240Z: The future of the project (Big Boost)

Long time followers might have realized that the project lost a bit of its original momentum. As much as I loved to take everything apart and attempt to fix it myself – at one point I had to realize that with life evolving and me becoming more involved my job, I simply don’t have the time and energy left to spend every evening in my Garage. The Project was always meant to be a “learning-by-doing” project, but from that crappy rust bucket it once was, it has meanwhile evolved in an expensive quality build, and I also simply lack the knowledge to give the car love it deserves to become the good-looking, mechanically flawless, but also safe-to-drive car I look to own one day.
I had several setbacks over the years and I have definitely learned my lessons, but you’ve mainly seen me do small tasks here-and-there, rather than attacking the big chunks of work which are still to do. So I’ve been thinking of how I can solve this in the best possible way. Luckily I can count myself being a part of the S30.world team, and they happen to have the best S30 mechanics and restoration team in the world, in my opinion. The work they do is truly outstanding. Chris finally agreed to put the car on his project backlog, and recently he came to Switzerland to assess the car.
We made a first rough sketch of what needs to be done.

Then this week, I flew to Budapest in Hungary to discuss a few other S30.world related things, but since it’s also where they do the bodywork, paint, and mechanical stuff, it was great to see the team again and refine the plan with them.
We discussed many options and I still wanted to do a few things myself, but we agreed on the fact that they should do everything that is impossible for an untrained person like me to do properly in a first attempt.

So we agreed on the following:
– Put the car on the measurement bench and make sure it’s straight.
– Fix some body issues that the previous body shops didn’t get right, or messed up.
– Paint the chassis in factory 904 white, including cavity sealing, seam sealer, undercoating, blacked areas, charcoal panels, engine block blue, etc.
– Restore the engine (with a little twist) including the Mikunis
– Restore the original and competition adjustable suspension
– Restore the MK63 brakes install them with new brake lines, fuel lines, etc.
– Restore the 5-speed A-type Gearbox, differential, drive shafts and propeller shaft
– Install the roof liner, and difficult-to install a-pillar parts, etc.
– etc.

So the plan is that I get back a Car with an excellent body, restored drivetrain, sitting on the suspension and wheels. They calculated roughly about 11–12 months of work and I will go and check it out regularly. Starting point is expected to be in August / September 2026.

After that, my work will be to install electrical wiring (my specialty), finalize the interior and all the missing bits and pieces from the body, exhaust, etc. That still will give me 1–2 years of work, I guess.

Until then have plenty of work to do to prepare the car. I’ll remove temporary installed stuff, attach other stuff correctly, find a few missing parts and prepare all individual items of the above list for shipping.

While it will be a lot of work, it will also be a lot of fun, I hope, and I’m really, really, really excited to see Gustav, Tom, Lesly and co work on the car.