted to address. Before we cover the cosmetic and mechanical work we performed let’s hear how Bill got into Z cars…

Bill’s Z Story

 

“When I was about 10, my sister and her husband bought a 1979 280ZX. (They still have it but it currently doesn’t run.) I loved it. I always wanted a Jaguar E type and the Z has a similar shape. As soon as I could afford one, I got a used 1977 280Z and drove it to almost 400,000 miles when I finally wrecked it. I went a couple of months without a Z when a friend told me about a 240 he saw for sale. The owner was a teacher and so am I so of the 3 bidders I got it.”

 

“Then a few years later I went into administration and with the raise I thought it would be fun to have a new Z to go with the 240 so I ended up buying a 2008 350Z. I have had two Zs ever since. The 350 is definitely more capable and is very fun to drive, but I still think the 240 looks better. A really fun part of owning the 240 is taking it to car shows. I get a lot of people saying things like, “I owned a car just like this.” It seems to bring back a lot of memories for many people. Everybody loves the Z!”

Keeping Bill On The Road

 

When Bill came to Z Car Garage in 2019 we re-chromed his rear bumper, zinc plated various hardware, removed smog equipment and cleaned up the engine bay. A failing oil spray bar was replaced and we added ZCG exhaust, header and Z Therapy carb set.

Re-chromed rear bumper:

 
Zinc’d hardware:

 

New exhaust header and SU carb set from Therapy:

 

In 2022 we did more work to Bill’s awesome ’73. We replaced the radiator with a Koyo race unit, installed a Rebello street cam, adjustable T/C rods from T3 followed by alignment services in-house. We also replaced the speedometer seal rings and oil pan gasket. More detailed photos in the gallery below!
New camshaft installation:

  

Adjustable T/C rod before/after:

 

Koyo Race radiator before/after:

 

Dyno Tuning

On the dyno the L24 made 137hp/138tq to the wheels:

 

Enjoy the dyno video!

 

Details

We took care of a few more items like weatherstripping and added a set of Holley retro headlights:

 

Enjoy The Ride

 

We have been taking care of Bill’s 240Z and enjoy working with him:

“ZCG does the highest quality work. They are very knowledgeable, honest and you can tell they really love Zs. It’s like they are working on their own car when they look at a customer’s car! It really feels like a new car. It needed a camshaft and some other parts and they did it perfectly. I love driving that car!”

We also take care of Bill’s 2008 Nissan 350Z convertible, to be featured on zcarblog.com soon!

 

What’s in store Bill’s 240Z? He’s always wanted a rally clock since seeing one at a car show 10+ years ago.  Also in the near future he wants to do a drum brakes to disc brakes conversion. Keep Enjoying the Ride Bill, thanks for your support and Long Live The Z!

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Jaime is performing a full restoration of his beloved 1972 Datsun 240z, now in color 920 Safari Gold with a host chassis and drivetrain upgrades. We are happy to report that his Z Car Garage Big Brakes fit nicely behind the rare, sand-cast Gotti wheels from Racing Service Watanabe. These are 15×8 and 15×9:

Big-Brake Kits Available For DIY Install!

Z Car Garage is proud to offer our Big-Brake Kit to Z-Car owners that want to perform the installation themselves. We can ship worldwide and each kit contains everything needed with a comprehensive (40-page) installation guide. Blog posts documenting all of our customers running the ZCG Big-Brakes can be found HERE.  Let’s take a closer look at Jaime’s beautiful S30 and his ZCG Big-Brake installation:

 

As mentioned, our ZCG Big-Brake kit ships with everything needed to install and retains the factory parking brake:

  

See more about his Z in our feature on zcarblog.com HERE and follow Jaime on his Instagram page to see his attention to detail. Thanks for your support Jaime!

 

John E came to Z Car Garage through a dealership connection at Dublin Infiniti. He purchased this Q50S Red Sport in 2019 with 46k miles on the odometer and it was time for bolt-on performance upgrades with dyno tuning.

 

We installed several parts from AMS Performance including their AMS Heat Exchanger, AMS Coolant expansion tank. Helping the VR30DDT engine breathe are AMS downpipes and a full Fast Intentions cat-back exhaust system. Photos of each are shown below.

 

The new AMS heat exchanger compared to the stock unit and installation:

AMS expansion tank installed replacing two plastic OEM units:

 

AMS downpipes:

 

The Fast Intentions cat-back exhaust replaces the restrictive OEM system:

 

Standard exhaust tips on the FI exhaust system, we love the quality, fitment and sound of these parts:

 

We also installed new Hotchkis sway bars front/rear. Stock vs new below:

 

Dyno Tuning

Straight from the factory, the VR30DDTT is an impressive motor rate at 400 hp and 350 ft-lbs tq stock. It is actually underrated as we have seen with dyno testing. With a few bolt-ons and tuning, even more power can be unlocked from the VR30. Rob tuned John’s Q50 using EcuTek, making 404hp/435tq at the wheels. A significant improvement over the 336hp/338tq baseline:

  

Enjoy the dyno video below:

 

Enjoy The Boost John!

Are you ready for upgrades on your late model Nissan/Infiniti? Give us a call or e-mail!