Hey all, today is the day I picked up what I am calling "Ctrl-Z" because it is a solid little car but has been mistreated by previous owner modifications that need to be undone. She was $2132 with all the fees, not including renting the trailer. With the title in hand I am now officially a Z owner.

It is an 07 with 117 on it with no rips on the seats, all the interior plastic needs to be painted, stereo system was a hack job and it smells like cigarette smoke something fierce. I left the windows down for the hour and half drive home from Copart, it kind of helped but she needs a deep cleaning. My plan is to start working on it once I get rid of another project (2008 Jeep that needs a little bit done).

What it needs; Front and rear bumper cover, front bumper, headlights, washer tank, trunk struts, side mirrors, a few small areas of rust removal, fenders, and paint job. I think it also needs an 02 sensor, at least that is what the previous owner had said.


Leaving copart

Pulled the fender, car is perfectly straight.

Busted knuckle/spindle

Replaced and just about ready to roll off the trailer

Yikes, battery is just loose!

Parked in her resting place for a little while.

 

You left something off the list: needs to lose the green wheels and brakes.

Have fun.

 

Good point, my son likes them but man are they ugly!

 

Not bad if you are color blind

 

Yeah the calipers don't even match the ugly wheels or the headlight. Not sure what the original owner was thinking.

Forgot it has no side skirts either...

 

Just noticed the "Stay Humble" on the border tint. Humble? With green wheels, calipers, yellow tinted lights..... not so self effacing, hardly what I'd call "humble". Ha!

Overall, a good project find methinks. Doesn't look like it'll take too much to get it back to a "normal" looking car. And that Daytona Blue paint overall looks pretty good, mileage is respectable and it is an HR car.

"Ctrl-Z" - that is such an awesome name given the " take back what was done to it" it needs. Hahahahaha!

 

Readers of Stephen King's "The Stand" might recognize the OP's user name. Hope there are no evil plans for that poor, abused Z33!

 

It's great and what a buy. Fleabay the rims as one of a kind. Don't change anything else.

 

Glad to see this Z has been rescued. It is SEVERLY in need of some TLC!

 

Yes, before I parked her in the garage I HAD to make sure that banner was partially removed and no longer said that. Ctrl-z seemed so appropriate when I was thinking about that I needed to do to this. I found the original owners facebook and as I scrolled down the car looked more stock and so much better, kinda funny.

Not even Demon eyes, haha.

Think I might cheap out and just try to return the rims to the stock color for now by stripping the 30 layers of paint on them. We shall see how that goes.

Yes, a prime candidate for "de-molestation". I need to take a picture of the backside of the rear bumper, wow is it bad!

 

After watching a bunch of drifting 350z videos on utube I think it will soon become very rare. They are wrecking them on a regular basis.
Good luck restoring this one back to normal. Great project.

 

Whew!! That looks like a hell of alotta work brother....good luck with the restoration!

 

Welcome and congratz, I like what I think it'll become. Before you spend $$$$$ on paint, buy or borrow a buffer and Meguier's 105, 205 or consider wet-sanding. From the little I see I think it can be saved, you'd be surprised! hmu if you needed coaching on paint resto.

 

So I thought the paint was pretty decent as well at first then with some digging found a decent amount that was bad. If I have to paint a front and rear bumper, both fenders I was thinking about a budget color change (maybe). I don't hate the blue but I'm not in love with it either.



Been slow going but managed to do a couple things like pull the drivers seat, shampoo the drivers side and clean the seat and Lysol the side of the console. I bent the headlight frame back with a hammer and ratchet strap (not at the same time) and was able to mount my replacement washer tank.
Ordered the fenders, headlights, front bumper cover, mirrors, a bunch of small hardware (i.e. battery tie down hooks, and push pins), and some new trunk struts.

 

These aren't perfect but I figured for $500 I wasn't going to get better than 19" G35 forged Rays with tires, goodbye yellow-green ugliness!

The tire size seemed a bit odd to me though, the fronts are 245/35 and the rears are 245/40, is that a common thing?

 

I think if I had spent hours I might have been able to get the frame under the headlight straight but ended up ordering a new one because the headlight just wouldn't sit correctly. Swapped that in today and mounted everything back up. Installed my upper hinge on the drivers door and it no longer hits low, closes very nicely now.

 

Looks fun. Does It start up? I think you got a great deal on the wheels and tries.

 

glad to see you are making good progress.

 

Yes, she runs good and rolls fine, I found it she has a new clutch and slave cylinder but found out from the guy whop tuned this car that it likely needs gallery gaskets.

Yes, should be slow and steady. Now that I have many parts I just need to find the time to work on it. Ordered a bunch of wire to fix the sound system in this car, it sounded pretty bad when I first tested it.

 

Good Luck bringing it back to life can't wait to see more results!