The 240Z made just a few appearances over the years, including one at the 2017 Japanese Classic Car Show. While the Bonneville engine has been lost to history, today the car runs a race-prepped L28. Photography Credit: David S. Wallens

Over the years, the exploits of the record-setting 240Z were forgotten by all but the most hardcore Datsun fans. But Randy Jaffe always remembered. After all, this is a guy who’s owned 40 or 50 Z-cars, and he was behind the impeccable recreation–using many salvaged original parts, including the chassis plate–of the iconic BRE 240Z that John Morton drove to a pair of national championships. But when he finally got his hands on the car, he was stunned to find out that it was even more special than he’d thought.

The Bonneville Z-car is chassis HLS30-05834, built in June 1970. But the car has clear back glass, sans defroster wires–an anomaly found only in cars that came off the assembly line much earlier in the production run. Jaffe’s research found that chassis 05835 and 05836 both went to Datsun racer extraordinaire Bob Sharp, the East Coast analog of Peter Brock. The first car was later transformed into a wide-body 260Z famously campaigned in IMSA by Sam Posey, while the second won four SCCA national championships.

Jaffe surmised that the three cars might have been part of a special run of chassis earmarked specifically for racing. Sure enough, Micka confirms his suspicions. Speaking of Jaffe’s 240Z, he says, “That was a car that came directly from Japan. It was a real lightweight car made of really thin sheet metal.”