A 50 year old Japanesse lady: SRL311 01228

[2mAn]

How it started

Lets start from the beginning. A few months ago, my eyes were opened as to how awesome the Roadster 2000 was. Not long after, I had accumulated a few Datsun Roadster LSDs and a pair of rear ends. Then Harlan called me and told me he had found the perfect car for me. It was Garms old 1600-ish Roadster, aka Spike. Click here to see the Bring a Trailer auction. I met with Monty and drove the car for a good 30 minutes up and down the freeways and streets of Pasadena. Sadly, I was hesitant to buy the car, though there was no doubt in my mind that it was a great value and very well setup car. After it sold on Bring a Trailer, I was really feeling remorse. Luckily, this car was linked here through someone who found it on craigslist and linked to me by my friend Will (Blackbird M3). We chatted about the car and since it was relatively close to his home in Napa, he agreed to go check it out. Lets stop here and post some pics.

These were the pics in the ad, with a very short description, simply saying :

Straight Rust free body, 2000 engine. Has the optional Solex side draft carbs, & large capacity aluminum oil pan. Many new parts come with car.Clean title, current non op. Driveable project needing finishing. CALL WITH QUESTIONS. NO TEXTING!!! WILL NOT REPLY

craigslist1 by 2mAn

craigslist2 by 2mAn

craigslist3 by 2mAn

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craigslist4 by 2mAn

The fact that this car was so far away (400+ miles) made this a bit of a mission, but being that Will was close and more than willing to help me get into a roadster meant that this might actually work out... the wheels in my head were turning

[2mAn]

A closer look

After chatting with Will about the car, he setup a time to go look at it and get better pics. Not only did he do that but he wrote me a short novel about everything he found on the car, the likes and dislikes. The cliffnotes version is that it was a good car to start with, but if I wanted a "show car" this wasnt it. The biggest issues Will mentioned was that there was something screwy going on with the brakes and clutch. The seller mentioned that these were all new, so we believed it hadnt been bled or adjusted properly. The good news that it had some expensive parts on it and a trunk full of NOS parts too.Overall, this was great news because I wasnt looking for a show car. I like to drive my cars pretty hard and I usually will break stuff along the line. The longterm plan for this car is to get my VARA racing license and use this Roadster as something I can enjoy on the weekends and also drive to the track and mix it up with some other vintage cars.

Things were looking up, but there was still a whole logistics thing to deal with. I am usually very busy on weekends and with started a new job and my night class starting soon, if I wanted the car, I would need to act fast. I stared at the ~30 pics Will sent me over and over and read his novel over and over. I even spoke to the owner a few times. He seemed to be a grumpy older man who was firm on the price, and wouldnt budge even $100. I told him if he took care of the brakes and clutch issue, I will give him his asking price.

Heres a few of the pics that Will took:

pass front by 2mAn

vin by 2mAn

solex by 2mAn

steering1 by 2mAn

trunk goodies by 2mAn

pass rear by 2mAn

minilites by 2mAn

So at this point, Im loving it, but with a closer look, a few questions popped up. "Why does it have '70 fenders on the front," "Ive never seen that color combo before," "Those are some cool parts, but whats the history on it all," and probably many more...

The bigger issue for me was that I very much love my current fun car, my '84 BMW and there was no way to justify keeping 3 cars. I had a tough pill to swallow, so I thought Id better do more research and try to answer some of those questions that were brewing in my head.

I began to wonder, if this car has been parked for around 25 years, theres no way those parts were installed recently, and this was confirmed with Will noticing that these were early Solex 44s. Combine that with the fact that he couldnt identify the cam (no stamping on it) and I began to wonder if this car had the Competition package added to it after it was purchased sometime in the 70s. All the signs pointed to this being true. So, why the '70 fenders?... this is the worst part, Will noticed some wrinkling in the inner fender, plus with a bent rear bumper, this leads me to believe the car was in an accident and in the process, was repainted from what we believe is an original silver car to the current burgundy color. Overall, Im ok with this as well, because the paint doesnt look terrible. And that interior ?... Well heres the full story I got from the seller (Im jumping a little ahead here)

Ive had the car for about 6 or 7 years and I bought it from my friend whos had it sitting for a long time. The previous owner to my friend was an upholstery guy and made the interior himself. I used to work on these cars in the 70s and I hated them then, and I still hate them now, but I know that this car is valuable...

