Z32 ADAMZX's OEM+ 2000spec Version R Replica Conversion & Rebuild Project Build Thread

I appreciate the comment mate, as far as I can remember the fluid level for the transmission did check out fine during the simple & basic checks of all of the mechanical fluids in the engine and transmission before we did the test drive. After the test drive we rechecked the levels and everything seemed to be fine fluid level wise.

Now unfortunately for me, I didn't end up bringing with me, my usb consult cable I use to connect my tablet to the od1 port along with my full conzult software on the day to be able to check the transmission ecu's sensor data and or error codes. So at the time we had no idea whether this was normal behaviour or not from the transmission and though I knew it didn't feel right to me, after 3 long days of working on the Z getting it back together, i might have just been hoping on hope that it was all fine and the car just needed to be driving after sitting for so long and in the end it didn't change anything and I'm just lucky the box didn't end up blowing up.

Following this update I have been doing a lot of stuff to try and solve this issue with the transmission which you will be able to read about in next month's upcoming blog updates and all I can say is I still don't know what's wrong with the box atm and at this point in time I am suspecting the worst case scenario, just stay tuned for the next few blog updates to get updated on the situation of my auto trans as time goes by.



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Just noticed someone selling a new Xenon RH Headlight, in case you want to replace the restored one. Shame the guy doesn't have the LH, or I would've bought them myself

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/1692604094710485/

 

thank you very much for the comment, $1500 is doable once I get my tax money so I'll definately contact the seller at some point once I have the funds and maybe I can make it work out. thank you very much again for posting the link for me, much appreciated

 

For anyone interested, I called Nissan Ipswich about three weeks ago, to inquire about the xenon headlights. They actually had two in stock, both drivers side though unfortunately.

 

After multiple months of massive updates and progress made for the rebuild project, this month saw a quite a bit of a slow down in new developments and work done on the Z but with all of the issues I was now experiencing with my automatic transmission since getting the car back on the road, I had decided to try and play it safe and not drive the Z very much over the course of this month. I was also now 6 months behind in the back end for producing and releasing my rebuild projects monthly blog updates for you all which I again apologise for and so moving forward I wanted to spend more time on writing up and releasing as many of the delayed blog updates that I hadn't posted up yet as fast as I possibly can and eventually I hope to catch up to where I am now with the current developments I am working on for the Z.

But even with all of stuff going on in the background for the rebuild project, some exciting progress was still made for a couple little things that I managed to do this month including giving the car its first bath in almost 3 years. I also test fitted several aftermarket and real carbon fiber exterior trim pieces for the Z that I am planning to install onto the car at some point in the future as well as install a couple of different types of aftermarket LED replacement tail light globes into the car with mixed results and to finish off I did a little bit more work on the Stillen SMZ nose panel which I wasn't able to complete during the reassembly phase of the rebuild project.

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ADAMZX Instagram: instagram.com/adamzx_z32​

 

FULL CAR DETAILING PROCESS AFTER REBUILD

So it has been a week now since the events of the reassembly process of the front end of the car and one of the things that I never got a chance to do before I drove the car home from my Dad's place, was to give the car a full inside and out detail, so that I can then remove all of the years of dirt and dust buildup that had settled onto the exterior and interior surface of the car while it sat for 3 years in the front yard of my Dad's place under a car cover.

Here is how the car looked before I started with the detailing process and besides the dust buildup that is visible on the rear hatch in the below photos, the car doesn't really look that dirty on the outside. Still after sitting for such a long time and now that its finally parked in its new home, I definitely wanted to give my car a decent bath and clean off all of that dust as much as possible.





As for the interior of the car, that too really wasn't that bad either but there was a thin layer of dust that was covering the dashboard, both of the door cards, the seats and all of the surrounding trim inside the car. Not to mention that it had been quite a while since I had last vacuumed the interior of my Z even before the accident occurred, so it was differently due for good cleaning of the whole interior while I was planning to detail the outside of the car anyways.







Starting off the detailing process will be a thorough vacuuming of the entire interior of the car, followed by a wipe down of all interior trim surfaces using a interior cleaning spray product and a microfiber towel. To finish off, all of the trim panels will then have a high quality interior protectant applied to all of the plastic panels in the interior which will help to protect those pieces from the damaging rays of the sun and bring out the depth of colour in the vinyl. Things were off to a good start with the rear boot area and passenger side foot well coming up looking fantastic after I going through my thorough detailing process in those areas but unfortunately for me, things then took a turn for the worst unexpectedly when my new BigBoi SuckRpro vacuum cleaner machine decided to die on me midway through the vacuuming process which pretty much ended my ability to finish off the rest of the cleaning process of the interior of the car for the day, which was pretty annoying considering it was the first time I had tried to use the machine to clean the car since I got it from work several weeks ago. Luckily it was a faulty unit that I managed to grab from work before it was to be thrown out under warranty. This meant that the unit didn't cost me anything so there was no lose for me in hindsight. I may try to pull the unit apart and possibly fix the machine later down the track if its possible of course.

Now because of the breakdown of my new vacuum machine, I didn't feel happy enough to take any "after" photos of the detailing process for the interior that I had managed to complete before the machine died on me and I will need to go back to my Dad's place at some point in time and collect and bring home my old workshop vacuum which was working fine when I swapped it for the BigBoi unit. Once I have my old vacuum cleaner machine back at home I can then finish off the cleaning process for the interior.

Moving on now to the exterior detailing process of the car and I began by thoroughly cleaning all 4 of the factory OEM wheels which were covered all kinds of gunk including spider webs and grass clippings along with the usual buildup of brake dust that had bonded to the surface of the polished aluminum wheels before the accident occurred. Using a high quality wheel cleaning product along with a pair of different styled wheel brushes, I first chemically dissolved and thoroughly scrubbed each alloy wheel to remove as much of the gunk buildup on each wheel as I could by hand. Then using my Karcher pressure washer, I thoroughly rinsed down each wheel to wash off all of the wheel cleaning product as well as all of the grass clippings and spider wheels in and around the wheels and even in the wheel wells as much as possible.

The next step was to do a quick touchless pre wash of the entire exterior of the car to safely remove as much of the surface dust and grime off of all of the surfaces of the car as much as possible. This process will help to eliminate and or minimise the chances of me causing micro scratches to all of the painted surfaces of the car during the manual hand washing process. This step included a quick high pressure rinse down of the entire exterior of the car which was then followed by a pre foam wash, which was left to dwell onto the body of the car for about a minute or so and should help to gently lift off as much loose dirt and dust off the paint without me needing to touch the car at all. Then I thoroughly rinsing off all of the remaining foamy suds from the surfaces of the car to leave the paint as clean as possible before moving onto the next step.

Then using the classic 2 bucket wash method, I manually hand washed every surface of the exterior of the car thoroughly using a high quality automotive body wash and a microfiber wash mitt by Bowden's, to effectively and safely remove all of the more stubborn stuck on grime that did not come off the car during the pre wash process.

