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Anyone want to buy new 320 vent window rubbers?


ol' 320

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http://community.ratsun.net/topic/7161-620-king-cab-window-gaskets/

 

 

This is never happening again. It went on for two? years and many Ratsun members paid in advance and got fucked over. If you want to discuss making them, fine. But if this gets to pre ordering or offering them for sale or taking orders, it will be shut down.  Sorry, once bitten twice shy.

 

Once you have them ready made, in advance and in numbers ready for sale, post in the classifieds. I imagine they will sell like hot cakes.

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http://community.ratsun.net/topic/7161-620-king-cab-window-gaskets/

 

 

This is never happening again. It went on for two? years and many Ratsun members paid in advance and got fucked over. If you want to discuss making them, fine. But if this gets to pre ordering or offering them for sale or taking orders, it will be shut down. Sorry, once bitten twice shy.

 

Once you have them ready made, in advance and in numbers ready for sale, post in the classifieds. I imagine they will sell like hot cakes.

I didn't know Al used to go by Tom
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http://community.ratsun.net/topic/7161-620-king-cab-window-gaskets/

 

 

This is never happening again. It went on for two? years and many Ratsun members paid in advance and got fucked over. If you want to discuss making them, fine. But if this gets to pre ordering or offering them for sale or taking orders, it will be shut down.  Sorry, once bitten twice shy.

 

Once you have them ready made, in advance and in numbers ready for sale, post in the classifieds. I imagine they will sell like hot cakes.

 

If you are implying I was the previous "vendor" then you are off course mate.

 

I'll waste 5 minutes of whoever reads this posts time to cover this off once as I'm concious I've lurked here on the forums for years intermittently and don't have a rep. My name is Phil Muffet. I live in Sydney Australia. You'll find me on LinkedIn professionally, and Facebook (it is on private but the profile pic is a lotus and a now gone but beloved malamute - Marouk).

 

Besides datsuns I have built a nice private collection of vehicles from every decade from the 10's through to 2017. Includes very early fords, buicks, 40's chevs, 50's F trucks, Lotus, Mustangs, Vipers, Harley's, BMW... etc. My ambition is to build out a collection of different driving experiences from every decade of motoring - hence why so eclectic. I got into the 320's 15 years ago when I was given my first because it looked like a little 55 F100.... trust me it doesn't but my wife thought it did. That truck was extensively modified and built very much how the infamous MX520 was built. We built around the same time - a world apart and unbeknownst of each other until years later. Sadly my truck is being rebuilt after a significant crash and the passion for that waxes and wanes. No defined finish - but I'll throw up a thread oneday as we have lots of rebuild photos.

 

While I appreciate some here got burned in the past - it wasn't me. I'm doing just fine with legitimate business and ethics/integrity are something I get deeply offended by when accused of impropriety. Not withstanding I expressly said this wasn't commercial for me - I'm not so bad at business to think the Datsun market is worth trying to exploit even. (A) there is but a handful of 320 trucks left that people care about, (B) Datsun people enjoy their trucks for the cheap/diy builds they represent, and © cost per rubber already if I am trying to make back their money would see them selling for significantly more than I've paid for some of my trucks!! Oh... and there is the problem of me finding the time to even pour rubbers for myself let alone on mass.

 

My project started when I requested from a Facebook 320 group some assistance in finding a decent set of rubbers to scan and get started. I didn't take free ones despite the offers. I paid Ted Heaton for both the rubbers and his expense in posting them to the other side of the world - so as to ensure I wasn't rushed given the broader pressures on my time. Cars are my hobby and done in spare time for which I have very little. WHEN I am successful Ted is on a promise for the first set I don't keep for my own collection as way of a thankyou.

 

Beyond Ted I'm not taking pre-orders. I'm not looking for funding. I'm not even offering to add names to lists that don't exist so when I have a result you can be first in line. I simply offered where I am up to and where I am currently blocked on progressing. Heck I think I even said if someone beats me to it that's fine.

 

...but cheers for the support and welcome. Phil.

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Mike can speak for himself, but I did not take it that he was implying that you were the previous vendor.....only that a previous guy did collect money for this same project and nothing ever came of it.  He's simply saying that he won't let another "deposit" scenario happen again.  

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If you are implying I was the previous "vendor" then you are off course mate.

 

 

 

Jesus, calm down. Maybe my post was too subtle for you... so, no, not you. I have no idea who you are, I'm only pointing out that bad things have happened to our members in the past that I don't want repeated. 

 

I encourage any technical discussion on making rare impossible parts. If you can build a better mousetrap, do so. It's part and parcel of owning a vintage vehicle. Mklotz70, ]2eDeYe, BEEBANNI and others make and sell their products but they have to pre-exist before they are sold here. That's all I'm saying. 

