Sh!ts and Giggles 510

[Draker]

Welcome back!

[510T]

Thanks Draker!  It is good to be back, better to be driving my Datsun!  It's on the road and hope to get back to the track soon.  I have a few things to do first...

 

I need to drill the hat bolts and safety wire my new brakes:

 

 

So I can run my new wheels up front:

 

 

...and about a million other things! lol

[Draker]

Oh nice! Those look like they will perform well. What struts are you running up front?

[510T]

On 5/9/2020 at 11:49 PM, Draker said:

Oh nice! Those look like they will perform well. What struts are you running up front?

 

Struts are Infiniti M30, same same as late Z31 turbo or S12 V6 but with 4 lug hubs and floating rotors.

 

Not much to update, I've just been driving it as much as I can before I take it to get exhaust fixed.

 

 

Night cruise!  Before the curfews 😉

 

[510T]

Off the back burner, now on a side burner lol.

 

Is this the year? Time will tell!

 

 

[510T]

Very old oics from the Legend @INDY510

 

 

 

 

Working at getting it back on track, literally.  Lots of issues from sitting but I am making progress.

[510T]

I'm glad I have those nice pictures because I recently had an incident.  Forgot to latch the hood and went for a drive 😞  I smashed it up pretty good.

 

 

It bent both wiper arms and blew up the blades, also got a nice dent in the cowl.  My hood got bent pretty bad.

 

 

Pretty bummed out.  A few weeks later, I put out a post on the gram asking if anyone local had a hood.  Within a few hours I had one lined up thanks to an old HS classmate and his brother.  Thanks guys!  We made arrangements to go pick it up the next weekend.  I was ready to take just about anything as long as it was straight.   Magically I found a pretty great condition hood half buried in leaves behind a stack of doors.  Got it home and cleaned it up over the next week.

 

Fresh out of the leaf pile:

 

After a thorough wash:

 

My first time trying to care about paint:

 

It came out better than I could have hoped!  The plan is to wrap it.  That plan has been sidetracked because I haven't been able to get it to fit. My hinges were obviously bent so they came off and repops from Z car depot got installed.  Still no dice.  The hood is too far back and crooked to the drivers side.  All adjustments have been maxed so I am contemplating my next move.

 

At the same time this was going on I had been working through sorting out the brakes.  I couldn't get them bled for the life of me, then when I finally got some pedal the front calipers were gradually locking up as I drove.  Replaced the MC, bled again and the brakes are good!  Finally a win.  It was after this small victory with the brakes that the hood incident occurred.

 

I was cruising around for a few days uncomfortably hoodless when my clutch pedal went to the firewall on a 1-2 shift.  No leaks, so I figured the MC was roached from sitting with old fluid all these years.  I limped the car home and ordered a replacement.  It was delayed, and turns out I ordered the wrong part :). New part ordered and was also delayed, then I casually snapped my clutch line A/N adapter in the MC.  I couldn't save it so had to order a third master and a new adapter.  Got them installed and the pushrod was too long.  Pushrod is now trimmed and the system is ready to fill and bleed.  

 

Lots of real life happening around the car so progress is slow.  The goal is a (successful) track day before the end of this year...

 

 

[Stoffregen Motorsports]

I had the hood pins in my 510 race car come out during a race once. I watched the first one fly off, then watched the second one vigilantly wiggling back and forth until it hit the windshield on its way by. Then I braced for impact... The hood flying up broke the windshield and I had to make it to pit lane by taking down the driver window net and sticking my head out to see.

 

Sucks when shit like that happens to a nice car.

[Draker]

Yeah pretty lucky the windshield survived. I've heard this story so many times with hood pins. 😞

[Will]

Would you possibly be up for a hood trade? I'm trying to find a decent hood for my car in that color (...though this one is the wrong blue for you!)

[510T]

Yeah I am definitely lucky it happened at low speed, the windshield already has a crack but really glad it didn't turn out worse. 

 

Will,  I could possibly be open to a trade but I have a bit of time and some $ wrapped up in this one already...  Feel free to hit me up on IG @510Tyler, I would be interested to see some more pics of your hood if you want.

[510T]

We are back from page 8! 

 

New Clutch, new master/slave, pivot, lever arm, rear main, upper oil pan resealed, etc.  I diagnosed my clutch failure from a while back as an issue of overextending the throw out bearing.  The lever arm had cracked and was flexing to the point that it wouldn't work anymore.