Once I had finished washing down the entire surface of the car by hand, I then dried the entire car down using a high quality 1200 grams per square meter (GSM) drying towel and my new BigBoi BlowRProMini blowing machine, which together allowed me to quickly and effectively dry off all of the remaining water on the surfaces of the car and leave me with a very clean and shiny looking 300ZX and I was very happy to see my pride and joy looking like a million bucks once again.









With the car now thoroughly cleaned on the outside at least, I could now look into installing and finishing off a few little minor modifications to the car that I wasn't able to do during the reassembly process.​

 

ADDITIONAL CARBON FIBER TRIM COVERS FOR THE SIDE & REAR VIEW MIRRORS (SEC-963)

While we are on the subject of carbon fiber parts for the rebuild project, lets have a look at the 2 other carbon fiber trim covers I have acquired which I plan to go along with the installation of the Lamborghini Diablo headlight trim covers. I hope that together all 3 carbon fiber parts will add that little bit of super car styling I am aiming for without altering the car's original body styling and or factory appearance that I am trying to maintain as much as possible.

CARBON FIBER SIDE VIEW MIRROR TRIM COVER



I purchased this pair of carbon fiber trim covers from a seller on yahoo auctions in Japan back in 2022 and just like the Lamborghini Diablo trim covers, the side mirror carbon fiber trim covers look absolutely fantastic on my silver metallic 300ZX. The covers come complete with included double sided tape to allow for an easy DIY installation of each trim cover onto the rear exterior body of both of the factory 300ZX side mirrors.





CARBON FIBER REAR VIEW MIRROR TRIM COVER



The last of the carbon fiber trim covers I have is for the factory 300ZX rear view mirror found inside the car which I also purchased from yahoo auctions back in 2022. When I did my initial test fitting of the trim cover onto the rear view mirror back in 2022, I found that this trim cover is able to be simply positioned and clipped into place over the outer body of the rear view mirror assembly.



Before I install the cover though I want to add a small "Nismo" decal to trim cover which will replicate the official and original factory style Nismo mirror covers found on the several Nissan models including the Nissan Skyline GTR R33 & R34.



Now as much as I would really love to just install all of these cool carbon fiber parts onto my 300ZX's, I know that I have way more important things to worry about right now on the car especially with regards to the automatic transmission issues I have experienced since getting my Z back on the road and I need to focus on fixing that problem first before I can then look into and install these carbon fiber parts onto the car later on in the future.​

 

CARBON FIBER LAMBORGHINI TRIM COVERS TEST FIT (SEC-260)

The first modification I wanted to look into this month, was for the test fitting and installation of my pair of Lamborghini Diablo carbon fiber trim covers or eyelids for my factory 300ZX xenon headlights. As part of any new exploratory type of modification I want to install on my 300ZX, which as far as I know has never been done before. Means that I will need to figure out how, where and what important things I need to do before I can commit to installing these trim covers onto my pair of factory 300ZX xenon headlights.



The first thing that I want to do is to check the overall fitment of each of the trim covers onto both of my factory 300ZX xenon headlights. This will help me to see where each trim cover will sit on both glass lenses of each 300ZX headlight to replicate the original Lamborghini Diablo headlight setup as much as possible.



So after a quick test fit of both trim covers, I found that there was no issues with the fitment of each trim cover onto both of the glass lenses of my factory 300ZX xenon headlights which confirms the truth for everyone to know that the Lamborghini diablo carbon fiber headlight trim covers are interchangeable with 300ZX headlights.

With the covers in place, I was also then able to see how the carbon fiber trim covers looked visually on the car and my first impressions were that they looked absolutely amazing when fitted onto the both headlights. Though the carbon fiber effect was very minor, it still doesn't look out of place and really helps to add to that super car feel and look to the front end of my Nissan 300zx ever so slightly and the darker shade of the carbon fiber pattern on the trim covers really complimented my factory silver metallic paint finish to a tee.













The only small little issue that I found during the test fitting process of the trim covers, was that I wasn't able to properly test fit the passenger side trim cover onto the passenger side headlight due to the SMZ nose panel which is currently pressing up against the left hand side edge of the passenger headlight assembly and this prevented me from being able to slot down and the left hand side edge of the trim cover into position onto the passenger side headlight. Because of that issue it means that when it comes time for me to commit to installing both of these headlight trim covers in the future, I will have to uninstall the SMZ nose panel first so that I can then install both trim covers correctly and then I can reinstall the SMZ nose panel back onto the car.

With the test fitting process completed the next item I will need to figure out and decide on is which method of bonding, I will decide use to attach and install each of carbon fiber trim covers onto the glass lenses of each headlight. This is the most important part of the installation of these trim covers as I need to make sure they will not come off of the headlights in the future which would be a very frustrating an expensive loss for me to have to go through, so I need to make the right decision the first time around.

From the research I have done so far on the choices I have to be able to attach each trim cover onto the glass lenses of each headlight. I can either use a high quality double sided tape or an adhesive type bonding sealant product which will need to both have the ability to provide a strong adhesive bond for the trim covers onto the glass lenses to prevent them coming off due to wind resistance forces that might be applied to the covers as I am driving down the freeway at 100 kmph.

On top of the strong bonding characteristics I require, I also need a product that will be able to also withstand for expended periods of time, the potential of either extreme heat and or extreme cold conditions without breaking and or losing their bonding abilities. This is the key element I am looking for as there will be times when the car will be sitting outside for several hours in direct sunlight where the adhesive product will be subject to high heat temperatures as well as during winter time, will experience a temperature drop down to as low as about 5 degrees Celsius here in Melbourne where I live and I need a product that wont degrade overtime due to those temperature differences and exposures over as long a period of time as much as possible.

Initially I was leaning more towards using a high quality double sided tape for the bonding application of the trim covers onto the headlights but after speaking with a representative from JB Weld at my work on the matter. He suggested that I should be going more with the use of an adhesive type sealant product to attach the trim covers to the headlights over using double sided tape. The points he made were that the issue with using double sided tape was that the thickness of the tape would cause the trim covers to not sit flush and or flat enough with the glass lenses and that would allow for dirt and grime to eventually form under the raised edges of the both trim covers which could lead to the adhesive tape losing its bonding abilities over time and then with the added wind resistance of freeway driving could enviably cause the trim cover to fall off of the headlights.

But if I was to use an adhesive sealant product instead, that product would allow me to have a strong bond that would be able to resistance all of the high heat and cold weather conditions I was concerned about, as well as provide a more flush flat fitting of the trim covers onto the glass lenses and because of this, the adhesive sealant application would eliminate all of the issues that the double sided tape would create and the potential of dirt and grime and even wind resistance from getting under the trim cover would not occur and this would mean that the trims covers would not fall off overtime.

With this information, I feel more inclined to go with the adhesive type sealant product for my bonding application method of the trim covers onto the headlights and the JB Weld rep was even kind enough to provide me with a few product options from both his own range and even some of his competitors to help me make the most informative and correct choice of product I was looking for.

