1975 C110 (KHGC110 240K) Build

Adzmax · **Posted:** Thu Mar 29, 2012 11:33 pm

Hi everyone, I thought I'd share the build of my C110 coupé.

A bit of a back story, I purchased a white coupé back in 2008 sight unseen (just pictures on eBay). While the car looked OK the listing wasn't completely truthful and the car was really rough and full of rust.

It had been patched up very poorly and a lot of the rust was hidden. As I dismantled the car, the more parts I removed and the more filler I stripped, the bigger the problems were. Sure it was repairable but it was not the base I was looking for and it was too incomplete. The floor pan, around the windows and the sills etc were all rusted out so it was more than just your usual 240K rust.

Adzmax · **Posted:** Thu Mar 29, 2012 11:47 pm

Whilst I owned this car I managed to get onto another 240K though a work mate. His friend’s father was into Datsun in a big way and had many Z's and what he thought was a 240K. It turned out he was correct and the owner also had a shed full of panels and parts. I picked up this car and all the spare parts in December 2008. It was a tidy looking car, It was filled in the usual places and had a back yard spray job so it was a bit of an unknown quantity but along with all the spares it made for a good deal. It was also running and resisted. Some pictures at purchase -

Between 2008 and 2012 I bought a house and part of a business so I became pretty weighed down, at one point I had both cars for sale. I was lucky enough to get rid of the white car and a lot of parts for a reasonable price and decided to keep the blue car, this was a good decision

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 12:08 am

Over the last few years I've been collecting a lot of parts locally and from Japan and I've now got pretty much everything I need including JDM tail lights, badges, mirrors, centre console, dash and other interior parts. My plan is a full rebuild from the ground up, a GTR replica in white. I started stripping the car down recently and as I remove a piece, I'm restoring it, bubble wrapping it and then shelving it. As time and space is a problem for me this is the easiest way. Once I'm left with a shell it's off to the body shop.

I started by stripping out the carpet to get a closer look at the floor pan etc. I will need to redo the whole interior as this coupé has a blue interior to match the factory blue paint job. Not a fan

This isn't really as issue though as it's pretty crummy and not really up to standard.

Next I removed the front and rear end, I also took of the guards to have a peek, very little rust so far which is a good sign!

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 12:45 am

My first task was the tail lights. I picked these up from Yahoo Japan. They were complete with genuine GTR surrounds but they had seen some hard times. The lenses were very faded and the chrome on the rings was chipped and marked. I disassembled the tailed lights and removed the lenses and stainless steel rings. I also removed the reflectors inside which had started to corrode. The seals on the lenses were deteriorated and had let water into the housings. One of the lenses had taken a hit and was cracked inside. The lens had to be repaired and we had to re-facet the larger red lens to remove a chip from the hit.

With the help of my good friend Troy I cleaned and prepared the lenses then a layer of clear was applied, the end result is pretty nice.

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 1:01 am

I had the small stainless rings polished and the reflective housings plated in the same coating they use in modern head lights. This should provide some serious light! The actual housings had some damaged and missing threads so I ended up using another set I had. I cleaned these up as best possible.

I also cleaned up the bulb holders that screw into the back of the lenses.

I pulled a nicer set of backings off a 3rd set of lights and started to reassemble the tail light assemblies. I bought all new stainless screws and used mastic to reseal the lenses after cleaning the seals as best possible. Mastic is horrible, horrible stuff to work with, it's so messy. If you don't get it right the first time or used to much, you'll spend a while cleaning up!

I was missing a cover from the back which I managed to source here in Australia

The other cover was really dirty and scuffed so I hit it with some wet/dry and the polished it. It came up like new in the end. I then finished reassembling the housings and swapped over the JDM loom.

Over all I'm very happy with the way these turned out!

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 1:16 am

I picked up a new horn pad and Skyline "S" emblem. It was a GTR badge but had cracked with age which seems to be pretty common from what I've seen.

I dissembled the pad and removed the badge. I rubbed back the original backing paint and then hit the font of the badge with progressive finer grades of wet/dry to remove the cracks which appears only surface deep. We then polished the surface and sprayed the backing in a candy red.

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 1:50 am

I started on the headlights next.

I stripped whole assemblies down and removed the nylon grommets by shaving some material from the back of the plugs with a dremel. I took off just enough material so I could push the plugs through with some force. I then hit them rust with a wire wheel and sent the assemblies off for gold zinc plating. The springs and clips were acid bathed and coated in blue zinc. I managed to source some head lamp retaining brackets from a local NOS dealer. The parts came back looking like new!

I re-fitted the plugs and used epoxy to fasten them. They are used to adjust the lamps so it's pretty important that they stay in place. I used all new stainless bolt for this.

I reassembled the housings and polished up the lamps. They came up looking fantastic, especially next to an old set!

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 2:22 am

The sealed beam lamps are not the brightest of lights so in keeping with the Japanese theme I picked up a set of Koito semi-sealed head lights. These use a standard H4 and H1 halogen light which means I can fit any bulb for optimum brightness! Here's the new compared to old and the finished light.

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 2:34 am

Fender mirrors are expensive! I've seen sets go anywhere from $500-$1000 delivered which is pricey for a set of mirrors. I picked up a separate left and right hand side mirror from Yahoo Japan. The finish of the mirrors didn't match but this wasn't really a concern as I planned to rub them back and respray them anyhow. One was NOS and the other was used.

