Anth's '69 510 FJ20ET from AUS

[anth]

Yeah thats where I was looking. Says they ship worldwide...ehh, I don't have the $300-400 to get a set over here right now. Wish I did though, I would LOVE a set for Jr.

Hmm what about this place? https://vault2.secured-url.com/ShopSecure/autocables/results1.asp?CategoryID=12&CarMake=NISSAN

 

Or you could always try and make a set! I can take close-up photos of how they're made if you like.

 

Glad to hear youre still updating the car Anth. This is easily one of my favorite... cant wait to see what you do with it.

Thanks Tristin! Love the updates on yours too, keep it up. '69 4 doors fo lyf! haha

[datsunfreak]

Trialling the yellow tyre lettering look...

 

 

 

 

Any chance you could tell us how you did it, and how well it's held up? :thumbup:

[datsunfreak]

I also had the numberplate light surround re-chromed. These lights are unique to JDM/AUDM, USDM 510′s have two lights mounted to the rear body of the car, on either side of the plate. I’m not sure which version the European delivered cars run.

 

 

FWIW, the USDM '68 had this same light. Some time around 1968 the US DOT decreed that cars have to have two license plates lights, and not one. No idea why. Most modern cars actually have two lights right next to each other. :rofl:

 

So I'm 99.9% sure the cars all over the world except North America had the bumper mounted light only. :thumbup:

[Tristin]

Thanks Tristin! Love the updates on yours too, keep it up. '69 4 doors fo lyf! haha

 

Truf! Haha

 

As you, I have some updates on the way... Although not as cool as an upgraded FJ20.

[FiveSeventyZee]

Hmm what about this place? https://vault2.secur...&CarMake=NISSAN

 

Or you could always try and make a set! I can take close-up photos of how they're made if you like.

 

Coupla photos can't hurt if you don't mind. Might make a project out of it, could be a fun learning experience at the very least

[anth]

Any chance you could tell us how you did it, and how well it's held up? :thumbup:

I used some very cheap chinese tire paint pens from ebay, like this, but it didn't hold up so well, parts of the paint flaked off almost instantly. However, a friend of mine spent a bit more (~$20) on a similar pen and had much better results, so it's worth spending a bit more. Not sure which exact one he bought though, sorry. Just browse around eBay using some keywords like "tire paint pen" and see what comes up.

 

Coupla photos can't hurt if you don't mind. Might make a project out of it, could be a fun learning experience at the very least

Next time I work on the car I'll take some photos and measurements :thumbup:

[datsunfreak]

I used some very cheap chinese tire paint pens from ebay, like this, Just browse around eBay using some keywords like "tire paint pen" and see what comes up.

 

Thanks. :thumbup:

[FiveSeventyZee]

Next time I work on the car I'll take some photos and measurements :thumbup:

 

Thanks, sounds good

[anth]

Long time no update!

Well, where do I start? This is going to be easily the biggest update I’ve ever posted about the car, as I’ve just completed 8 months of on/off work under the bonnet in my spare time. During those 8 months I also sadly lost two of my beloved grandparents, went a holiday to Europe, and have attended 4 weddings, so things may have taken a little bit longer than usual.

To get straight to the point, the car never had an intercooler, and it was always my intention to fit one, so that’s what I did. Unfortunately it’s not such a simple task with the Datsun, unlike when I had my S15 and bought a $400 kit that had everything I needed (and I fitted it in a day). To fit the FMIC I would need the following:

- Intercooler + custom piping
- Smaller radiator
- Electric water pump
- Modified crank pulley
- Modified intake manifold

That’s the main items, with countless smaller items that were needed along the way. Some things didn’t go so smoothly, but I’ll explain as we go, so let’s just get into it.



First things first, let’s pull apart a perfectly running and very reliable car. All lights, grilles and bumper were removed.



Since the radiator was coming out, the old hoses were removed and all fluid drained.



Next the (huge) radiator was removed, giving a full view of the engine from the front end. I needed a smaller radiator as my current one took up all the width between the chassis rails, so I had nowhere to run intercooler piping.



I couldn’t resist an FJ20 glamour shot.