For now I have achieved my goal of test fitting the carbon fiber trim covers for the headlights and I think I have enough information to proceed with the installation at some point in the future.​

 

TRYING TO UPGRADE MY TAIL LIGHT GLOBES TO AFTERMARKET LED VARIENTS (SEC-265)

If you all remember during the mid to later stages of my rebuild project, I was able to upgrade several of the factory halogen globes for my pair of front and rear indicator's as well as my parker and front fog lights with LED versions with much success. Now it is time for me to try and do the same thing on the rear tail lights but the problem with converting over to any type of aftermarket LED globes for the 300ZX's tail lights is having to deal with the factory tail light out warning system built into the wiring circuit / wiring system of the 300ZX's tail light wiring harness.

From what I know, the system is designed to detect any amount of low wattage current running through the circuit of the tail light harness via a "Stop & Tail Sensor Assembly" attached to the back of the drivers side tail light housing. If a low wattage current is detected due to a effect of a blown tail light halogen globe, the system will display and illuminate the tail light warning indicator on the dashboard.



The reason this setup in the 300ZX is a issue, is because of the fact that all aftermarket LED globes are designed to be very power efficient and so produce very low wattage when compared to their halogen globes counterparts. This in turn causes the warning light system in the 300ZX to illuminate whenever a set of LED tail light globes are installed and activated either via turning the car's running lights on in low light driving conditions and or when depressing on the brake pedal which in turn causes the tail light warning indicator on the dashboard to illuminate. This situation is exactly what happened to me when I first tried to use LED tail light globes way back in 2008 when I was running from custom made DIY double clear rear tail light setup on my Z.



After several months of use, I began to notice that the cheap LED globes that I paired up along with my DIY double clear tail lights setup, all began to start breaking down and fail on me, to the point where I decided to just ditch the idea of using LED tail light globes and instead revert back to reinstalling the appropriate halogen globes back into the tail light assemblies which lasted until I eventually replaced the double clear tail lights setup and went with the way better looking later model "JDM' style tail lights setup as part of my 2000 model conversion project.



Now I'm hoping that modern day aftermarket LED globes that I can easily purchase from my work, will be a lot more reliable then the cheap LED tail light globes I used more then 15 years ago and if I'm lucky, they may also have the ability to include an inbuilt load resistor setup inside in the LED globes which could replicate the same electrical characteristics of a halogen globe much like what the new Narva LED indicators globes did for me and defeat the presences of any factory tail light warning system found in some cars including the Nissan 300ZX.



STEDI BAY15D LED TAIL LIGHT GLOBES (P/N: LEDCONV-BAY15D)



The first set of LED tail light globes that I installed was the Stedi branded BAY15D (1157) LED globes which looked to be a very high quality set of LED replacement globes with a colour temp of 6000K and according to the packaging information produced a low amperage of 0.39amps and a high of 0.41amps.



Unfortunately after the installation of the stedi set of LED tail light globes, I found that the dashboard warning indicator for the tail light warning system would now illuminate when i either turned on the driving lights and or whenever I depressed the brake pedal. Initially I tried to ignore the warning light as much as possible while I was driving the car around town but eventually it did get quite annoying for me to see the warning light constantly turning on and off while I was driving and I was nearly ready to give up and revert back to my factory halogen globes when I found another set of aftermarket LED globes that just might fix this problem for me.

NARVA BAY15D LED TAIL LIGHT GLOBES WITH INBUILT CANBUS MODULE (P/N: 18266BL)



And those LED tail light globes I went with was made by Narva and the differences with this set of LED globes was that they came included with a canbus module inside the LED globes housing which according to the packaging would eliminate the dashboard warning light indicator and not require the use of a load resistor to be installed in series with the factory tail light wiring harness.





If what the packaging was stating was true then this was exactly what I was looking for and I had high hopes that this new set of LED globes from Narva would finally do the trick. So I removed the Stedi LED globes and replaced them with the Narva variant's.





But even with the new set of Narva canbus style LED globes installed, I was still getting the activation of the dashboard tail light warning indicator coming up just like what would happen with the previous set of Stedi LED globes.

A few days later while I was at work, a Narva representative came into my store to showcase some of the new product ranges that Narva were going to releasing soon to the market here in Australia. I took the opportunity to speak to him about the issue I was having with the activation of the tail light warning system in the Z even with the installation of the canbus style LED globes from his range and his response to me was that, yes they have found that some cars tail light warning systems can still trigger even with the use of their canbus style LED globes in place and the only way now to overcome the activation of the warning light on the dashboard is to install a load resistor unit into the wiring harness of the tail light wiring system.

With this new information from the Narva rep, I could quite easily install a load resistor into the wiring harness of the tail light warning system as an simple DIY option but I also wanted to look into the possibility of modifying the circuitry of the "Stop & Tail Sensor Assembly" as another option to change the way the system detects the amount of wattage it needs to be able to activate the warning indicator on the dashboard.

The problem is that this kind of modification would be a very difficult and complex alteration to the sensor assembly for an electrical novice like me to do and would require a deep understanding of the inner workings of the electrical components of the "Stop & Tail Sensor Assembly" which I have yet to look into myself and I haven't seen anyone talk about and or modify this unit to allow for the use of LED globes in this system thus far. But if it was possible it would a be an simple plug and play option for other 300ZX owners to install into their cars after they had modify the sensor assembly themselves leaving the factory wiring harness all original and untouched.



For now though I am just going have to try and ignore the tail light warning indicator on the dashboard as much as possible, hopefully one day I can possibly look into either modifying the sensor assembly and or install a load resistor into the wiring harness of the tail light system to hopefully one day overcome the issue I have with activation of the tail light warning indicator while using LED globes in my 300ZX.​

 

STILLEN SMZ NOSE PANEL UPDATES NOVEMEBER 2024 (SEC-650)

The last item that I wanted to address for this months blog updates, was to do with sealing up several empty and now unused mounting bolt holes I currently have along the upper lip or rear section on my Stillen SMZ nose panel.



Normally these specific mounting bolt holes would allow for the installation of a set of factory rear rubber seal and bracket pieces that would mount up and onto the rear lip of all early model nose panel's like so;



However because I am going to be following the later model 1994+ factory nose panel setup on my Stillen SMZ nose panel, I no longer required the need for both of the rear rubber seal and bracket pieces anymore and my plan was to block off all of the empty mounting bolt holes for those 2 pieces by using a set of factory specific blocking clips I found listed in section 650's parts fiche illustration.







My best guess is that this option, to use blocking clips in the parts fiche illustration was probably a way for Nissan to be able to slowly change over to the later model nose panel setup on cars produced after October 1993 and most likely use up any remaining early model factory nose panel stock they might of had in left over before the changes to the nose panel setup were made and then after 1994, all factory later model nose panels produced for the 300ZX were made without any of these mounting bolt holes being drilled out anymore and looks to be a cost cutting measure Nissan was doing alongside many others during the later model production cycle of the 300ZX.



SEC-650 Parts Fiche Illustration for 1998-2000 models.



