Leaderboard

Everything I've heard - having talked to several people who worked for Datsun UK at the time - points to there being very little actual choice when customers were ordering HS30s in advance. It seems that, for most dealerships, cars were turning up from Japan and were distributed with a 'luck of the draw' on body colour. The customer would only be able to choose to state a preference, and then choose from what came into stock. Some of the bigger dealerships had more cars and therefore more colour choice per batch. Interior colours were fixed by exterior colours. I've only ever seen Brown interiors in a couple of UK market HS30s, and they were both #907 Green exterior colour. One of the ex salesmen for a reasonably large Datsun UK dealership told me that he'd had more than one potential customer give up on buying an HS30 because it took too long to get them what they wanted in terms of body colour.

Have you got the vinyl swatch page in your 'R-Drive' Export part catalogue Kats? Here's the illustration 103 page from my earliest 'R-Drive' Export parts catalogue, which has actual vinyl swatches for the Black and Brown seat vinyl textures. Blue colour is listed, but no swatches. I have never seen an original Blue interior in a UK market car and only one or two Brown. Normal colour was Black.

As i've said before Kats, this is such a gem of a thread to the forum.

Hi Kats, Here are the parts numbers from the 11/69 North American parts catalog.

Got the timing cover off today. Driving in the double ended sheet rock knife blades all the way around, followed by the gasket scraper gave me enough gap that I could whack the distributor housing and lower radiator housings with a 4# hammer plus a wood 1"x2" block alternately and slowly walk it off. Whew! The three sheared water pump bolts were all proud of the block by 10mm+ so used some pen oil, hammer shock, MAP cylinder then vice grips slowly back and forth, until they all yielded. Whew!! Although the timing cover came OFF w/o destroying the head gasket or oil pan gasket, not confident about reinstalling the cover w/o screwing up one or both of them. Maybe should remove the rest of the oil pan bolts, lowering it and moving it out of the way slightly. Then install the timing cover with the oil pan last?

I did the same for the harness I redid, but I did it with all the wires so I didn't have to heat or stretch the boot. I haaaave done that in the passed, but I find it's best to do it near a sink so you can cool the rubber down if you get it too hot too quickly. it will "freeze" it in its current shape and not let it get too goopy. But on the Z that wasn't a problem for me because de-pinning the connectors on these is so easy if you are used to it. They're actually the easiest automotive connectors to de-pin across all makes and models. I also used the right width electrical tape instead of the standard/generic 3/4" electrical tape so the wrap would be identical to the original. 3/4" tape gets a bit too bulky or "spirally" IMHO but that's not something many people would notice anyhow, but I likes what I likes. I also had harness tags printed to match the originals for all the harness tabs, and also some other years. I matched the font and glyphs to what I would say is 98.9% accuracy based on reverse engineering the leading/spacing/tracking of each digit and the one preceding it. The only difference being that some fonts were a tad bit bolder, but luckily I had a license from a font from the same series (not quite exact, but same typeface, just different era) from a design job I did long time ago. Most wouldn't be able to tell the difference without having both beside one another anyway. They were then printed on the correct thickness vinyl and I affixed them using the OE over-wrap technique. Also, there were two or three wires on the harness that had large plastic sheath on them that are not available, though at the time I was going to buy some to test that I think I found to be the right ones- but they were tinted green. I also noticed that Yazaki provided their own wire too at the time, which I thought was cool: I almost forgot, there are some cheap dollar store electrical tape rolls that have the perfect shade for each additional "marker" colour like green, blue, red, and yellow, which were placed on the harnesses at various points too. Just remember that if anyone is going to attempt to colour match... unroll the tape first, it gets about 5 shades darker under the first wrap if it hasn't been exposed to sunlight or heat. Never had the chance to look into what each colour signified or if they were mentioned anywhere in the FSM, but I just put them anyway: The wiring is so simple on these cars, it's actually an enjoyable experience to redo and have piece of mind- and you can safely clip each wire at the very end of its factory crimp and put on a new terminal with new brass and sheaths and it will still reach all the terminating points since they weren't super tightly placed to begin with. The larger width tape helps it flex a bit better too.

Just drove it! Got a ignition problem fixed and made a club run with a local car club

I ended up buying a small torque wrench, which helped dial in the bearing pre load on the R180. Worked great.

I concur, only seen one brown interior on a UK market HS30, many years ago. And the "choice" (lack of) other interior colours on the RS30 carried onto the UK cars too. Mine must of been one of the few that originally came with blue seats (to go with metallic blue exterior paint), which were swapped out just before I brought it (and sold the seats on). Hindsight is wonderful. I owned a Feb. 1980 first registered RS30 (build date was around late 1977 if I recall) and I think it sat at the UK dealers for that long because it was a sick tan/yellow colour, and nobody wanted it. I haven't seen the colour on any othe RS30. We were poorly served by Nissan UK then.

Brilliant pics guys!

Kats let me check the AU parts manual also. On the topic of interior colours I find it fascinating that home market cars never got the Blue / Red / Tan interiors. Did they get white? Any idea why not? Was it considered too lairy for the home market customers? Even today with Nissan I see examples of unique interiors on cars they produce. I recently bought an Autech car which has a different interior (similar to the Skyline GTRs) which didn't appear on the other models. I like it, but because of you Kats I now want to keep everything as original as possible on my cars and I have got seat covers etc.. to protect all the original materials. So in another 10-15 years people like us will be able to appreciate the original cars.

Always remember, Google is your friend. Do a google search for "CSI Panasport Wheels" and see the many pictures. Dennis, An Old timer

Bolts torqued and bearings pressed. I also got the pinion seated. I had to buy a smaller Torque wrench for the bearing pre load. Seating the bearings for the pinion was a giant pain but I got it. I love owning s press.

Is it the rubber mat material that was used on the early cars instead of carpet?

Night driving with light intensity meter on windscreen at eye level and data collection instruments on rear deck? Hmmm second thought is sound and vibration monitoring. Here is another helmeted tester on a turning circle with sensors in wheel:

Sounds great! Come on back here to the Ozarks! This will be the largest assemblage of Scarabs ever to gather in one spot for a Zcon. This may also be the largest assemblage of flat top carbed Z'z ever to gather in one spot for a Zcon! July isn't that far off and would really like to see you again Rich, meet and greet Bob and this beautifully restored 73 Z!!!

I have those - homemade style. A bag of cheap hockey pucks with a slot milled thru them. The bag had 12 pucks so I was able to give a set to a couple of buddies. They also work perfectly with jack stands to get the entire car off the ground.

Thanks bud. Maybe I will keep her around for this years car show circuit where I live. I as invited to show her in the collectible cars section of the HOuston Auto Show this year. So that will be fun. Love to take her out on sunny days and just go nowhere. It is amazing to hear those webers sing with the top down. Will probably use bring a trailer when the time comes. I may also give the original owner a chance to buy her back.