With everything out of the way, I could do a very quick mockup of the intercooler. This is just a generic eBay item that I bought years ago off someone who had some 90 degree bends welded onto the outlets to suit a Datsun 1600. You can see I’ve already started to mark some cuts I need to make on the body of the car near the intercooler outlets.



Moving around to the back of the intercooler (with cardboard to protect the fins) you can see why the water pump needs to be removed. In the space between the ‘cooler and engine I still need to fit a radiator and a thermo fan or two. There is just no room to mount all these items and keep the intercooler behind the grille. The only solution is to remove the belt driven pump and go with an electric one mounted off to the side of the engine.



A few quick bolts later…



…and it’s off.



To stop water spewing out everywhere, I needed to block off the gaping hole in the front of my engine. To keep costs down I decided to make my own block-off plate. I first made a paper template, traced it onto some 3mm galvanised plate that I found in the garage, and then cut it out with an angle grinder. After bolting this up to the car I started to have second thoughts about my material choice once I learnt that people were selling block-off plates much thicker than mine.



With that weighing on my conscious I found some 5mm alloy and re-made the block-off plate. Re-making things will be a common theme in this update. I’m not a mechanic, my day job sees me sitting in front of a computer all day, so I’m not afraid to admit I learn as I go and make plenty of mistakes along the way.



Block-off plate v2.0 bolted and sealed onto the motor. In hindsight I should have used button-head bolts to gain even more room.



My next job was to remove the intake manifold. The reason the intake manifold needs to be modified is because from the factory, the manifold is cast with the throttle body flange pointing towards the middle of the car (see above). When adding an intercooler, to make routing the piping possible the manifold needs to be cut just behind the T/B flange and then re-welded at a new angle so it either comes out straight or points towards the outside of the car.



Since I was going to the trouble to remove and modify the manifold, I decided to source a smaller one from an S12 Gazelle, compared to my larger DR30 Skyline one. The reason for this was mainly aesthetics and also ease of fitting/removal, as the DR30 one was very large in the small Datsun engine bay.



After taking plenty of photos for future reference, removing a lot of stubborn hoses and hard-to-reach bolts, and barely having enough room between the engine and strut tower, I finally removed the manifold. One thing that jumped out immediately was that large looped hose you can see under the thermostat towards the lower center of the image.



A bit of research told me that this was originally meant to be a coolant circuit that ran to a part under the throttle body, to stop it icing up and jamming in colder climate (obviously not Australia!). The previous owner had simply looped it with a long piece of hose, so I sourced some rubber bungs to block them off much more neatly.



There were a few times where I realised just how big of a job I was undertaking (for me, anyway) and this was one of them.





The ‘big ticket’ item of this whole job was definitely my Datsport aluminium radiator. I had originally planned to use an N13 Pulsar radiator (and even purchased one) but even though they are a popular solution for FJ datto’s they are also known to be diffucult when it comes to routing intercooler piping around them. After some careful thinking and piggy-bank smashing, I bit the bullet and ordered a Datsport item, “do it once do it propery “, right?. You can see they are worth the money, with special features like the in-built overflow tank, SPAL thermo fan, and an aluminium mounting plate which locates not only the radiator but also the intercooler.



The mounting plate dropped into it’s rough position. The smaller rubber o-rings locate a pair of dowels underneath the radiator, while the larger ones locate the threaded inserts found on most generic intercoolers.



Close-up.



I couldn’t even test fit the radiator, as the thermo fan would be sitting against the crank pulley. My engine only has one belt which goes from the crank pulley, to the (now removed) waterpump, and then to the alternator. The crank pulley has 3 grooves, but I was only using the middle one for my single belt (see this image again for reference), so the front groove was doing nothing and could be sacrificed. I failed to remove the single nut which holds the crank pulley using my air-compressed impact gun, so I asked around and was told about the ‘starter trick’. This involved attaching a socket and breaker bar onto the nut, with the breaker bar handle sitting a few inches above the chassis rail, and then shitting myself while I cranked the engine over with the fuel relay disconnected. This makes the crank rotate and forces the breaker bar to hit the chassis rail where it cannot go any further, bottoming it out and transferring the force onto the nut which then easily un-does itself.