Unfortunately for me during the final assembly process of my SMZ nose panel, I discovered that the factory blocking clips I had purchased to suit this exact task, turned out too big to fit into any of the unused mounting bolt holes with and so I couldn't finish sealing the holes up at that time. I would of had to drill out and enlarge the empty bolts holes to be able to accommodate the installation of the factory specific blocking clips which I didn't want to do because that would have required me to alter the Stillen SMZ nose panel further then I would have liked considering that the SMZ nose panel I have would of came off either a 1995 or 1996 and technically should not of had any of these empty mounting bolt holes present at all and must have been done by the previous owner of this nose panel.





So because the factory blocking clips I had weren't going to work out for this application, I now had to find an alterative solution that would fit these smaller sized bolt holes and that's when I realised I could just use the same aftermarket plastic mounting clips I used for the front section on the nose panel which allowed me to mount up the front factory rubber seal and bracket setup without any problems during the final assembly of my SMZ nose panel.





Front section of the SMZ nose panel all setup.



After purchasing another set of these champion branded mounting clips from my work, I installed 6 of them into each of the empty bolt holes without any further issues and I was very happy overall with the end result.



With all of the mounting bolts holes on the SMZ nose panel finally all sealed up, I can now move onto figuring out the final problem I have left to solve for the SMZ nose panel which relates to the installation of a replica SMZ badge as well as installing the very rare later model Red and Gold Z badge onto the front of the SMZ nose panel as the final assembly step I have left to complete for this part.

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Their great drying tools that's for sure, I've had one of bigbois little handheld blower juniors for for a few years now and it is great little unit and has made drying my car very quick and easy but it's also great for drying small parts and even my dusting out my gaming pcs when compared to other units out there for a higher price then the bigboi unit.

Now the mini blow R junior I've got now is even better and more effective at drying my car from the limited amount of time and experience I had using the tool so far but it has multiple speed air settings, the choice of cool and or heated air to be blown out from the unit. A long lengthed hose which is easy to handle and the other good qaulity I like about bigboi products in general is that they do sell most replacement parts for all of their products that you can source individually if needed which means I can maintain my big Boi units for as long as I need to even if something minor breaks on it.

Overall I think the mini blower jnr is worth the money if you can budget for it, otherwise the little handheld unit bigboi sell, is also perfectly fine for someone to use with drying a car on a smaller budget.

 

For this months blog update, I went about trying to see if I could fix my car's faulty automatic transmission which involved me doing a basic automatic transmission fluid and filter service much like an oil and filter change on an engine. My hope was that the service work I did on my RE4 automatic transmission, would somehow cure my cars irregular shifting symptoms that it has developed since I got my car back on the road in October.

On top of the transmission service I also investigated a strange whining sound that I could hear coming from outside of the car whenever I was driving the car down the road. During my investigation of the issue, I discovered that all of my front brake pads were worn out and needed to be replaced as soon as possible. So I went about removing the old set of worn out brake pads and then swapping in a set of used front brake pads that I had in storage so that I could not just drive the car with slightly less worn front brakes pads for a short time but to also get the car back on the road before it needed to be ready for a scheduled inspection of my faulty automatic transmission by a specialist workshop in early January next year.

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ADAMZX Instagram: instagram.com/adamzx_z32​

 

AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION FLUID & FILTER SERVICE PROCESS (PART 1)

After 2 months of preparations, I am now finally ready to attempt and try to hopefully fix my current irregular shifting symptoms that I've been experiencing on my RE4 automatic transmission since getting my Z back on the road in September of this year. My plan is to perform a basic transmission fluid and filter service on my RE4 automatic transmission which I developed after watching "ChrisFix's" transmission service YouTube video. I have done this service once before on one of my previous RE4 transmission's that I had been running in my Z prior to my current RE4 transmission and to my surprise the service job I did on that previous RE4 transmission did actually help to improve the shifting performance of that transmission for a short while anyways until that transmission randomly broke down on me a few months later and I then replaced it with the current RE4 transmission that its the car now. As much as I want to believe that this service might cure all of my transmission's shifting problems unfortunately I don't think I'm going to be that lucky this time around but I have to try at and see if it does or doesn't change anything with the functionality of the box and if it does great but if it doesn't I'll need to take the next set of steps to have the transmission assessed and most likely rebuilt.

Before I begin, lets quickly go over the steps I'll be doing during this service process on the transmission, first up I will be draining as much of the old transmission fluid out of the RE4 transmission pan as much as possible followed by the removal of the transmission pan itself. Once the pan has been removed, I will then have access to the transmission's strainer or filter unit which I will then remove and replace with a new aftermarket strainer unit. While the pan is off I'll also check all of the valve body mounting bolts holding the valve body control unit to the transmission casing to make sure that they are all torqued down correctly to their factory torque specs of 8Nm each as according to "ChrisFix's" YouTube video, the valve body mounting bolts can loosen over time and retorquing them while I have access to all of the bolts, can potentially help to improve the shifting quality of the transmission after the service and being that mine is currently not shifting at its best, I'm hoping that this little tip, might help to cure or improve on the shifting functionality of my RE4 transmission.

From there the transmission pan will be thoroughly cleaned and then reinstalled back onto the transmission casing followed by a refilling of the transmission pan with roughly 3 - 4 litres of factory recommended high quality semi synthetic Dexron 3 transmission fluid to complete the basic service process of my RE4 automatic transmission.

Once the transmission has been fully reassembled, I will then start the car and let the engine idle to allow for the engine and transmission to slowly warm up before I then take the car for a test drive to check the overall operation of the RE4 transmission after the service.

After the test drive I'll then check for any fluid leaks from the transmission housing and pan while the car is warming up and I'll also try and connect my laptop and Conzult monitoring program up to the car's OD1 diagnostic port to try and access my car's transmission ECU or ATCU (automatic transmission control unit) to check for error codes and all of the transmission electrical sensor readouts.

Speaking of my ATCU, for the past few weeks I have attempted multiple times to connect my conzult monitoring software up to my transmission's ECU but so far i have been mostly unsuccessful at getting any kind of connection and or readout from the ATCU so far. The engine ECU will connect just fine, but I have always had a slight problem trying to get a connection and or readout with my car's transmission ECU whether that be via the manual self-diagnostic procedure you do inside the car and or by a connection via the OD1 port and using a laptop and a conzult program, with the results of a connection being very inconsistent and rarely do I get a readout from both connection attempts. This connection problem with my car's ATCU has been a ongoing problem for me on this car for many years, and I have tried running with 2 other ATCU's to try and fix the issue but nothing seems to work and what I have found is that sometimes I will get a connection and readout from the ATCU but most of the time I will get no connection at all and this has made diagnosing the issues I have currently with my RE4 transmission very annoying and frustrating to deal with at this point in time. Hopefully the ATCU will play nice for me after the service is completed and let me get some sort of information from the sensor readouts, so that I can then see exactly what the transmission is doing while the car is both stationary and most importantly while it is driving down the road and hopefully the sensor readouts might give me a clue as to what the transmission is doing and not doing and hopefully I can figure out what's wrong with the box.

