When growing up in a household full of car culture, it felt like that buying a car of my own was like a wright of passage. So I started my great journey onto craigslist to find something of my own to start wrenching on. Being a ford guy my top picks were pretty limited. I either wanted to follow in the footsteps of my father and go with a classic Mustang, or maybe honor my grandfather and build a Falcon in his memory. Maybe even start my own thing and find a classic Maverick to tinker on. But while scrolling through craigslist one late night I came across my dream car, it wasn’t the Mustang, or the Falcon, or even the Maverick. What I came across that night was a 1977 Datsun 280z.
So the first step I had to take was contacting the person selling it. It took a couple tries and some time spent waiting but I finally got a text back. The guy lived in new Gloucester, a bit of a ride but but needed. There were some good pictures but nothing could show what kind of shape the car was in. The guy was asking $650 for the car so I wasn’t expecting very much of it but what was presented to me on that Sunday mourning was not a full car but 3/4 of a car. But no one saw the potential that I did. What I saw was the fastest most nimble street car build of the late years. So I shot him an offer of $300 and he knew that was all it was worth because all he said to barter that offer was he wanted to get the money back he spent for gas to get it back to his house when he bought it. so the deal was done and we loaded the car onto the trailer and brought it home.
When I got it home I knew it ran but it took some MacGuyvering but after a week of tinkering and the purchase of a trick flow fuel pump to get the fuel from the the tank in the rear to the engine in the front. Some flushing of the gas tank and new gas and it was running. Man did it make some good noises too. Due to the aftermarket header that came with the car. The sky is the limit with this car and it was due to the magic craigslist.
Featured Image: by Author
