Kelmo's Coupe Build(?)

[KELMO]

Now with all body parts installed.

 

Drove it to work yesterday and it did fine.  OK, work is 9 tenths of a mile from my house but I still made it there and back.

 

Put in some of the interior panels yesterday afternoon...pics to follow.  I am not really sure about the clutch operation in this thing, it feels like it could use some adjustment but I don't have any left. Found a longer push rod yesterday and may look at that as an option. Worst case scenario would be take the trans out and see if I may have a taller T/O bearing collar laying around.

Lastly, just for grins, I measured floor to top of fender height on both the grey car and the green car....the green car is 3" lower than the grey car. I have been trying to get a pic that illustrates the difference.

Green car: lowered 2" and 12" tires

Grey car: stock suspension and 14"tires.

 

[KELMO]

Pic so it happened...

 

How to make a 99 cent trim piece.

 

99 cent trim pieces installed.

 

I also think I have the clutch sorted out. While I was looking for something completely different I stumbled across a bag of slave cylinder push rods.  Turns out one of them was longer than the other 2. Upon inspection I found that the one on the car was of the short variety so, presto changeo, swap 'em out and boom..clutch works more better.  Will have to do a real test drive today as I did not want to leave the property since I had been in the bottle a wee bit.

Edited August 12, 2018 by KELMO

[datsunfreak]

What, no ash tray hole?   ?

[Charlie69]

Twins!  Notice the cursive writting emblems on the trunk lid and the rear quarter panels,  those are automatic transmission cars only.  The standard transmission cars are non-cursive.

 

This little car is turnining out real nice!

[KELMO]

Negative on the ashtray holes.....sold them to some guy that needed 'em more than me. And I didn't want to fuck it up and have to waste another 99 cents. Oh, and #cuznobackseat.

 

On my first 1200 (Sedan) it also had the cursive emblems. That car was certainly a standard trans and this was back in 1986 so I don't think it was molested prior to my owning it.

The catalog only shows the cursive emblem 76854-H1600 for the side emblems, applies to Sedan and Coupe

Deck lid emblems do show different numbers 84822-H1806 Coupe, 84822-H1600 Sedan.

The only block type lettering I have seen/ looked up are the "Nissan Automatic" and "Deluxe".

This is all for the US market, JDM may be different cuz JDM yo. Oh, and Charlie, you may change your opinion when you see her up close.

 

Anywho, all that blathering aside...I did a few shake down runs today with no issues got it up to 60MPH just to see if it would but did not sustain it as I don't want to get too far from the house. OK, truthfully, I didn't want to get too far away from the truck and trailer. You know you have a slow car when 60MPH is a thing for you.

 

**I would have put emojis in here but my emoji screen is blank, so a good portion of this should be read in sarcasm/smartass font.

[Duncan]

Looking good Kelmo!   I really miss having a Coupe.  My sedan was cool, but I prefer the Coupes..

 

Those polished Jellybean slots are the stuff.  ?

[Charlie69]

I have only seen cursive writting on the automatics, but who knows for sure.  Could be Datsun/Nissan to use up the stock put them on the later standard transmission cars to use up overstock of the cursive badges. 

 

Anyway considering that was a parts donor car it is looking good.  The best thing is it did not end up in the scrap yard.

[KELMO]

Did a freeway run yesterday, runs nice and even at about 68MPH and seemed to have a bit of throttle left. The truck and trailer in the background seems to implicate that I planned to fail, however, I was just taking a little precaution. Just incase, Missus Kelmo was ready to hop in the truck and come to the rescue. In the end all went well with about a 25 mile trip.

 

I needed to replace the outside door glass squeegees and could not find the correct clips.

 

Binder clips, they're not just for headliners anymore! These and some 3M super weatherstrip adhesive seem to have done the trick.

 

Pulled some carpet out of the green car (little payback here) to use as a template.

1200 Coupes have a type of air scoop on the cowl.  I have 2 sets of these but they are so haggard and fragile that they are unusable. So I took the grilles that go underneath and did this.

Not perfect but then again, neither is this car. Note to self: I need to wash this thing at some point.

[Charlie69]

You are not missing any details are you!!!

[KELMO]

Oh, there will be plenty of details missing on this one.

 

Got the rest of the carpet cu last night and Missus Kelmo will be doing the binding around the edges. The passenger side is done and hopefully by the weekend she will have the rest done. I got the belt moulding installed and it will do...I guess.

Will post some more pics once I collect a few more.

[Duncan]

I like it!

 

Too bad we live so far apart.  We could slap some paint on that bad boy...

[KELMO]

We would have to slap a bunch of metal on it first. Somewhere along the line it was hit in the left quarter and bondo man was first on the scene.

[datsunfreak]

On 8/13/2018 at 12:25 AM, Charlie69 said:

I have only seen cursive writting on the automatics, but who knows for sure.  Could be Datsun/Nissan to use up the stock put them on the later standard transmission cars to use up overstock of the cursive badges. 

