<VV> Old EFI system on a Corvair

[Bryan Blackwell]

The originator of this swap was Milton Binion - pretty sure it was a 280Z, not a 260.  He wrote a quite involved piece for the Communique, which I believe was put into the Tech Guide.  Milton wrote several other tips that were put in the Tech Guide as well.

One of our club members here did the conversion to one of his cars, and got parts and advice from Milton.  Jeff did very good work and the install looked and started very nicely, but the engine really didn't run right at speed.  He and I discussed it at length, IMHO the Z system was poorly suited for a Corvair since the engine characteristics were wildly different - compare the torque curves even casually and you'll see what I mean.  The Datsun engine is tuned to a much higher power peak and the curve is quite a bit peakier, the cam profile and the bore/stroke is different.

The Fiero conversion that Craig Nicol did, OTOH, is a much better match, the GM 2.8 V-s has a very similar power curve to a Corvair, the cam profile is very close to the same, and so is the bore/stroke ratio.  Craig's results sound really good.

--Bryan

On Oct 13, 2010, at 9:09 PM, shortle wrote:

> There used to be a guy with a LM in So Cal. that used to go to Palm Springs for the Toss every year whose name I do not recall. This was about 25 years ago. He used a complete EFI system off of an early Datsun 260Z . This was what Bosch simply called L Jetronic using an air flow sensor (with a door that would open based on the amount of air going into the engine). He had to modify the heads to mount the 6 injectors as well as the FI temperature sensor. There was no on board diagnostics. He told me he picked this system because the parts from a junkyard were plentiful (back then) and the Z had the same size engine as the Corvair. He also said there was better all around driveability and performance. It was interesting at the time. Anyone know who this was or what became of this car?