 

Ready to slide the unit in!

 

 

After having done this a handful of times I have found it much easier to lift the car and slide the engine and trans in from the bottom.

 

 

With help from a couple good friends it went in smoothly!

 

 

[510T]

Out and about!  

 

 

The car wasn't running too good.  Very rich and possibly some boost leaks.  I ordered and installed some replacement injectors as I had determined that at least one was leaking heavily.  After popping those in and monkeying around with my charge pipes it has slowly gotten better.  At this point it is running decently, but not quite as well as it was once upon a time.  I figure (and have been told by everyone I know) the ECU is at it's limit and the car is way overdue for a standalone.  That will likely be the next big mod. 

 

 

Now that I had it running, I reached out to a friend and got set up with a really cool body guy to get my hood back on.  He killed it and not only was it done quickly but the price was super reasonable as well.  It definitely took some finessing but it fits pretty well and latches just like it should.  I am stoked to have a hood on again, even with the mismatch.  I had also dropped off my original hood to get straightened out and will be picking that up soon.

 

 

I had done a couple other little things to the car in this time too.  One was finally buying and installing an insanely cheap plug and play headlight harness with relays from amazon.  Combined with a fresh set of lights I am now enjoying adequate light!  One of those things I should have done years ago.  I also purchased and installed a universal clutch pedal stop from Serial9.  This should eliminate the issue I had with overextension.

 

Next up was the longest drive in years, to Datslocos!  2ish hours there, 3+ hours back in traffic and pretty warm temps.  The biggest issue I had was a left arm sunburn lol.  The car ran great but only got about 22mpg.

 

 

 

 

I didn't take any pics at the show but I was able to make a few bucks to put back into the car. 🙂

It feels so good to be back in the drivers seat.  

 

[510T]

Datsun has been on one lately!

 

Trip to the coast with my friend in his NX2000

 

 new Koni inserts and 350lb front springs!

 

cat couch

 

 

 

Edited August 6, 2025 by 510T

[510T]

Late night cruising

 

 

 

Edited August 6, 2025 by 510T

[510T]

The car is running pretty good.  Still some small issues like wanting to die at stops and random erratic AFRs, but it has been improving with more miles.  I recently obtained a Link G4X PNP ECU and new 740cc injectors and will get that all installed and tuned at some point.  I go in for knee surgery tomorrow and am facing a substantial recovery time so there won't be any progress for a few months. 

 

Last oic for now... 😉

[510T]

Knee surgery (Osteochondral Allograft- recovery/ PT was brutal!) was a success and I have been Datsuning hard! A little too hard? Lol.

 

I got the Link installed!  FLI in Santa Rosa took great care of my car.  They installed a top feed fuel rail with ID1050x injectors, removed the MAF and installed an IAT in the charge pipe before tuning the car to about 290ish WHP, 265 WTQ at ~12psi. It is a lot of fun and running great!

 

 

 

Next up was an alignment with the one and only @Bustanut !  He was able to dial it in, the alignment was super whack so really glad to get that sorted.  He also found a few too many loose fasteners... 😕

 

 

I went to a couple cars and coffee events and a BBQ with the crew, very good times!

 

 

Next up was getting back on track!  I booked a spot at Thunderhill West and was lucky enough to get trailered up by a good friend.

 

Thunderhill was amazing, but I left early with a couple small issues.  My 15 year old epoxy repaired rad was leaking (just distilled water) as was my rear brake circuit at the connection to the master. 

 

 

I definitely had fun and hope to get back out on track at least once more this year!

 

I was able to get a new rad fabricated from a Summit Racing supplied Griffin, Special Technique Fab in Santa Rosa did an excellent job on it.

 

 

Things have been a little bumpy lately.  Before I had the car tuned I installed a surge tank and 400lph inline pump.  That was a whole ordeal lol.  After ECU install the pumps wouldn't shut off correctly. I dealt with it for a while but after the track day I was over it.  I rewired my fuel pumps to turn on and off correctly with the key and killed something in the car in the process.  No start! I was fearful I damaged the Link so I had the car towed back to FLI.  It turns out I burned the starter wire, so it was a relatively cheap mistake lol.  I also had a small problem with the rad and had to take it back to Luke at Special Technique to weld around the filler neck. It was nothing he did, apparently they tend to leak there. 

 

Last night I got the rad back in and filled, I'll be driving it again next week!  

 

Edited April 25 by 510T
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