 

 

I've never seen a 1200 that didn't have cursive badges? We've had maybe two dozen of them, all years, and only two that were originally automatics. And if they had quarter badges, they were cursive. 

 

 

On 8/14/2018 at 12:53 PM, KELMO said:

I needed to replace the outside door glass squeegees and could not find the correct clips.

 

Binder clips, they're not just for headliners anymore! These and some 3M super weatherstrip adhesive seem to have done the trick.

 

 

What did you use for the rubber squeegee? 

[datsunfreak]

As for the trunk badges, I have seen those two ways. Early cars all had one like his, later cars had block letters. 

[Charlie69]

Good info datsunfreak.

[KELMO]

The rubber squeegees, um well, I used some shit I had laying around the shop and convinced myself they were the right part.  After further investigation ( and after 2 or 3 days they are starting to peel off), I think they are for the INSIDE of the door.  I can no longer remember where I got the ones for the green car. I thought it was newdatsunparts.com but they had no listing for the outers and the inners that I looked at on their site (after I installed my stuff) look just like what I installed on the outer.  They will most likely work, just not the way I did it.  I think part of it needs to be trimmed.  The channel that the glass sits in is pushing the rubber up from the bottom.

 

FWIW they look really good when the window is rolled down.

[datsunfreak]

5 hours ago, KELMO said:

FWIW they look really good when the window is rolled down.

 

Well, you're in New Mexico, with no AC, so...  ?

 

[KELMO]

I have 2/60 AC on both 1200's...2 windows rolled down, 60MPH. With the wing windows it is similar to having fresh/recirculate on late model cars.

 

 

 

 

 

The above to be read in sarcasm font.

[KELMO]

Robbed the green car carpet to use as a template for the grey car.

Then put it all back in place.

A pic that kind of illustrates the height difference between the two. Also notice the difference in the valance panels...the green car has a build date of 11/71 and the grey car 02/72. Bigger bumper brackets on the 02/72. Not that you would see bumpers on either of these cars.

 

[datsunfreak]

7 hours ago, KELMO said:

Also notice the difference in the valance panels...the green car has a build date of 11/71 and the grey car 02/72. Bigger bumper brackets on the 02/72. Not that you would see bumpers on either of these cars.

 

 

 

Grey car has likely had it's valence changed. The bigger bumper brackets were only used in '73 to try and skirt the upcoming 5mph bumper laws. But past a certain point ('75ish according to a friend who worked at Courtesy Datsun all through the 70s) you could only buy the later valence as Nissan had stopped making the early one. Ergo any car that had one replaced, got the later valence. Also a good easy way to tell if one you want to buy has took a smack in the front at some point. 

[KELMO]

From the looks of this car, and the amount of bondo on it.....I think it was beat like a red headed step child.

 

 

Come to think of it, the whole front clip was replaced. I do not know if the valance was from the donor car or this one.

[datsunfreak]

14 hours ago, KELMO said:

From the looks of this car, and the amount of bondo on it.....I think it was beat like a red headed step child.

 

Such was the life of a $1600 car...  ?

[KELMO]

• Did a little shake down run yesterday. I put 180 freeway miles on it and it did quite well with the exception of pulling hills. I finally hooked the tach back up a week or so back and at about 70 MPH it is turning around 3500 RPM which is good for my little sewing machine motor. The car tracks down the road quite well but there is a little more play in the steering wheel than I care to have but it is livable for now.  After yesterdays little trip it appears that gas mileage was about 33-34 MPG.  I need to record the GPS readings and compare to the speedo readings to see if they jive together. I had done this before and they were close but yesterday it didn't quite add up and I don't know if I missed something or not. Current set up is; stock A12 engine, 1979 210 5spd trans, factory Hitachi carb.

[datsunfreak]

On 8/27/2018 at 7:14 AM, KELMO said:

•  Current set up is; stock A12 engine, 1979 210 5spd trans, factory Hitachi carb.

 

Tire size? Tach reading seems a tiny bit low for 70mph, but not if you have bigger than stock diameter tires. 

[KELMO]

Well, the tach could be off a bit, but the engine didn't sound as if it were about to 'splode (any more than usual with stuff I build).

 

Tires are 185/50 or 55/14.  I've been told it looks like a damn Hot Wheels. Which I'm good with.

So I think 24' instead of about 21 or 22.  This is all guessing as I have not measured them since the 12th of never.

 

Also discovered oil on the drivers side floor (yes, on the brand new carpet...fiddlesticks). I think the safe money is the trans seal has given up the ghost.  I took a pinion assembly out of one of the other transmissions I have and my feeble memory told me that there should be a roll pin holding the actual pinion in which would have to come out to replace the seal. I took a punch to it with no luck. Have to take another look today....or just replace it with one of the other ones first and see if the leak stops.