I was surprised at how well it worked. I placed a stack of cardboard on the chassis rail so the breaker bar wouldn’t damage it when it made contact.



With the pulley removed I was able to cut off the un-needed groove with a hacksaw, as there was a gap between itself and the next groove, so it was easy. After mockup stage I had planned to take the pulley to be professionally re-balanced, but my plans changed. The two remaining grooves are a single piece joined together, and adhered to the center key with a rubber isolator.

I don’t have a picture of how the radiator sat with the grove cut off the pulley, but I can tell you it still interfered.
 

[anth]

My next call to action was to shave off some of the material on the plastic shroud around the thermo fan, but even this didn’t give me the clearance I needed. I think this is due to my engine mounts and how they position the motor in the bay, from what I can tell my engine sits a bit further forward than other FJ 1600′s, as some other people run this radiator and don’t have the clearance issues I have. After yet more research I decided my only choice was to mount the alternator 20mm rearwards so the belt would use the groove on the crank pulley which is closest to the engine, and then have the other groove machined off.



After removing the alternator I inspected the standard mount and started researching how to make a new one. In the end I decided to make it out of 3 pieces of flat plate.



First, I made a very crude jig, and I use the term “jig” loosely!



Next, I made a very quick mock-up mount out of thin aluminium, with the forward mounting tab located 20mm further back than the original.



Bolted to the engine…



…and then the alternator bolted up to quickly check I was on the right track. So far so good.



To make extra-sure that I wasn’t wasting my time, I made a second mockup out of MDF to ensure that the design would work with a thicker material, and it did, so next it was onto the final metal version.



Since the bolt holes had to be fairly close to the mounting tabs, I bought a couple of allen-head bolts to save some room.



While all this was happening, I sent my crank pulley away to be machined down to one single groove and then re-balanced. You can see the metal that was removed during the balancing process.

When it came time to make the metal alternator mount, I decided I’d had enough of relying on other people to weld things for me and did something I’ve wanted to do for a long time…



I bought myself a mig welder, gloves, a helmet, picked up some scrap metal and signed myself up for a gas account. What followed was lots of Youtube tutorials and lots of practice. After I started getting confident I decided I was ready to attack the alternator mount.









Thanks to Tony from The Motor Report for kindly lending me his tap and die set for a very long time. It came in handy on a few occasions.



The final mount. I added in a tube between the tabs for extra strength (not yet welded in the above photo). Naturally all of my practice welds were way better than when I tried to replicate them on the final piece, so annoying!



Another item I had to make for the alternator was the upper adjusting bracket. Again, I started with some 5mm scrap metal, spaced it off the engine until it was in the right position. (v1 waterpump blockoff plate pictured)



After working out the arc of the alternator, I started drilling holes…



…and then started joining them up with a die-grinder I loaned from my mate Gaz (thanks mate!)



Another test fit.



I had to clearance the top of the plate for the water pipe to fit above it.



With both mounts fitted up I was very pleased to see that everything lined up well and the alternator was able to be adjusted easily. The true test would be when the engine fired up for the first time.



Up until this point I was using various pieces of tubing and washers to space the upper bracket, so once the design was finalised I cut down one piece of pipe to the correct length.



I also added a triangular gusset for some extra strength to try to reduce any flexing, since it’s essentially a flat plate.



Welded, painted, and fitted for the final time.



Mounting bracket painted and fitted. You can also see the amount of clearance I gained between the crank pulley and the radiator/thermo fan.

With the alternator relocation out of the way I was now back to where I started; fitting the intercooler, radiator, and modifying the intake manifold! It was a huge setback for me and it took a lot of time to complete, sometimes feeling like I was going nowhere, but once it was out of the way I concentrated on moving forward and the real progress started to happen.

To be continued…

[Tristin]

Anth! Great update... glad to see youre still doing work. Every update makes this car better and better. Cant wait for more. 

[fisch]

Nice update Anth!

