300zx drift car

J

justinhagberg1

New Member
i have a stock na automatic nissan 300zx that i would love to turn into a drift car i would do an engine swap and tranny swap coils and put money into it but i have heard that the 300zx's are not good drift cars bc of the way the body is but i felt like i should ask other people before i throw the idea out the door right away if i could get any help that would be awesome
 
Anything rwd will skid, from a starlet to a skyline, while it may not be the easiest platform to learn on, i'd see if the car is right for you before you pile loads of money into it. Things you might want to think about:
Will this also be your daily, or do you have another car for that?
does your auto box have gearlock? (could be on your gear selector i.e: PNRD123) if so finding a nice open space, even dirt if that's all that's available and whack it into 2 try and skid it, it will be difficult at first but if you can manage to transfer the weight to make it go into a skid then thats a start, also have you thought about how you would put this power down if you did do a motor swap, stock rear end may not be beefy enough if your wanting to wack a torque monster into it,
but you got the right idea, have a look around maybe on some other forums even, anything to help you find a solution, i dont know where your based but if getting a s-chassis is fairly cheap, that may be a better place to start off drifting but its all your choice
 
I do have a daily it is an Acura Integra right now and I have been looking around for some s chassis but they are rare in my area do to snow and slippery winters so most cars are frw but I have found some a few hours away that I have looked into and they haven't seemed to be very nice also do the the roads but it is rust from the salt on them so I thought if I could get the hang of my z maybe I could use that as an actual drift car and still try to get and s chassis as kind of a drift missile.
 
I do have a daily it is an Acura Integra right now and I have been looking around for some s chassis but they are rare in my area do to snow and slippery winters so most cars are frw but I have found some a few hours away that I have looked into and they haven't seemed to be very nice also do the the roads but it is rust from the salt on them so I thought if I could get the hang of my z maybe I could use that as an actual drift car and still try to get and s chassis as kind of a drift missile
 
If you're worried about an S-chassis rusting I would be more concerned about the zx, they rot like a peach.

I did a 6 hour round trip for my first S14, I would seriously consider an Sbody or even a bmw 328i for your first drift car, they do half the work for you. A friend of mine drifts his 300zx but it's the twin turbo v6, does rather well now it's had the handling set up.
 
It has been clearly demonstrated now that the zed can drift, it's just a heavy fucker.

There's fuck all rust on my JDM SWB zed and that's 21 years old and has been parked up on top of a Welsh mountain getting battered by the weather for the last 3 years. My old UK spec's body was solid but did seem to attract surface rust underneath.

I believe the NA zed driveshafts are not as robust as the TT driveshafts (they are thinner) so if you were looking to upgrade the engine/transmission I'd suggest that should be a consideration. The TT diff/driveshafts are more than capable of taking abuse (for obvious reasons just make sure to put the driveshafts back on the same side if you ever have to remove them)

Zed owners seem to be trying to bump the prices up now, so £2k TT's are now being advertised for £5.5k (fuck knows why?) but I believe spares such as TT diffs and driveshafts may also follow suit.


Edit: Just to add, the stock lock is wank so should also be placed firmly on the 'to do' list.

Other than that parts are readily available with DW catering for most. Ebay is your friend and steer clear of the 'zed experts' with hiked up parts prices
 
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They're abit of a pig to work on so keep that in mind, just because it can skid doens't mean it's going to provide plenty of cheap thrills.

Being old, Japanese and complex for it's time you're going to be spending a fair time fixing all the shit that go's wrong with it.
 
akinadan79 said:
It has been clearly demonstrated now that the zed can drift, it's just a heavy fucker.

There's fuck all rust on my JDM SWB zed and that's 21 years old and has been parked up on top of a Welsh mountain getting battered by the weather for the last 3 years. My old UK spec's body was solid but did seem to attract surface rust underneath.

I believe the NA zed driveshafts are not as robust as the TT driveshafts (they are thinner) so if you were looking to upgrade the engine/transmission I'd suggest that should be a consideration. The TT diff/driveshafts are more than capable of taking abuse (for obvious reasons just make sure to put the driveshafts back on the same side if you ever have to remove them)

Zed owners seem to be trying to bump the prices up now, so £2k TT's are now being advertised for £5.5k (fuck knows why?) but I believe spares such as TT diffs and driveshafts may also follow suit.


Edit: Just to add, the stock lock is wank so should also be placed firmly on the 'to do' list.

Other than that parts are readily available with DW catering for most. Ebay is your friend and steer clear of the 'zed experts' with hiked up parts prices
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rusting on the car isnt a problem i bought it completely clean it is truly one of the cleanest cares underneath and on the body there is no rust i am also in the process of building a garage so that isnt a problem the only rust i was worried about was buying a super rusty car and yes my original thought was a 2jz for obvious reasons but the 5 speed trannys ( 6 speed even ore so) are rare and so they are very expensive so i have thought about the stock TT engine but i have also thought about an RB25 but my friend told me maybe a VQ what would you guys say if i did do it. also i thought and i have seen a lot about the z's being heavy and bulky to get sideways so i would have to do as much weight reduction and practice on it and work on it and i thing then i could do it but what is ur guys take on it.
 
r3k1355 said:
They're abit of a pig to work on so keep that in mind, just because it can skid doens't mean it's going to provide plenty of cheap thrills.

Being old, Japanese and complex for it's time you're going to be spending a fair time fixing all the shit that go's wrong with it.
Click to expand...


This ^^^^ is so very true.

From the dash forward it's a bastard to work on, especially the TT with its additional intercooler piping, brittle electric connectors and over a million different vacuum hoses. There are plenty of jobs where it's far easier to just pull the engine than it is to fuck about trying to do it in place (knock sensor replacement, turbos and manifold repairs etc)

It's as if the engineers at Nissan's various design departments didn't talk to each other until the very end.

If the current NA lump is in good order just use that for now, it'll be far easier to work on. The NA puts out around 220bhp I believe. Rip out the heavy stock seats but leave the rest.
Carry out a manual conversion and possibly a TT diff and driveshaft upgrade then go and enjoy.

I'd suggest just using it first and foremost before even contemplating JZ swaps and such like as you may decide that it skids like a pile of wank!
 
Ok so this past weekend I pulled the auto tranny out and have ordered the normal standard other than this that would make this car easier to drift in other that weight reduction and thank you all for your help
 
Hi I was tipped off about this post as I've been in zeds for years. The zed will drift just fine and I would spec up the running gear and have fun with it as a NA you will have a lot better reliability than a TT. Then once the chassis is right look to swap engine out if you wish. Suspension parts there is a fair bit out albeit overseas rather than in the UK and feel free to PM me if you want some advice on suspension components as its a hot subject on brands and there is a lot of crap that will shear or just not last the lifespan it should with regards to bushes.

Marty
 
If you're setting it up to learn in then research what coilovers fit, I'm sure Nissan will have just mix-and-matched

TBH if you're still in love with it once you've gotten sick of the NA engine i'd be looking at going 1J seeing as though you're in the US.

Puts the exhaust on the opposite side of the steering column and BMC, block is a bit shorter than an RB and is easier to work on than a TT VG motor. Just a matter of getting the right sump to fit the Z32 crossmember and deciding if you want to go W series or R series gearbox
 
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