The last little addition that I want to do during this transmission service process, will be the installation of a replacement reconditioned torque converter clutch solenoid which I purchased from eBay. After I had my current RE4 transmission installed into my Z back in 2017. I discovered during one of my regular engine service intervals while checking the ACTU, that there is a transmission error present on the ACTU which was indicating a "T/C clutch solenoid valve" fault code that I have been wanting to fix on this transmission for many years now. Its possible that this faulty solenoid might also be the root cause of my current shifting problems with my RE4 transmission and so my fingers are crossed that replacing it along with a new strainer unit and fresh transmission fluid all combined might just be all that's needed to cure all of my transmission problems for good.



STEP 1: PREPARING VEHICLE FOR TRANSMISSION SERVICE

The first step in this process will involve lifting the entire body of the car off of the ground as safely and securely as much as possible. This is because the 300ZX's transmission is mounted directly under the center structure of the undercarriage of the body of the car and I will need to lift both the front and rear ends of the car as high as possible to give me as much room to work with under the car as much as I can.

Due to the factory low ride height of my Z, I needed to do a multi stage lift of the front end of the car to get it as high as I possibly can using the lifting devices I have. The first stage involved reversing the front 2 wheels up onto a pair of low profile car ramps to slightly raise the nose of the car to then allow for the second stage of the lifting process which uses my pneumatic triple balloon jack to further lift the front end of the car via the front cross member and this gives me a little over 300mmish of clearance from the ground.



With the front end of the car at its maximum lifted height, I then secured the car into its raised position with the use of a pair of my new light weight aluminum jack stands placed directly under the factory recommended jack stand points along the two front frame rails.



The rear end of the car was then lifted via the differential using my pneumatic balloon jack before positioning and placing a second pair of jack stands directly under the car in the recommended rear jacking points on the rear subframe from the FSM before the car was lowered onto those jack stands to finally secure the car safely off of the ground. A final push test at several points around the car was done to confirm the car was safely secure on top of all 4 jack stands. ​

 

AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION FLUID & FILTER SERVICE PROCESS (PART 2)

STEP 2: DRAINING TRANSMISSION FLUID FROM TRANSMISSION PAN

With the car now safely secured off of the ground, the next step in the process was to drain as much of the old transmission fluid out of the transmission pan as much as possible. The good news is because the current RE4 transmission in my Z is from a 1996 model, it was a simple matter of just removing the RE4's transmission drain plug from the bottom of the transmission pan and then collecting all of the old transmission fluid that flowed out of the pan and into my Toledo fluid drain pan.





While the old transmission fluid was draining out of the pan, I quickly noticed straight away that the transmission fluid coming out of the pan was visibly more brownish and dark in colour then I was expecting to see, considering that the transmission fluid in this box had only done roughly 40,000 km since 2017 and for the past 3 years the car hadn't even be driven at all, so this was very surprising for me to see.

Also while I was waiting for all of the transmission fluid to drain out of the transmission pan, I decided to do a quick visual inspection of the undercarriage of the car around the transmission casing and that's when I noticed some grime buildup along one of the exhaust pipes near the back of the transmission. Upon further inspection of the grime buildup, I found what looked like transmission fluid had been leaking out of the rear mounting port for the speedo sensor at the back of the transmission housing as you can see here.





This was the first time that I had ever noticed this transmission fluid leak and by the looks of it, it has been leaking for a little while now. From what i can tell it appears that the leaking transmission fluid has been coming out of the speedo sensor port and slowly down directly below and onto the rear transmission and center exhaust mounts which are both attached to the rear crossmember. The leaking transmission fluid has then slowly overtime covered the center exhaust mount in oil and grime along with a few small areas on one of the exhaust pipes in that same general area.

A much as I wanted to continue with the transmission service I knew that the discovery of this new transmission fluid leak, needed to be address as soon as possible and my thought process was that if I fix it now, then I will prevent the leak from getting worst over time. So with that in mind I decided to temporarily stop progressing any further with the transmission service and instead focus my attention of investigating, repairing and cleaning up this transmission fluid leak at the back of the box.

STEP 3: CLEANING UP TRANSMISSION FLUID LEAK AND GRIME BUILDUP ON EXHAUST



The first step in fixing this transmission fluid leak would involve getting access to the speedo sensor itself as this is where the leak is coming from. The problem was I couldn't get to the speedo sensor because of the center exhaust hanger bracket being in the way. So that was going to be the first item that needed to be removed so I could then get access to speedo sensor and because the hanger bracket was covered in oil and grime, it needed to be removed anyways so I could thoroughly clean the bracket before it could then be reinstalled back onto the car.

I removed the 2 mounting nuts holding the bracket onto the rear transmission mount as well as remove the pair of small mounting nuts for the 2 rubber exhaust hangers on either side of the bracket, to disconnect the hanger bracket from the two exhaust pipes.



With the exhaust hanger now out of the way, I could get a better look at the fluid leak coming out of the speedo sensor port which wasn't terrible but like the exhaust hanger I wanted to try and remove the sensor itself and clean the sensor and the surrounding area up of all of the grime buildup as much as possible.



I removed the single mounting fastener holding the speedo sensor to the rear transmission casing and then slide the speedo sensor out from its mounting port. From there I then tried to trace the electrical connector for the speedo sensor to disconnect it but even after tracing the wiring loom of the sensor that seemed to travel up into the void of the transmission tunnel, I just couldn't find it and after several minutes of feeling for the connector with my hand with no success, I ended up deciding to just leave the speedo sensor connected and instead hang it from the wiring loom out of the way, while I checked the condition of the speedo sensor and mounting port further for clues as to figure out why transmission fluid was leaking out in this area.



After visibly checking over the speedo sensor and mounting port for the sensor thoroughly, I didn't end up finding anything wrong to indicate why transmission fluid had been leaking out of the speedo sensor mounting port. I read online that the rubber O-ring seal on the speedo sensor can get pinched during installation and cause a leak like what I was seeing but from what I could tell there was no visible signs of pinching or dislodging of the rubber O-ring seal on the speedo sensor at all and after cleaning up both of the speedo sensor and mounting port for the sensor on the rear transmission casing as best I could, I then just decided to reinstall the speedo sensor back into its mounting port and hope that I had fixed whatever was causing the fluid leak to occur.

Once everything is back together and after I had gone for a final test drive of the car, I'll then recheck the area where the speedo sensor is located and look for any signs of fluid leakage from the speedo sensor mounting port. If there is indications of fluid leakage from the speedo sensor after the test drive, I'll then look into purchasing a replacement rubber O-ring seal for the speedo sensor and install it on the car when I get a chance to do so.

The exhaust hanger & bracket was also disassembled and placed into a small container submerged in a degreasing solution which I then put through a 30 minute cycle in my ultrasonic cleaning machine to effectively remove all of the grime off of those parts.