[anth]

Thanks guys, hopefully another update tonight (or today, since you're all over the other side of the world)

[anth]

When we left off from the last update, I had successfully relocated the alternator and had the crank pulley machined down to one single groove, with a smaller belt fitted to suit. I was now ready to get back to the original task at hand; fitting the intercooler, radiator, and modifying the intake manifold.



Now that I could fit the radiator in and intercooler in the bay without hitting the pulley, it was time to affix the lower mounting plate. The Datsport instructions told me to drill and tap 3 holes per side and use the supplied cap-head screws.



I chose to just do one on each side to start with, in case things changed. This ended up being a big help, as I had to move everything across a few mm, so I slotted the holes in the mounting plate to give me some wriggle-room.



The top mounts of the radiator slot onto the supplied cotton-reel bolts.



A couple of holes drilled into the front fascia did the trick and saw them firmly mounted.



It's a bit hard to tell in this picture, but the intercooler that I bought with aftermarket outlets didn't fit around my radiator. Both of the inlets just touched the radiator, but even if they were a few mm wider and just cleared the problem would be magnified once the radiator was brought closer due to the radius of the bends.



To rectify this I needed to remove the existing bends and weld on some new ones with a tighter radius.



When it came time to do the cutting, I chose to do it by hand with a hacksaw, holding the cooler on it's side with a rag stuffed down the  outlets. This was all to try and reduce the amount of filings that could find their way into the core. I also took a die grinder with a cutting  disc and cut a small groove around where I wanted to cut, so the hacksaw blade would have a good way to locate itself and wouldn't walk around on me.



Cut off...



Nice and clean. As an extra precaution, once I'd finished cutting I stuck a vacuum cleaner in there and cleaned up any possible stray debris.



For upper intercooler mounts, I found some aluminium brackets that already had a right angle bend, and cut them down to shape. Once it was bolted into the cooler, I marked a hole on the radiator support and drilled it  out.



Instead of having a nut and bolt setup, I welded nuts to the back of the radiator support to make it easier for me to bolt the brackets in.



Done.



With both the radiator and intercooler bolted into place I was then able to mock up the position of the new sharp-radius intercooler outlets. Once I was happy with where they sat I marked them with a texta and took it  all to my ever-patient mechanics at Protek Automotive to tack weld into place, as my mig welder cannot weld aluminium. You can see just how tight everything is, there's only a few mm of clearance between the chassis rails, silicone hoses, and radiator, and that's on both sides!



Another  part I had tack welded was the intake manifold. You can see the line where it was cut, this was something I left to my mechanics as their  angle grinder has a much bigger blade than mine so they were able to make a more precise and cleaner cut. To change the angle of the throttle body we actually made a single cut and then flipped the flange 180 degrees before re-welding it.

[anth]

With the intake manifold flange and the intercooler outlets all tacked into place, I was could then make a start on mocking up my intercooler piping. I bought some 2.5" straight pipe and some mandrel bends to mix and match.



The cooler piping was another part of this round of mods that I did multiple times. The first time I did it I tried to fully weld them  myself on the mig welder, but no matter what I did I kept getting pin-hole leaks in the joins. To test for leaks I filled the pipes with water. Also my cold-side pipe needed a tighter bend than I initially thought, so I bought the above "donut". This series of pictures is my second attempt at piping.



This is the shape of the cold-side pipe, very simple.



Test fitted to the car. I got lucky with this side, very easy.



The  hot-side was a bit more complicated, using two bends and some straight  sections. At the top right of this image the piping joins into the  factory piping. I did this to keep things looking as factory as possible and to also make the job easier for myself, instead of making all-new hot side piping. You can see the electric water pump hiding underneath the piping.



On the ends of both of the pipes I added a few series of tacks to stop the silicone hoses blowing off under pressure.



Once I was happy with the position of everything, I dropped it all off at Protek again for final welding.





One side was offset compared to the other.



This shot shows the difference in size between the DR30 manifold (bottom) and S12 manifold (top). The runners are also shorter, but it was a bit hard to show that in a photo.



Since  we had cut and rotated the throttle body flange 180 degrees, some things didn't line up very well on the inside and wouldn't do the airflow any favours.



A bit of effort on the die grinder had it smoothed out. I lost count of how many aluminium splinters I got stuck in my fingers over the past few months.



