By Timothy Odell
Few cars epitomize the late-70s and early-80s like the Datsun 280ZX “by Nissan”. We’ve got Japanese cars coming into their own as high-end machines, but still incapable of a cohesive branding scheme. (See also: Toyota’s Tercel Corolla.) This unit’s L28 has Bosch L-Jetronic fuel injection with turbocharging right around the corner.
I’ll confess that most of my 280ZX knowledge comes from the last 15 minutes of reading the wikipedia page, but what I do know is we’re looking at an EFI’ed straight six in a decent RWD, IRS chassis with eBay Motors with bidding at $381. It’s a donated non-starter (fuel pump, at least) vehicle with back-registration due and a crappy paint job. If ever there was a vehicle screaming to be LeMons’ed to death, this is it.
According to our own Eric Rood, the 280ZX sits at about 41st place for LeMons car domination, whereas the 300ZX occupies 10th. For years, Z-cars had a reputation for seeming like they’d do well in LeMons, then blowing up disappointingly. Since that curse was broken way back in 2010, there’s certainly no way this obviously neglected machine could fail you. Also: T-Tops.
1983 Datsun 280ZX for sale – eBay Motors
Jeff Glucker
What typically happens on these is the fuel pump relay goes bad. It's usually located around the driver's side fender and is an inexpensive fix. It's not always the fuel pump.
Injector seals were a major problem. Did not show up till I gave full throttle,learned an expensive lesson that day.
I learned that same lesson! Carry a fire extinguisher!
Wasn't that expensive though, it was only 50 bucks or so to replace the injector and wiring that melted in the fire. and 30 for an extinguisher( which came in handy for the next fire. I sold it after that).
Window louvres are top-notch LeMons ZAZZ.
The Z-Wrecks guys have won four times with a 280ZX, also, making them something of an outlier.
NACA duct, NACA duct, hey, hey, hey!
NACA duct, NACA duct, all the way!
The driver's side door also caused problems on these particular models when you were drunk, and gave you a rather hard time getting inside. The passenger side wasn't nearly as bad, this example shows both, and it does have the curbside champagne cardboardinthian leatherette privacy obtrusion for random back seat unconsciousness.
L-Jet is pretty robust, albeit with zero tunability. Be sure to clean all the grounds and address vacuum leaks.
Get rid of that hopeless tangle of fuel injection nonsense and stick a couple of SU's on. Or three. Instant IOE points.
Can I get it with $400 chash!
We aaaRRRREEEE DRIVEN!
This is imprinted, permanently, on we older folk.