cw240z Posted November 27, 2015 Report Share Posted November 27, 2015 Hi everyone, I've been in the Datsun community for awhile now and figured it was time to post my current project. I came across this 2 door when I met the previous owner at a local swap meet. For anyone on here who's from or lives in Texas you know Datsuns are very scarce in junk yards and swap meets. That being said, you stick out wearing any kind of Datsun clothing which is how I was able to find out about this car. It's a 1972, originally 068 yellow, and a one owner car purchased new at Trophy Nissan here in Dallas, Texas. I found it like this with no engine or trans out in a cow pasture near Ennis, Texas. Previous owner had ripped out the entire interior with intentions to restore the car. That fell through and everything was chunked back inside the car Overall it was a pretty clean and honest car. With the exception of the drivetrain it was complete and only had moderate rust problems in the floors and quarters. Quote Link to comment
datzenmike Posted November 27, 2015 Report Share Posted November 27, 2015 Nice first post. Welcome to Ratsun. Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Dug up a set of spare wheels and drug the shell back home. Now the fun begins! Since the car basically is a shell my plans are to start from the underside and work my way up. I wasn't too concerned with originality since the original L16 engine was long gone, so sourcing a clean KA or SR will be in the future plans. Under the hood wasn't too bad, Minor surface rust, but no serious cancer. Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Battery tray removed, holes filled, and new seam sealer applied. Fresh coat of 068 yellow! Since I had the grille out I figured it would be a good time to clean it up. Surface rust had killed almost all the chrome and after blasting it and painting it in a gray sealer. I liked the color so for now I'll leave it like that. 1 Quote Link to comment
datsunfreak Posted November 28, 2015 Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Glad to see you finally doing a build thread on this. :thumbup: Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Found some kid with big plans for his s13 and sold me his rebuilt KA24DE, 5 speed, and all the wiring for $300! New clutch, eBay short shifter, and a freshened up block and head. Engine cleaned up pretty well 2 Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Glad to see you finally doing a build thread on this. :thumbup: Yep! Figured I'd get a bunch of photos in and then post it all at once. :D Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 It's nice starting from a clean canvas. I tried to clean up everything that was being reassembled back on the car before the engine goes in. Engine and trans went in smoothly without scratching the fresh paint B) 2 Quote Link to comment
paradime Posted November 28, 2015 Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Wow, can't believe you got that motor with trans for $300. What a great way to start. I like the look of a blacked out grill on a 510. It updates the car while being respectful of originality. While you still have easy access, you may want to consider installing a brace on your steering box. It really helps stiffen up the play in the 510's steering. Best of luck on the rest Quote Link to comment
datsunfreak Posted November 28, 2015 Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 While you still have easy access, you may want to consider installing a brace on your steering box. This build is a bit further along than the photos indicate. ;) 1 Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Wow, can't believe you got that motor with trans for $300. What a great way to start. I like the look of a blacked out grill on a 510. It updates the car while being respectful of originality. While you still have easy access, you may want to consider installing a brace on your steering box. It really helps stiffen up the play in the 510's steering. Best of luck on the rest Yes I'd definitely like to do something about that. Most likely deal with the bracing when I rebuild the rest of the steering components. This build is a bit further along than the photos indicate. ;) I'm slowly getting all the details together and posting in one place! Much more to come B) Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Next to deal with was the trunk where the previous owner cut out the spare wheel tub and planned on installing a mustang fuel tank. Since I have two 510 fuel tanks in really nice shape I decided to not run an aftermarket system. Fortunately no major cancer was in the trunk of this car! Scored a perfect spare wheel tub from a friend building a BRE 510. Sliced, welded, seam-sealed, and primered. Ready for some color Finally color! 3 Quote Link to comment
scooter stuff Posted November 28, 2015 Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Nice work! Quote Link to comment
Lockleaf Posted November 28, 2015 Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 it's real purdy. :). Nice work Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Thanks for the positive feedback! I'll definitely need some advise when I get to the electrical side of this project. Once the trunk was cleaned up next on my list was fixing the floor pans. Fortunately for me the floors were pretty solid with a few pin holes around the drain plugs behind the front seats. I really wanted to keep the stamped patterns of the factory floor pans, but it didn't look like I could get replacement panels at the time. In my searching I came across this floor pan restoration kit from Eastwood. The kit uses fiberglass mat, which I know some of you may cringe at but hear me out. Instead of using a resin to bond the fiberglass together, you use POR-15 which also kills all the rust and provides a nice barrier from the elements. For me the kit worked great. Since I didn't have any structural rust issues this looked like a good opportunity to test out the kit. I was able to treat all the rust in my floor pans, fix the pin holes around the drain plugs, and add some rigidity to the floors as well. I drilled out the drain holes and from the underside it looked all factory. The mat laid down nicely and followed the factory floor pans perfectly. It's also a very fine fiberglass mat, so you don't see a bunch of chopped fiberglass when it's done. Of course having an all metal floor pan would be the best choice, but I'm pretty happy with how this came out. Once the sound deadener and carpet get put in you'll never know the difference! Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 After getting the top of the floor cleaned up I turned my attention to the underside. The car had several layers of undercoating applied to it throughout the years. It had also been sitting in that field for over 15 years so it was in pretty sorry shape when I got to it. What was left of the rear suspension is sitting beside it ready to be blasted and painted. Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 I really like the factory look of having the underside of the car textured in the body color, similar to how this 240z was done After searching what was out there I came across this tintable bedliner kit from U-POL. It comes with everything you need to spray, just add 10% of your choice of color to the bottle. After several long nights of media blasting the underside of the car and applying a POR-15 rust inhibitor primer, the four bottles of Raptor liner covered just enough to do from the firewall to the trunk. It lays down very easy on the car and you can always go back over it to get an even texture or to spot in a scratch in the future. It's also a very messy job, I wouldn't recommend doing it in a garage, or even a paint booth. Quote Link to comment
fisch Posted November 28, 2015 Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Love getting a project dump right out the gate! Like catching a season of a show in one weekend. Look forward to next season. 3 Quote Link to comment
banzai510(hainz) Posted November 28, 2015 Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Found some kid with big plans for his s13 and sold me his rebuilt KA24DE, 5 speed, and all the wiring for $300! Icehouse on here gets those deals. Just waits like a predator for a weak one to fall behind then strikes!!!!!!!!!!!! car looks good I found him a 1st gen KA for free kid said it was bad. Jeff changed the spark plugs and ran fine!!!!!!!!!!! Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 Found some kid with big plans for his s13 and sold me his rebuilt KA24DE, 5 speed, and all the wiring for $300! Icehouse on here gets those deals. Just waits like a predator for a weak one to fall behind then strikes!!!!!!!!!!!! car looks good I found him a 1st gen KA for free kid said it was bad. Jeff changed the spark plugs and ran fine!!!!!!!!!!! Nice!! I was pretty happy with the deal. I haven't heard this one run yet but from what I can tell there shouldn't be any surprises. Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 One of the details of this project I've been working on lately is platting the original hardware on this car myself. Normally you have to disassemble everything you want to have platted, clean it as best you can, send it off to some shop to do it, and pray that you get everything back you paid to have platted. That didn't go as planned for me, the shop I used lost several unique parts to my SU linkage. I figured there had to be a better way to go about getting that yellow zinc finish at home. I had also tried the three rattle cans of different hues to get the effect, but that just looked like cheap plastic. Searching the internet I found a company who sold a DIY platting kit that could be used to plate parts in a blue, yellow, or green zinc chromate finish depending on your setup. The whole patting process is very basic and easy to do. I try to soak whatever parts that need platting in a cup of Evaporust over night to strip them down to a clean and bare surface. Then its a matter of stringing the parts up and hooking them to a power source. You set them in a solution with pure zinc in order to give the yellow coating a surface to adhere to. Everything is based off of surface area. Once a good zinc coating has formed you wash the parts off and dunk them into the yellow solution for 25-30 seconds. Then BAM! Freshly platted parts done in no time! The gas cap looked like complete crap before I platted it. It's a pretty user friendly system to work with in order to get the right shades of yellow on your parts. Also work in a well ventilated area! In total I'm in at around $200 for all the supplies and equipment to do this. If you keep things clean than it should last a very long time. I've platted just about everything possible under the car that came from the factory that way. Definitely worth the money! 1 Quote Link to comment
cw240z Posted November 28, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 I'd be happy to post where I purchased everything and how I have set this system up. It makes a huge difference to the appearance of any part of your car. Quote Link to comment
datsunfreak Posted November 28, 2015 Report Share Posted November 28, 2015 I'd be happy to post where I purchased everything and how I have set this system up. It makes a huge difference to the appearance of any part of your car. I would start another thread in general discussion with all that info so more people see it. :thumbup: Quote Link to comment
sebpv Posted November 29, 2015 Report Share Posted November 29, 2015 Ive got the stuff too, Im a bit leery about the hardware as there is no easy way to bundle them for plating. Do u have a solution? Also what is ur preferred way to show bare metal? I have a blasting cabinet nearby I can access but Im not a fan of the finish... Quote Link to comment
Draker Posted November 29, 2015 Report Share Posted November 29, 2015 I'd be happy to post where I purchased everything and how I have set this system up. It makes a huge difference to the appearance of any part of your car. I would start another thread in general discussion with all that info so more people see it. :thumbup: YESSSSSS 2 Quote Link to comment
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