So it turns out that this car was parked since 1986, and this explains the one off colors and designs of the door panels. I believe this car to have had one "owner" and two subsequent "holders" since technically the last two never actually drove the car. It seems obvious the original owner loved the car, but once it got parked it just got dirtier and dirtier. However, the car would start and sort of drive under its own power so we were off to a good start.

[2mAn]

The mission

You'll notice towards the end of the last post, I got a little ahead of where we were at. Basically, I had to decide if I was willing to move on from the E30 and replace it with a slower, older and neglected Roadster. After thinking about past experiences, what Id like to do in the future and the timing of all of this, I decided YES! Lets do it!...

I bought a round trip ticket to fly up and see the car. I knew it needed a few things, so even before I had seen the car in person, I had spent several hundred dollars on some parts I knew it was going to need. Our plan was to drive it from Petaluma to Napa, which is about a 45 minute drive. I purchased an ITG filter setup from Dean that was already drilled for the Solex setup, and I had some 45mm Velocity stacks and a Solex gasket rebuild kit sent directly to Will, because they wouldnt arrive to my place in time before I flew out. The filter was fairly local so a mid day run to his "store" and I had what I needed. I would be flying on Spirit Air for the first time and with what seemed to be strict carry-on baggage rules, I had to carefully plan what I was bringing in my backpack...

Freed from captivity by 2mAn

Called in to work on Friday and caught an early flight up to Oakland. Id have to stop and get Wills jets from his friend Cam, then it was off to Napa. A little while later, and were at the grumpy old mans house and he has the car in his shop. Apparently the brake calipers are sticking, making it hard to drive the car. It was driveable so we decided to take it out anyways, but not far. Problem was that we wouldnt be able to drive it to Napa now. Luckily the seller had a ton of trucks and offered to tow it to Wills place right then and there. We shook hands, exchanged the papers and off to Napa we went.

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Once back at Wills place, we threw it in his garage and started to gameplan what we were going to do in the next 24 hours before I had to fly back to LA. I was eager to empty the trunk to see what else was back there, so I did.

Freed from captivity by 2mAn

Lots of NOS parts: two clocks, several taillights, steering and suspension pieces, new motor mounts, a turn signal stalk, tons of gaskets, some interior pieces, and more!

The next few hours were making runs to the Auto parts store to buy oil, cleaners, towels, etc We had 30 years of grime to get out of the car, inside and out. Also stopped at the DMV to register the car in my name and get the current tags so that Will could drive the car legally and prep it for me to drive back to LA in a month or so.

Now that it was night time, Will adjusted the valves. Every single one of them was out of spec. Then we looked in the carbs to see how the car was currently jet'd. It didnt feel too happy when we drove it, and it turns out the car was setup totally wrong. The seller just got it to run and left it as-is. Then we got the velocity stacks on and so on... more to come

Freed from captivity by 2mAn

[2mAn]

Lets really get started!

When we left off on Friday night, Will had adjusted the valves, changed the jetting but now the car wasnt starting anymore. We made a new ground wire that was grounded to the chassis, and also to the motor, as it shouldve been. Nothing. We made a new positive wire from the battery to the starter. Nothing. We knew that everything we had done was an improvement, but what it did was expose the weakness... the starter. So starting Saturday this was our first stop. We ordered it and it was set to arrive later in the day, so upon returning to the car, I decided I would go back through and work on some of the detail items and clean up stuff.

First was the taillights. 3 that were NOS, however one wasnt in the box and got the outer ring banged a little. Using the best parts available, new gaskets and the best old taillight I had improved the overall look of the back.

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Top is obviously new, the bottom is one of the old ones. Still not too bad IMO

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All done back here.... sort of!

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In addition, I had my own polish which Will said was crap, and though he was probably right, it did make a good improvement over what was there before. When it starts getting really sexy, I will use some better stuff.