Another part of the manifold that was smoothed was the ECCS logo on the plenum.



Some more un-needed metal was a mounting tab that used to be underneath the throttle body, but was now above it.
I found out the hard way that there was a few minor differences between the DR30 and S12 manifolds, that being the fuel rail and the fuel pressure regulator. I don't have any pictures of these until later in the piece but they were sourced the same way I bought the manifold,  through the always-helpful members of the FJ20 Facebook page.



Still on the intake manifold, I made a couple of block-off plates and gaskets for some ports I won't be using.



Speaking of gaskets, I also made new ones for the throttle body and thermostat. That sheet of gasket paper really came in handy.



While we're on the topic of the throttle body, I'll start rounding out this post with the intense cleaning it received. First I removed it from the  DR30 intake manifold, in it's very black state.



After removing the old gasket with a razor blade, I started spraying every nook and cranny with carby cleaner and degreaser...



...until I finally bit the bullet and pulled the damn thing apart. This allowed me to clean it properly and also do a better job of painting it, which you'll see later.



I was lucky in that the throttle body was already held on with stainless  bolts, they just needed a quick sand and polish to bring back their shine.



That brings us to the end of part 2, but don't worry, I'm already working on part 3, there's plenty more to come.

To be continued...

[FiveSeventyZee]

any details of how those Venetians were made? :P

[anth]

any details of how those Venetians were made? :P

Sorry guys I know I promised you that! I'll get to it soon, I just wanted to get the damn thing driving again first.

[anth]

Part 3, here we go. To quickly re-cap, Part 1 was all about relocating the alternator with custom mounts, and Part 2  saw the intercooler and radiator bolted into place, and the intercooler piping tacked together. Now we're getting down to the finer details.

The S12 manifold I bought was quite bare, so I needed an accelerator cable bracket because my DR30 one was not compatible. I decided I'd just make my own.



I broke out the scrap metal pile once again and found some 1mm plate. After a bit of work with the angle grinder and drill I had my basic  shape.



To weld it together I used the 'thin metal technique' which is a series of hot tacks joined together. This worked well for me.



The finished piece (with added gusset)



Side angle.



While I had the injectors out I thought it would be a good idea to have them professionally cleaned and flow-tested. It turned out that they were  actually quite good, but we still managed to extract a bit out of them and get them all equal.



Let's move away from the intake for a minute and talk about the electric water pump. I chose a Davis Craig EWP80, and as you can see above it comes with a couple of different flanges that you can bolt on to the inlet and outlet.



This  is the combination I went with, except I needed the outlet (to the  right of the picture) to face the other direction. This is simple enough  as the housing can be loosened and rotated (albeit carefully), much  like a turbo.



With the housing rotated you can see how lucky I was with the placement. The  inlet of the pump points down straight into the vertical facing lower  radiator outlet, and the pump outlet points straight into the engine. This means all I needed was two short and straight hoses. Davis Craig  recommends that you do not hard-mount these pumps, but simply let the  hoses hold them in place. If you solid-mount them you can risk damaging  them.

Time for more fabrication...





In  the above images you'll see the factory radiator support bracket. This sits behind the grille and ties the front of the car together in 3  places. Unfortunately with my new intercooler now taking up some real estate the factory item would no longer fit, so I had to modify it or make my own. I chose to make my own (duh!).



Much  like the alternator bracket, I started off with a quick and easy aluminium mock-up. Here it is compared to the factory bracket.



Once I got it to a point where I knew it would work, I made another one out of some thicker steel by marking the fold lines and bending it in the  vise. I used a thicker metal compared to the original bracket, since the  original was a stamped shape with folds in it to give it strength, whereas mine was just a flat piece of metal.



Here is the steel version next to the aluminium mockup.





Test fitting on the car to make sure it doesn't hit the front apron.



The true test was to put the intercooler into place and make sure it all fit together.



Great success!



At  this point I had only drilled and tapped the top hole. Now that I knew the shape worked, I could drill and tap the second hole, and drill the 3rd hole, as the third bolt is screws into a thread in the body of the  car. I used the same distance between holes as the factory item so  everything would line up the same as before.



