Painful Zs....

So, the Z broke two weeks ago today. I drove it to work that day. Coming off the highway on the way home, there was a violent bang and then some awful clanging and banging. I managed to limp it two blocks to the house, craw under it, and I see:



Yup, U-joint failure. Bad stuff. Not happy. Of course, I knew something like this was going to happen. The early Z cars had problems with this very thing. I actually already had the parts to prevent this in the bed of my truck.

So, I rebuilt the axles, and moved the diff back 30mm. This gives the halfshafts a straight shot from the diff to the hubs and eliminates this type of failure.

Purty pics:


Sanblasted parts


Powdercoating stuff



newly assembled axle.

The car is back on the road. It actually rides much nicer. Apparently straightening out the U-joint angles in the back also eliminates some vibration. I also had to get my driveshaft lengthened, and it was rebalanced as a part of that.