Heres an example of the interior door pull covers
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Here was probably my favorite NOS part. The NOS clock is still in the box, I didnt even take it out. The other clock was also there, not sure if it works. The one in the car works too, but its a bit slow, if I remember right

Freed from captivity by 2mAn


Cooling System will get done. Will pointed out that the thermostat housing wasnt the correct one, but the right one was in the trunk so that will go on, along with a new upper hose and thermostat. Lower hose should be there later in the week.
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Some weight reduction! Not using the washer bottle, so the mount came out. Also, the hard line is for the fuel return. Dont need either!
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Enough monkey business!... We brought the car out into the sun and started to check out the brakes while we waited for the starter to show up.

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It was really dirty under the car and Will decided enough was enough and sprayed engine cleaner all over the bottom of the car, the block, most of the engine area, the wheel wells and blasted it with the hose. It definitely got a lot off, but not nearly all of it

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And finally, the starter arrived and Will stayed in his beast mode and had it swapped it out before I realized what was going on. The car fires up immediately now and sounds fairly healthy. Not bad for a car that hasn't been driven in 30 years. This was also after we changed the oil once, one, maybe two bottles of oil treatment
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I worked on a few other things, one being changing out the rusted bolts for some shiny stainless allen head pieces for the steering wheel. I cant wait to get the wheel recovered too, it will be pretty awesome
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About now, I ran out of time and had to head back to the airport to fly back to LA. Will is taking over from here (not that I did a whole lot while I was there! haha )

[2mAn]

Will took over from here (though hes been doing pretty much everything anyways), and started with rebuilding the Mikuni carbs. Heres his post

carb-01 by 2mAn

carb-02 by 2mAn

carb-03 by 2mAn

carb-04 by 2mAn

carb-05 by 2mAn

Kinda gross...

carb-06 by 2xmAn

carb-07 by 2mAn

carb-08 by 2mAn

Bottom of the float bowl

carb-09 by 2mAn

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carb-11 by 2mAn

About as clean is its going to get.

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Almost all back together.

carb-15 by 2mAn

Will

[2mAn]

So while Will is finishing up the carb rebuild, I had to get a heat shield out to him along with a few other parts. Talking with Mike Young, I ended up buying the heat shield from him, but not before I also bought the comp springs and the lower radiator hose too! haha I couldnt help myself. I really dont need the springs yet, so there wont be a big rush to get them installed. I do need some shocks to go with them, so who knows when I will actually install them because I really want Lousteins.

Heres the pics Will sent me of the parts I got from Mike

Protection by 2mAn

I also needed to get a brake master brace, and theres a few local choices to go with and Stans advertising sold me. Love dealing with these Grumpy Old Men. Stans a good guy though and I have a few more parts I plan on buying from him. but for now, I am shipping this brace up to Will while we wait for Moose Motors to fix the master cylinder.

Protection by 2mAn

Hopefully once these parts are all installed, the car can get some miles on it to iron out any issues before I do a fly and drive to get this little lady down to LA.

[MrBurgundy]

You should name it, "MrBurgundy"

[2mAn]

You should name it, "MrBurgundy"

Shes a lady, so MRS Burgundy

[rturbo 930]

Awesome! Welcome to the world of Datsuns. I'm more into Zs but I have a soft spot for the roadster. Not too much rust... lucky for you.

What year is it? Looks like a later dash, so this is one that won't impale you with the steering column, yes?

[2mAn]

It's a very early '68, built in October '67. I'm pretty sure the competition kit was installed in the 70s so this car has a solid racing history or some kind of enthusiast driver

[parkerbink]

Nice! Congrats!

[AwakenNoMore]

Sweet project. I'll be keeping an eye on this awesomeness.

[IceWhite]

Cool stuff here!!

Thanks for sharing, and will also be waiting for updates as you progress.

[Northern]

you and Slammin will need to have an "Obscure Roadster"-off at some point.
Datsun vs Jensen

[bostonvert]

Very cool car, I enjoyed reading the story about it. Never really knew about these little cars but I do like it, must be a blast to drive when ready.

Any idea how much it weighs?