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AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION FLUID & FILTER SERVICE PROCESS (PART 3)

STEP 4: TRANSMISSION PAN & STRAINER REMOVAL

With the speedo sensor fluid leak now fixed and all cleaned up, I can now get back onto progressing with the transmission service and the next step in the process is to remove the transmission pan off of the body of the transmission housing. This required the removal of 18 x 10mm fasteners holding the transmission pan onto the body of the transmission.



Once the transmission pan had be successfully removed off of the body of the transmission casing, I then had access to both the bottom of the transmissions valve body control valve as well access the transmissions strainer unit.



The old strainer unit was then removed off of the valve body and left to drain out in one of my drain containers.





After 20 minutes or so both the transmission pan and strainer unit were now fully drained of all of the old transmission fluid, I thoroughly inspecting both parts to look for signs of metal fragments remaining inside the transmission pan and or strainer unit along with inspecting the transmission pans magnetic pickup located on the inside of the transmission pan. If I was to find big chucks of metal fragments inside either of these parts it would indicate a catastrophic failure of a metal component inside the transmission assembly.



During the inspection I found a lot of what I can only describe as little pieces of black none metallic debris particles on both the bottom of the transmission pan and strainer unit. I have no idea where these black particles have came from but I figured this was not normal to see especially on a transmission that has only done just under 40,000 km in nearly 7 years. The good news was that the magnetic pickup that sits on the inside of the transmission pan looked relatively normal to me with the usual buildup of very small metal particles on the magnet indicating normal wear and tear of the moving parts inside the transmission assembly.





With the inspections for both the transmission pan and strainer unit now done, I continued with progressing on the transmission service which at this point required me to check and re-torque all of the valve body fasteners which I hope will help to improve the shifting quality of my RE4 transmission after the service has been completed.

The factory service manual states that all of the 10mm valve body fasteners need to be torqued to 8 Nm each along with torquing them all in a star pattern process starting from the inner section of the valve body and working my way out. This torquing process will help to evenly compress the gasket that sits between the upper and lower part of the valve body control valve.



STEP 5: TORQUE CONVERTER CLUTCH SOLENOID REMOVAL AND INSTALLATION OF RECONDITIONED REPLACEMENT

Finally its time to replace the suspected faulty torque converter solenoid which is located on the bottom side of the valve body control valve next to the strainer unit. There is a single 8mm fastener holding the solenoid to the valve body which I removed and then disconnected the solenoids electrical wiring connector to allow me to then remove the original OEM solenoid out from the transmission.



A visual comparison of both the original TCC solenoid and the aftermarket reconditioned replacement solenoid was done just to compare the differences between the 2 units as well and though the new solenoid looks a little bit different when compared to the original solenoid, it looks almost identical so it should mount up onto the valve body with no issues.

OEM (Left) Vs Aftermarket (Right)





An ohms reading check was then done on both solenoids to check they are providing the factory recommend ohms reading to indicate whether or not the solenoid is good or bad using a multi-meter. The basic test I did showed that the replacement TCC solenoid gave the correct ohms reading of between 15 - 17 ohms but the original TCC solenoid gave me a reading of 0 Ohms and or an OL or "Open" reading. This from what I know indicates to me, that the OEM solenoid is faulty and explains why I am getting a error code on the ATCU for that solenoid.

With all of the testing on the TCC solenoids done, I then installed the replacement TCC solenoid onto the valve body and connected up the solenoids electrical connector back into place.



STEP 6: AFTERMARKET REPLACEMENT STRAINER UNIT INSTALLATION

Next on the to do list was to install the new replacement aftermarket strainer unit onto the valve body control valve. The new strainer was included in the aftermarket transmission filter kit I purchased for this service. The aftermarket strainer is an identical replacement unit from the factory strainer and should install into place just fine. Even though the new strainer unit comes complete with the new rubber o ring, it is common practice from what I heard to replace the o ring from the original strainer unit and onto the new strainer unit to apparently prevent sealing issues so I did just that and swapped over the rubber o rings from the factory strainer to the new one.





The new strainer was then inserted into its mounting location and secured into placed via the 4 x 8mm mounting fasteners holding it to the valve body.



STEP 7: TRANSMISSION SUMP PAN CLEANING

With the strainer now installed it was now time to clean up the transmission sump pan before it will be installed back onto the transmission casing. Using some simple green and elbow grease, I scrubbed and cleaned out the entire surface of the transmission inside and out before I then wiped the pan down dry to complete the cleaning process of the pan.





Along with the cleaning of the sump pan, I also needed to clean up and remove all of the metal filings that had bonded to the sump pan's magnetic pickup found on the bottom of the inside of the transmission pan. The magnet was wiped down and cleaned as much as possible before it was then reinserted back onto the bottom of the transmission in a slightly raised position to help provide more surface area on the top, side and bottom of the magnetic and so collect more metal filings as the transmissions internal metal components experience wear and tear from regular everyday driving.





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AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION FLUID & FILTER SERVICE PROCESS (PART 4)

STEP 7: TRANSMISSION SUMP PAN CLEANING

With the strainer now installed it was now time to clean up the transmission sump pan before it will be installed back onto the transmission casing. Using some simple green and elbow grease, I scrubbed and cleaned out the entire surface of the transmission inside and out before I then wiped the pan down dry to complete the cleaning process of the pan.





Along with the cleaning of the sump pan, I also needed to clean up and remove all of the metal filings that had bonded to the sump pan's magnetic pickup found on the bottom of the inside of the transmission pan. The magnet was wiped down and cleaned as much as possible before it was then reinserted back onto the bottom of the transmission in a slightly raised position to help provide more surface area on the top, side and bottom of the magnetic and so collect more metal filings as the transmissions internal metal components experience wear and tear from regular everyday driving.





STEP 8: REINSTALLING THE TRANSMISSION SUMP PAN BACK ONTO THE TRANSMISSION CASING

The last major step left to do now is to reinstall the transmission pan back onto the transmission casing, but before I can do that I first needed to prepare the transmission pans gasket mating surfaces on both the transmission sump pan and the transmission casing itself to prevent leaks from occurring.

Using a maroon scuffing pad and some brake fluid, I lightly went scuffed along the entire gasket mating surface area on the transmission pan which will help clean off any remaining stuck on gasket material and or dirt that I may have missed during cleaning process of the transmission sump pan from earlier.



Another one ChrisFix's helpful tips from his transmission YouTube video, I applied a thin bead of dielectric grease along the entire gasket mating surface on the transmission pan. This was done to help stick to and hold the OEM paper transmission pan gasket I am using in place on the transmission pan and prevent it from moving as I attempt to reinstall the pan back onto the transmission casing and it really does work and makes putting the transmission pan back onto the car with the gasket in place so much easier to do.



The mating surface of the transmission casing was also scuffed up to make sure the matting surface was as clean as possible.





Then all that was left to do was to reinstall the transmission pan back onto the transmission casing. I slowly reinstalled all 18 of the 8mm fasteners that hold the transmission sump pan to the transmission casing and once everything was in place all of the mounting fasteners for the pan were torqued to their factory torque setting of between 7 and 9Nm.