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Marouk....

 

First, Welcome to Ratsun! Let's get that out there right away.

 

As someone who spent considerable time looking into making these vent rubbers, which will fit nothing else except a 312 as far as i know, I for one am grateful that you are considering making some very rare parts available again, and that you seem to want to make every effort to make a quality part available. Please keep my email handy (I will PM you) as while I have sold my 320, it only meandered down to my buddies garage, and it still needs vent rubbers. Please keep in touch with me on that issue.

 

I sold the 320 to buy a 521 or a 620 KC. I studied the aforementioned debacle and hellish development of King Cab gaskets with horror from afar, but at least for a while there new gaskets were finally available.

 

I had partly ruled out getting a 521 because at that time there were no quality 521 vent rubbers. Now, thankfully, we were able to buy some and the 69 521 I bought has a set.

 

As in any car forum, Ratsun has some flakes, some great people, and some hilarious people. I have been privileged to meet a few people off this forum, and I have benefited from the kindness and advice of several people whom I may never get to meet in person.

 

Hang in there. One of the greatest things about this forum is that a lot of people share pics and talk about their builds, and share not only their successes, but to my mind more importantly, their failures and struggles as they try to either keep their cars and trucks running, make them more reelable, or tastefully McGuyver some solution to improve them to to deal with situations where parts are no longer available.

 

Some people on here are fearless about modifying wild and totally whack bits of other cars into their Datsun-based creations. When I read dome of these threads, I don't know if I should have that Johnny Cash song "One piece at a  time" playing in the background or if I mentally hear banjos are people try to avoid winning Darwin Awards, but it is all good.

 

There are some world class fabricators on here. And then there are people like me, who grew up destroying 510s on the track (once just on the way to the track) when they were new. I have LIMITED mechanical talent, but I listen to everybody and try to learn from my mistakes and theirs.

 

Please carry on. And if your 320 build was anything at all like Bob3's MX520, you gotta post pics, dude.

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Beyond Ted I'm not taking pre-orders. I'm not looking for funding. I'm not even offering to add names to lists that don't exist so when I have a result you can be first in line. I simply offered where I am up to and where I am currently blocked on progressing. Heck I think I even said if someone beats me to it that's fine.

 

I understand you might not want the burden of making a bunch of these or the headache of selling them but I wonder if there's a way to leverage your efforts in a way that might be able to help all of us out here in need of gaskets. I'm not sure what that'd look like I'm just posing the question. 

 

The wicked problem is, even though there's a bunch of us probably willing to pay up for a set its still probably a loosing financial venture. 

 

Regardless, thank you for your work on the project. 

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Make one set, post pics of product and mould, and enjoy a small avalanche of orders. You will for sure sell a dozen sets to the diehards who just need these to complete their projects. Now, if you are willing to do these out of sheer perseverance and sell them for somewhere around $300 a set, you will sell some. When I was really looking into this, I had about 30 semi-serious sounding people indicate that they would pay $200 a set.

 

Here's he thing. Stock engine. Beater. Restored. Re-engined or swapped show car. Unless you want to spend far more money converting to one piece windows, what else are you gonna do? You probably need a set of vent window rubbers. And a dedicated handful of enthusiasts will pay for new quality vent rubbers and be your new best friends:) 

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Mid 80s Mazda B2000 trucks wing window gaskets can be made to work, it will take effort to make them work, one might even be able to make a decent set out of the Mazda bottom and front angled upright and the Datsun 320 rear upright piece glued together, or if one cut the rear upright piece out of the Mazda wing window frame and welded it into the L320 wing window frame as the L320 frames are regular metal while the Datsun NL320, U320, and the V320 all have stainless steel frames.

There are photos of the Mazda gaskets in a NL320 frame on page 2 of this thread, I also discuss how the Mazda gasket is not quite tall enough but it will work, if one had 2 sets of them wing window gaskets I am sure it would be easy to cut them up and make one set that was tall enough, but that rear upright piece still presents an issue, there is no way to connect it to a 320 wing window frame without modifying something.

 

To see the photos below and on page 2 of this thread you have to load the embed fix extension for what ever browser you are using, Chrome and Firefox both have these fixes for sure, I don't know about the other browsers.

