Nothing huge to show you, but i got another update from my Bodyshop guy. The area behind the passenger seat got formed out of a piece of sheetmetal and installed. ready to weld in all of that stuff, including the floorpan.

Two weeks ago i found a footrest for the 240Z for sale on a local ads-website. I remember i’ve seen them before but never really investigated about them. Both my cars came without them. This particular item was from a 260Z 2+2 and got a fair price-tag, so naturally it gathered my interrest.

Turns out that the parts fiches say that it’s the same unit as used in the 240Z (both LHD and RHD) and was an optional item. I love optional stuff. and since it was cheap and seemed to be in easy restoreable shape, i had to get it 🙂

And yesterday i finally got the package with it. It’s a bit rough around the edges but when in bring my next bunch uf parts for sandblasting and powerdercoating this will go in the same delivery:

I’m not really sure how “rare” this item is, but i think i’ve never seen it on a swiss car. And as a serious parts-hoarder i love to collect these things anyway 🙂

Well yeah, i have yet another two new books to add to my ever evolving list of Z-related books i have to read and translate when i find some time.
1) Fairlady Z Story and history, Vol. 1 – The 50th Anniversary Chronicles.
A book about the history of the Z including the development

It contains some backgroundinformation. for example about road testing in America:

And some of the racing cars. I’ve just been flicking through it yet, but it seems it seems to focus on the car globally with pictures showing old woking station, american race cars but also the japanese. so this might be an interessteing one 🙂

2) Japanese masterpiece series [Vol.12] – Nissan Fairlady
This book is actually a bit older (released in August 1973).

The cool thing is, it contains some backgronud information but also a lot of nice drawings and technical information about the different version. as shown below.

Still have to read it as well, but they seem to be (aside from the factory books) some of the more promising and serious books i bought. But i still have to prove my initial feelings about them 🙂

So lately i had the opportunity to compare my two rear lower valances which i had..
The first one i got from MSA (not sure who is the manufacturer. and the second one which i bought later from Auto Panel solutions UK. I wanted to give you a little quality comparison by laying them next-to-next and compare the details. The raw Metal one is from MSA, and the yellow coated one is from Auto Panel solutions.
1) What you can clearly see is the non-existens of coating on the raw-metal one. So after a while they start to rust, even if stored in a relative dry place:

2) The second big difference is that the yellow one is slightly rounded, like the original panels, while the MSA ones are completely flat and need a lot of adjustment to get the original shape.

3) Then the shape of the exhaust exit, which is closer to the original ones on the Yellow panels.
4) Then there’s also an original bent little lip on the bottom side on the yellow one, like in the original panels, while the MSA panels just have a straight, sharp edge at the bottom end.
5) and last but not least, the location and sizes of the holes, which are different on both panels. 

I don’t want to do any recommondations on what tu buy here. That’s up to you. I just wanted to show you the differences. They might seem small, but if you want to have a good looking car, you can spend a lot of time getting those little details right…