STEP 9: REFILLING THE TRANSMISSION WITH NEW AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION FLUID

With the transmission now reassembled and seal up, its finally time to refill the sump pan back up with some new automatic transmission fluid. The FSM recommends a Dexron 3 type of automatic transmission fluid for this specific transmission with a total capacity of around 8 litres of fluid, which is only for a complete refill after taking the torque converter out of the transmission which I obliviously haven't done, so I suspect I will need to add around about 3 - 4 litres of transmission fluid into the transmission sump pan to reach the recommend full fluid line markers on the transmission dipstick.

I inserted a suitable sized funnel that I found that is able to hold itself upright while fitting tightly inside the transmission dipstick tube, from there I gradually pumped in using a small hand fluid pump device to add in brand new Penrite branded semi synthetic transmission fluid into the transmission one litre at a time.



Between each litre of fluid that I pumped into the transmission, I would then reinsert and check the fluid level on the transmission dipstick to allow me know when and if I had reached the correct fluid level line marker on the dipstick I was aiming for as I was slowly refilled the transmission up with new fluid.

After the 4th litre of fluid had been added to the transmission, I had finally reached the full line indicator on the cold level marker of the dipstick. Now I needed to begin the final stage of the refilling process by turning the car on and letting the engine and transmission idle to allow for the transmission and all of the fluid inside of it to slowly heat up and reach normal operating temperatures. Once it had reach those temps, I could then recheck the transmission dipstick again but this time to confirm what the fluid level was on the hot level marker on the dipstick and depending where the fluid level in the transmission sits, I might need to either add or remove fluid from the transmission as I am tried to make sure that the fluid level inside the transmission is where it needs to be.

In the end I needed to add an additional litre of fluid to the sump pan to bring my grand total to 5 litres of transmission fluid to get the fluid level inside the transmission to sit on the full line indicator at the hot level marker of the dipstick.



Here are a couple of comparison photos I took comparing a fresh brand new transmission fluid next to some of the transmission fluid that came out of the transmission sump pan and as you can see, the old transmission fluid that came out of the sump, is very dark in colour and its crazy to think that this is only after 40,000 km of driving.





Looking at these photos makes me think that maybe, I should replacing my transmission fluid much more frequently so that I can possibly prevent the transmission fluid from getting so contaminated so quickly. So from now on during every 10,000km engine oil service on my VG30DE engine, I'll also be draining out and replacing the automatic transmission fluid out from my RE4 transmission sump pan during. Then at 40,000km Ill not just replace the transmission fluid, I'll also then replace the strainer unit as well. It might be a bit of overkill thinking here but after 3 blown transmissions in my Z's life, I am desperate to find a way to try and extend the life expectancy and functionality of my next RE4 transmission as much as I can in the future.​

 

AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION FLUID & FILTER SERVICE PROCESS (PART 5)

STEP 10: POST TRANSMISSION SERVICE TEST DRIVE RESULTS

With the refilling process now completed, the car is finally ready for its post transmission service test drive. The car was carefully lowered to the ground in a reserve process of the lifting procedure I did earlier in this post.

I then started the car for the last time and let the engine idle and warm up while I finished cleaning up and putting away all of my equipment from the transmission service. This gave the engine and transmission all of the time that they needed to get up to and reach normal operating temperatures before I then headed off on the test drive.



As part of the test drive process, I quickly connected up my laptop up to and then ran my full version of conzult through the OD1 diagnostic port and to my surprise I finally had a connection to my transmission's ECU and with that I could now see all of the sensor data readouts that I needed to hopefully tell me what the transmission was doing during the test drive in real time as well as screen record the sensor readouts from conzult to use as evidence for further diagnosing the transmission after the test drive had been completed.

And so off I went on a quick around the block test drive with a planned route that would take me around 10 minutes to complete. I wanted to try and get the car travelling at various speed levels to allow the transmission to provide plenty of headway for it to cycle through all 4 gears which meant I needed to drive along several low speed suburban roads before I then made my way to a main road with a higher speed limit let me safely get the car cruising up to 80 kmph and then I would head back home once I had gather all of the data I needed to see if the service had work and cured my transmission's previous shifting issues.

Unfortunately it didn't take long for me to notice that the transmission's shifting behaviour as I began the test drive did not seem to have changed at all and I could still feel the inability of the transmission to naturally shift up from 1st gear and into 2nd gear with it hanging and revving up until I picked up enough speed to finally get the transmission to shift up into the next gear. Once I made it onto the main road, I then tried to accelerate the car hard to force the transmission to change up through and into the higher gears but what I experience was anything but that with the car jolting back and forth as if it didn't know what gear to go into and so I had back off and slow down back to a try not to break anything. Then made the decision to just head back home as it was clear that the service did nothing to help change and or cure my transmission shifting problems which if you all remember me saying that as much as I was hoping it would I wasn't keeping my hopes up either.

When I got home and parked the Z in the garage, I stopped the screen recording and quickly looked over the sensor readouts to try see what was going on during the test drive. Here are a few screenshots I've highlighted from the recordings I took of the car at certain speeds to show you all what I can see from the transmissions sensor readouts during the test drive starting with 30 kmph, with the engine at 3,000 rpm in 2nd gear at a 15% throttle position.



Then at 60 kmph in 3rd gear now at 2,500 rpms at a 25% throttle position



And lastly at 80 kmph in 4th gear at 2,600 rpms at a 9% throttle position



As you can see these numbers are not looking normal at all and the car definitely felt weird to drive just like it was before with the main thing I noticed was the sudden and instant of RPMs whenever I took my foot off of the accelerator pedal as the car would slowly coast down in speed instead of the expected slowly decreasing of rpms with the engine as the car slowed down.

I also rechecked the ATCU's error code section to find that the TCC clutch solenoid error had finally gone from the listing but instead in its place was a whole bunch of new error codes showing up.



As possible as it might be, I still found it very hard to believe that what I had done with the transmission fluid service on my car, could have caused all of these sensor's to now register fault codes on the ATCU and not to mention I don't even know what half of the codes even mean and funny enough this isn't the first time I have seen all of these error codes show up on my ATCU before but that was with my previous RE4 transmission which displayed all of the exact same error codes just before and after that transmission failed on me and then needed to be replaced from what I can remember.

So after all of the work I had, unfortunately for me the transmission was still not fixed and the next day I rang and spoke with a local transmission specialist shop which was the same shop that actually installed this exact transmission into my Z back in 2017. After a quick chat with the technician on the phone about the symptoms my transmission was experiencing, he stated to me that "The RE401RA transmission's are know to have weak clutch packs and that when they fail, you normally lose 2nd and 4th gears".