Here is the chrome embed fix https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwiIq_iJtc3WAhUD4WMKHYk8A04QFggoMAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fchrome.google.com%2Fwebstore%2Fdetail%2Fphotobucket-embed-fix%2Fnaolkcpnnlofnnghnmfegnfnflicjjgj%3Fhl%3Den&usg=AFQjCNFPUKgOhKNwHZGLUVlCZzSjLnboGg

Here is the add on for Firefox/Mozilla  https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjf_KKstc3WAhUK5WMKHRbsALAQFggoMAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Faddons.mozilla.org%2Fen-US%2Ffirefox%2Faddon%2Fphotobucket-embedded-fix%2F&usg=AFQjCNFElK-lZKiG-MKwDEbkOv2J94x6NQ

 

Below in the photo you can see how the gasket is trying to pull away from the wing window frame

DSCN0299.jpg

Here you can see it does fit

DSCN0287.jpg

The guy back east made a set of these Mazda gaskets work, but you cannot buy them new either as far as I know, the only reason these were an option was because back in 2012(5 years ago) these Mazda's were still showing up in the wrecking yards with decent rubber pieces, it has been a while now since I actually seen one of these Mazda's in the wrecking yards, but I don't go there a lot anymore either.

The biggest issue with the Mazda gasket is the rear upright as there is no way to connect the rubber to the wing window frame without a major modification.

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Make one set, post pics of product and mould, and enjoy a small avalanche of orders. You will for sure sell a dozen sets to the diehards who just need these to complete their projects. Now, if you are willing to do these out of sheer perseverance and sell them for somewhere around $300 a set, you will sell some. When I was really looking into this, I had about 30 semi-serious sounding people indicate that they would pay $200 a set.

 

Here's he thing. Stock engine. Beater. Restored. Re-engined or swapped show car. Unless you want to spend far more money converting to one piece windows, what else are you gonna do? You probably need a set of vent window rubbers. And a dedicated handful of enthusiasts will pay for new quality vent rubbers and be your new best friends:) 

I would bet that more interested parties would come calling if they knew the parts were available. I sold my green 320 to you (Eric) for the simple reason that I could no longer keep it alive without knowing that I had indoor storage for it. When the rain would wash down the inside of the door panel (the custom upholstered, beautifully crafted factory recreations) it broke my heart and I knew I couldn't maintain it any longer, unless i grew the size of my shop. So in a nutshell, I sold my 320 because of the lack of new window rubbers.

 

If the window rubbers became available, I would run right out and buy another 320.

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3D Printing?

Stumbling block is needing a decent 3d model of the rubber. No one has one that they are willing to share as far as I know.

 

Otherwise you could print it out of several available flexible filaments (ex:Ninjaflex) or have it printed for you. Not sure how long it would last outside (ways around this) but the ease of doing it would more than make up for it.

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Guys have tried this (other car makes) and not had success. It does not hold up well to UV, or so I'm told.

Really depends on the material used at this point, and If you are going hobby level or pro-grade. Hobby level, yeah throw some black elastomeric paint on it and expect it to only last a few years, pro-grade SLS rubber, should be quite a bit different. But realistically, an OK solution for most people with 320s would probably be a big improvement over nothing, and frankly most 320s at this point are probably more babied then beat on.
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Just throwing out ideas, but if someone had a drawing of the window rubbers (parts book etc) and the dimensions, a 3D auto CAD drawing could be made. That could be used with the 3D printer.......

 

I was watching on Lenos Garage a while back he and (his crew) were making car parts that were NLA including a auto H20 pump using 3D printers

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Lol, I used to work with one of those printers and that 3D scanner, in one of these threads I have pictures of me bending the flexible rubber filament test sample, I'll try to find and repost it.

 

Edit:

NpisGJs.jpg

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My point in raising this topic from the dead was to point out that you could use the 3D printer to help with the mold making process. 3D print one example and test fit it. If it fits, then move on to 3D printing the mold. From there we could send the 3D printed mold (and the file) to a mold making company, like my friend in AZ, and have a mold made in aluminum. From there, having them poured is the easy part.

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My point in raising this topic from the dead was to point out that you could use the 3D printer to help with the mold making process. 3D print one example and test fit it. If it fits, then move on to 3D printing the mold. From there we could send the 3D printed mold (and the file) to a mold making company, like my friend in AZ, and have a mold made in aluminum. From there, having them poured is the easy part.

 

There has been some very cool stuff coming out recently with SLS of metal/steel/titanium/etc.. parts that would (cost not withstanding) let you directly 3D print the final mold. I think cost being the object mostly at this point, but I could see this getting way cheaper in the near future.

 

But seriously, does anyone want to move forward with this to doing the CAD work to design the 3D part?

 

Even if we can knock out some low quality parts on some home printers I believe that might make a big difference. Honestly, a cheap but sort of OK seal might be very useful for some people. Personally, I would like to try 3D printing a PLA mold and trying some reinforced silicone casting for a replacement part just to see if it works (I'm on year 5 of some black silicone I cast in place to fix missing pieces of my window seals, still holding strong).

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