All done!
 

[anth]

One  of the last bits of fabrication that I tackled was to add in some metal  to the radiator support panel. As you can see in the above image, there  is a big gap between the body and the radiator. Because my previous  radiator was so big and wide, the previous owner had cut a lot of metal  out of the front of the car.



It  was a similar story down below near the intercooler. These gaps would  allow air to go straight into the engine bay, letting in dirt and  debris. Not only that, the air would be better utilised if it was  directed at the radiator and intercooler instead of going straight past  it.



So it was out with the cardboard and scissors to make some templates that followed the shape of the radiator and intercooler.



I've only showed you the driver's side so far but it was the same on the other side.



Next  the templates were transferred onto 1mm metal. This metal had some sort of zinc in it, even after I grinded off the top layer, so it wasn't  very good to weld. Before you school me I have read up on zinc flu and  all that stuff, but I was only doing short tack welds and I had a dust  mask on and a fan behind me to blow away any fumes.



I  wanted to add some rigidity and a nice clean edge to the two vertical pieces.To do this I scribed a line and then took a shifter spanner  adjusted to the same thickness as the metal and slowly bent the edge into shape.



Which gives you something like this.



Next I put it in the vise and started hammering the lumps and bumps into shape.



And this is how it turned out. Noice!



Here are all 4 pieces tacked into place.



Close-up.



I  slowly joined up the tack welds until there was no gaps, ground down  the welds, and then filled up any more gaps. I would do a few tacks on  one piece, then move onto the next, and make my way around the 4  different pieces so as not to heat up the metal too much and reduce the  chance of distortion.





Once  the welding was complete I sealed it all up with Sikaflex on both the  front and back. If I could do this again I would have overlapped the new  pieces with the existing metal instead of butt-welding, this would have  allowed me to make simpler shaped pieces and would have made the  welding much easier.



Before  the welder was wheeled away, I needed to fill up some holes on the top  of the radiator support panel. This is where the old radiator mounts  were bolted in.



First the paint was ground back.



Then the holes were welded up. I used some 10c coins underneath to help.



Ground back.



A little bit of filler was used to even everything out.



Sanded back.



And finally a coat of high-build primer.



I'll finish this post off with a picture of my final intercooler piping that I had tig welded by Dom at Protek after I had tacked them together.



The tig welds are much neater than I could ever dream to achieve on my mig, and I know they'll be leak-free.
The  next update will be getting everything looking pretty and getting stuck  into final assembly. Sorry to drag this out but it was just too much to  put into a single post, I hope you're enjoying it.

[FiveSeventyZee]

Sorry guys I know I promised you that! I'll get to it soon, I just wanted to get the damn thing driving again first.

no problem just checking. these updates are more fun anyways. :P

[jrock4224]

Wow,.......just read thread ... nice build .....clean fj install

 

u should use black wrinkle on the intake ........

[///FiveOneOh]

What side view mirrors are you running?

[anth]

Wow,.......just read thread ... nice build .....clean fj install

 

u should use black wrinkle on the intake ........

Maybe I wll ;) the final update will be posted in about 12hrs or so.

 

What side view mirrors are you running?

They are XY GT mirrors. "XY" is the model code for the early 1970's Ford Falcon (aussie model), and GT was the hi-po muscle car version. Do a Google search for "XY GT Falcon" and you'll see. I bought the mirrors brand new (reproductions) from eBay.

[bonvo]

right on man glad to see your still around im torn on the update though on the one hand its amazing work and looks really good i love the belt driven water pump delete but at the same time it seems like a shitload of extra work when you could have just bought a thinner intercooler and avoided all of it 

[anth]

cheers Bonvo. Unfortunately it's not that simple, most generic intercoolers are this size. It's more about moving the radiator forward, I have room between the radiator and intercooler but if I do that I won't be able to close the hood, as the filler caps would interfere with the hood reinforcment. Maybe a custom radiator would have done the trick, or using two smaller thermo fans instead of one big one (to create a void in the center where the pulley is) would have worked? But I wanted to go with a tested radiator setup, I like the way Datsport does things.