This statement pretty much described exactly what I was experiencing with the symptoms on my RE4 transmission and this confirmed that the little black pieces of debris that I found in the bottom of the transmission pan and strainer unit was more then likely fragments of clutch material from one or more of these internal clutch friction plates found inside the transmission. It also explains why even though the sensor readouts on conzult were telling me that during the test drive I had been going through all 4 gears. In reality I am only going from 1st and into 3rd gear and that's why the transmission is making the engine rev so unnaturally to me, especially while I'm cruising at about 100 kmph and sitting at 3,500 rpms.

This was not what I was hoping to hear but it is clear that my RE4 transmission now needs a full rebuild to bring it back to fully functional again. When I asked the technician at the transmission specialist shop, how much would a rebuild on this RE4 transmission roughly costs me, he couldn't even tell me a rough figure as he mumbled "its a been a long time since I worked on one of those transmissions". not leaving me with much confidence it was going to be a cheap and or quick process to have the transmission rebuilt.

He then asked me if I wanted to bring the car over to the workshop their and allow him to inspect and check over my RE4 transmission. He would then be able to provide me with a proper diagnosis of what is wrong with my RE4 transmission and then provide me with a quote on how much it will cost to have them fix the transmission for me. Having done everything I could to try and fix the transmission myself, I saw no other option then to agreed to and bring the car the specialist's workshop and have them tell me what it will take to get my transmission fixed and get my Z back on the road again. Due to Christmas being just a few weeks away, the shop was due to close for a few weeks during and after Christmas and new years, so a date was set for mid January for me to bring the car over to specialist workshop once it had reopened in the new year.

The only good news that I was able to get from the specialists was that even though the transmission was not fully functional, he did say that I could still drive the car as needed but he advised me not to drive the car too aggressively as it could put stress on the transmission and possibly cause it to fail. Luckily for me my JDM model has the additional transmission drive mode Hold & Power switch located on the center console which allows me to put the car into what I'm going to call an ECO shift mode (HOLD) allowing the transmission to shift more quickly through the gears at lower rpms. The downside to using this "HOLD" mode is that this reduces the cars acceleration abilities making the car very sluggish to accelerate off the line but for now this is the best option I have to use to be able to drive the car and have it shift somewhat normalish in the meantime, until I can then take it to the specialists in a months times.​

 

FRONT BRAKE COMPONENTS INSPECTION & REPAIR TURNS INTO A COMPLETE CATASTROPHE FOR ME

With the service work I did on my RE4 automatic transmission now completed, I have organised and scheduled a date for early next month to take my car to a local automatic transmission specialists, to have my transmission inspected and diagnosed to hopefully figure out exactly what is actually wrong with my car's transmission and then either have the transmission either repaired, replaced and or rebuilt to finally get my Z back on the road and back to being my daily driver for the foreseeable future once again.

During the time that I will be waiting for the inspection date on the transmission diagnosis to arrive, I have one more final mechanical problem that I have observed which is causing a whining sound to occur from outside the car whenever I am driving the car down the road. It almost sounds like a small mechanical motor spinning up and down as the car increases and or decreases in speed but goes away completely when I come to a full stop and the car is stationary.

Because the sound isn't present when the car is not moving, I am confident that the problem or sound I'm hearing is not being caused by anything engine related. But because the sound is only occurring when the car is moving, my assumptions are that I either have a bad wheel bearing and or maybe I have an issue with one or more of my car's front braking components.

So on the following weekend after the transmission service was done, my Z was again driven back into my garage where I would then jack up the front end of the car using the same lifting method I had used in getting the car safely off of the ground during the transmission service, reserving the front of the car up onto a pair of low profile car ramps and then lifting the front end of the car up using my pneumatic balloon jack and placing a pair of jack stands under the front frame rails before removing both of the two front alloy OEM wheels off of the front wheel hubs to give me access to and inspect the front hub assemblies and the 2 front brake calipers.



At first glance, I couldn't really see anything wrong or out of place on either of the 2 front hub assemblies as well as nothing seemed wrong with both of the 2 front brake calipers. So I decided to then check and measure the thickness of all 4 of the front brake pads as I had assumed from the start that one of more of the front brake pads might be reason I am hearing this strange whining sound coming from outside the car when Its moving. What I found from all of my measurements I got off of each brake pad, was that all 4 of them were now measuring at a minimum thickness of less then 3-2mm and they all definitely needed to be replaced.

Unfortunately this put me in a bit of a predicament you see because yes I could easily just replace all 4 of the old front brake pads with a brand new set of pads with no problems. However I have been trying for years now to start and finish off a massive restoration process plan I have for my pair of later model TT iron front brake calipers along with restoring a spare set of rear aluminum brake calipers, then on top of the restored brake calipers plans, I was also wanting to install and replace my old front brake rotors with a brand new set of Vmax slotted front brake rotors and while I'm at it I would then replace all of the front and rear brake pads to overhaul my entire braking system as much as possible at some point. If I could somehow hold off on replacing all of the front brake pads just for now, then in my mind I wouldn't have to install half used brake pads onto the car after I had finish this massive planned restoration process I want to do for my car's entire braking system which I wanted it to consist of all brand new components when the process was finished.

As you imagine a restoration project of that scale would take a considerable amount of time to do especially when I would also need to learn how to do everything during the process. From stripping every single component down, to then painting what needed to be painted, to then reassembling everything back together again and finally reinstalling all of the parts back onto the car. I can tell you now that their is just not enough time between now and when the car needs to be taken to the transmission specialist for me to complete that kind of restoration process on my car's braking system.

All that I needed to do right now, was to make a quick fix in a sense to get rid of the annoying whining sound issue that I have been observing from the outside of the car while driving the car and then after the transmission inspection and repair was all done and dusted, then I could dedicate all of the time that I needed to finally start and complete a lengthy brake system rebuild process for my Z.

Now because I have done a few brake service jobs over the years on not just my own car but a friends car as well. I have collected a few sets of used front and rear brake pads which I have yet to dispose of. I'm hoping that if I can find a half decent set of brake pads from this used stash that I've collected, then I might be able to get a few more weeks or months of use out of those replacement brake pads compared to the existing pads I have in the car right now. So I checked and measured all of the spare used brake pads I have and to my surprise I found a set of old brake pads, that were measuring within the minimum 4-3mm range and so I decided that for now these pads will do just fine as replacements to the existing brake pads in the car.



REMOVING & REPLACING ALL FOUR OF MY FRONT BRAKE PADS

I began the removal process of the first 2 front brake pads by attaching a fluid catch bottle onto the bleeder screw found on the brake caliper. When I was ready, I then cracked the bleeder screw free to allow for brake fluid to flow out of the bleeder which made pushing and retracking the brake calipers 4 main pistons back inside the body of the caliper a lot easier to do and once the pistons had retracted far enough back into the caliper, I then removed the first set of 2 brake pads.

This process was repeated on the other side of the car for the second brake caliper with everything going pretty smoothly during the process.

The next step was to clean up and assembly all four of the replacement front brake pads, with all of the factory brake pad shims being attached to the back of each brake pad in the correct order with a layer of copper anti seize being used between each shim.

Then it was a simple matter of reinstalling all of the replacement brake pads back into the 2 front brake calipers like so;



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