You can see how different they were in these pictures and the damage is apparent close up. I rubbed them back to remove any imperfections and them masked them up for respraying.

My friend Troy sprayed them. While I was moving them to bake I managed to bump a door frame and gouge the fresh paint but Troy with his expertise was able to fill the gouge then once baked, rub the overfill back and then buffed them to perfection! :wink:

I have another lot of parts to be electroplated so I'll send the bases down and have them refinished also. More pics to come soon!

ericbauer · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 7:42 am

Good work!
Gotta love getting parts back from zinc plating - always a treat!

-e

samoht · **Posted:** Fri Mar 30, 2012 11:57 am

Awesome stuff, please do keep up the posting :tu:

You're getting some really good results on those parts. Looks like this will be concours-standard when you're all done!

Adzmax · **Posted:** Sat Mar 31, 2012 10:25 pm

I get a lot of satisfaction taking something old and tired and making it new again, it's a good feeling

I'll be sure to keep posting. I have some trim away at the moment being done and I just picked up some door skins on Yahoo Japan. They'll come over via container so I'm not sure on the quality yet but from pictures they look great.

Next is the bumper bars and chrome trim.

Adzmax · **Posted:** Mon Apr 02, 2012 8:45 pm

Some things are a bit more tricky than others and this is certianly the case for the combination parkers/indicators on the front bumper bar. Inside these units there is a thin reflector which is held in place by the bulb socket. The sockets are actually pressed into the housing and the only way to remove them is to grind back the lip of the bulb socket. I figured that I would remove the old sockets for plating and then replace them with some generic sealed press in sockets.

I had a lot of trouble finding something to suit, I ordered many different shapes and sizes and most either did not fit or would house the bulb too far forward meaning the lens would not fit. I was also going to have some issues trying to make sure the unit was well sealed again so I decided that this might not be the best path. I was lucky enough to pick up a second set of housings from Gerry (Kid-K) - Thanks! Seeing as though I had a second set of reflectors (which may not even be necessary) I wasn't really worried about acid dipping them. I cut the plug off the end of the loom, removed the wiring, spring and grommet which just press out and sent the housings away for Zinc plating in Blue Zinc. When I got them back other than looking great, the reflectors had been vaporised!

The lenses on these lights are all pretty rough, being so close to the ground and plastic the get a lot of stone chips and cracks. The plastic also tends to deteriorate over time. My plan was to sand back the lenses and then clear them the same as I did the tail lights.

I spotted some clear lenses on Yahoo Japan which I was considering using when what do you know, a brand new set popped up on eBay from the UK! I was wrapped when I found these.

The last part is the gaskets to seal the units. There are some on Yahoo Japan which I'm looking to get, I could make a set but these are pretty cheap. The old gaskets are too hard and cracked with age, I'm pretty sure they leak at the first sign of water.

I'll assemble these when the gaskets arrive and post some pictures.

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Apr 13, 2012 4:51 am

I called into my parents placed recently to pick up some parts they are kindly storing for me, I've got pretty limited space at home so I only take parts around as I'm really to deal with them. I picked up a lot of this gear back in 2008/9 and it's been sitting in their roof since so it was nice to pull it out and get it cleaned up.

They came up really well. I'll remove the wood grain inserts from the centre console (although it almost seems a shame) and fit some stainless inserts to match the GTR. Pics to come.

Adzmax · **Posted:** Fri Apr 13, 2012 5:53 am

The GTR tail lights I brought out from Japan were in reasonably good condition but the ring surrounds had been knocked about and the chrome was stained and damaged. I considered buying some replica rings but I'm keen to use as many genuine parts as possible so I looked into having them stripped and re-chrome plated.

I also wanted to have the rear bumper indicator housings cleaned up too. A common problem with these die-cast housings is that the bolts used to hold them rust. Because the housings are under so much stress, the rust seems to make the plastic swell and crack and eventually the mounts snap off.

I stripped the chrome plating off these parts by soaking them in household bleach. I planned to clean then up then etch prime and high fill but ultimately this proved to be messy, time consuming and a waste as the electro platers could easily strip the chrome and would prep them as part of the job. I should have called first :oops:

I received the parts back this week after about 2 months of waiting but it was certianly worth it! The finish on them is perfect.

The mounts for the reflectors are all fixed!

I also went to work on the reflectors when the housings were away. They were pretty dull and scratched so I hit them with some Novus plastic polish. I highly recommend this stuff, it worked really well! Here's a before and after shot of the completed units.

Now all that is left to do is mask and spray the tail lights rings

Eric · **Posted:** Fri Apr 13, 2012 8:40 am

You rock.

ericbauer · **Posted:** Fri Apr 13, 2012 8:48 am

serious resto skills!

pretty amazed, really...

10psitx · **Posted:** Fri Apr 13, 2012 12:26 pm

great work man, from the looks of it you're off to a great start on your resto. :tu:

Garant · **Posted:** Fri Apr 13, 2012 3:46 pm

really interesting build :mrgreen:

can you give us the contact info on the platers who can do plastic chrome?

ericbauer · **Posted:** Fri Apr 13, 2012 3:58 pm

Here's a couple in LA Matt

http://www.vacmet.com/contactus.html

http://www.mmmetalizing.com/contact.html

1975 C110 (KHGC110 240K) Build

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