zKars

Got the 4mm thickness ring in there now, bearing pressed on just fine. engines in the car, we’ll see how it goes. I put in an adjustable length slave rod as well so I can tweak free play. I have to say, given all the clutch/ throwout collar combo’s I’ve seen that are quite different from the 92mm ideal (all working just fine), that there is more room for error than we give it credit for. I’m not saying “put anything in there you like, but you can clearly do a bad thing by having too long of a collar, but you can make up a lot if it’s too short by just coming up with a longer slave rod.

I could just make a few spacers and put them underneath the throw out and gain a bit of length. The mounting collar is 14mm high, the bearings are a bit thicker, all the force is on-axis, I bet I could space that bearing out by 6mm (1/4”) and not cause any problems. So. Off the lathe I go. I have some 1.75 OD / 1.5” ID aluminum pipe, need to turn the inside to 40mm ID. The OD is perfect at 1.75mm (45mm)

Working on another engine the other day, assembling a new transmission to the engine, and I checked the throwout bearing collar tab height off the flywheel face to see how close it was to the 92mm ideal. Clutch was working fine when we took it apart. It was short by a good 10-12mm!!! Ok, so I go to the well as it were to look for a longer collar to get it closer to the ideal and low and behold, mother Hubbard’s cupboard is bare. Of longer collars at least. So what’s a guy to do? I’ve been dreaming of making adjustable length collars at some point so I never have to suffer this “no stock” indignity again, but haven’t quite gotten there yet, but I starred at the collar wondering how to make it longer. Cut it in half, machine and weld in a new ring of steel to lengthen it? Sure, I have all day to play that game, not…. Then an idea struck me. I wonder…..

Have to take another apart to look. BTW, no problem getting more of the longer bushings. Haven’t tried to do anything about actually put it in or any other other than restoration re-assembly, but someday I’ll have a few racks with new bushing available.

These should give you all the measurements you need to recreate one. Sorry for the washed off numbers on my cheap cutting board work surface. The last one at the bottom edge is 15

I will measure it up shortly.

Dark green canvas, black webbing, crude sewing. Pretty basic

No findy no-where. 11345-N3000 USA or overseas that I can find. Did a bit of measuring this morning. Front control arm bushings are the right diameter, 35mm OD. and could be pressed into service (sorry). Not exactly the right dimensions but.... They have a 14mm hole rather than the required 10mm hole. The stick out of the two ends of the center tube is too much on on side and not enough on the other, but since you'd have to have a 10/14 bushing made anyway, you could make it the right length, just has to spot welded in place. Over all body length is a bit short, but depending on where you position it in the body of the mount tube, you could put Anyway, there is a way to make these work and get stock rubber in the trans mount. Actually a bit stiffer perhaps, the stock bushing doesn't fill the entire volume with rubber (looks about half), there are some voids, where as the front control arm bushing has solid rubber. And Rockauto shows an aftermarket source from ACDelco for $6.72 CAD!!! A small fortune. About 17 cents USD

Still working out a price, and very tight time wise to make any for awhile with the on-going restorations here. Thinking about $40-$50 per set. I have to make them, then take them to the plater to get the areas that are machined re-coated. The raw parts come from the US, so I get exchange shipping and brokerage fees slapped on, many steps to create, couple of week turn around from the plater. I’ll try to add them to other plater parts to keep the cost of that incremental, but that adds turn around time. Like all custom parts, that seems like a boat load of $$ for a couple of bolts, but that’s the reality.

I really like the look of those bumpers! http://bumperautomobile.com/datsun-bumpers.html Maybe the new bumpers from these guys with their new rubber-less. over riders would make the perfect starting point. Hate to chop up an original if you don‘t have to.

Official release tonight at ZCON. 8 Eastern

I’ve made Wally a set of my “new” reproduction air cleaner hardware. We he gets them, he can report on appearance and functionality. The hex coupling nuts I used are 13mm wrench rather than the stock 14mm, and I make them by threading in an M8 bolt and locking it in place with a thin jam nut and red lock tight. The wing bolts are made from a M6 wing nut and an M8 bolt that has the end removed and turned down and threaded for M6 to attach the wing bolt. Red locktite and torque lock it in place. My reproduction cup washer are included. These are the raw materials. Comparison of an OEM wing bolt (top) and mine. Ears are dang close to the same size and shape wize. Slightly different surface finish.

Took a couple more close up pics of the new bushing.

Quick look at the horde suggests if there are differences they are slight. I did find some that are bent from apparent over tightening, perhaps that accounts for the asymmetry you’re seeing?

I have several rack hold down straps. I’ll look carefully at all of them and report what shape variations i see. The bushings don’t have any unique front/back shape that I’ve noticed, or do they?????

Well an interesting little something showed up in the mail today. This is neither of the above mentioned possible sources for raw materials. This is a real Nissan part. What I did was search for the part number of the right hand longer bushing (48128-78500), rather than the number for the shorter left side that always wears out. Easy to make something shorter….. I got one, let me see how many more are actually available before I reveal my source No sense gets hopes up too high.

I am indeed working on a replacement set of air cleaner hardware. It is not a perfect replica, but is 100% strong and functional as the original. The parts that show (wing nut and cup washer) as close enough to “correct” that most won’t notice without detailed inspection. I have a couple of sets made up if anyone would like to acquire one, let me know

I think its most important to ensure the compressor drive axis is parallel to the crank shaft to make sure the pulleys run true, I was un-aware that the sanden compressor cared much about being level in any plane. Did I miss something in the past Vintage installs I’ve done? I can think of some comment about the ports needing to be vertical ish, or within some degree swing either way of vertical, but it wasn’t all the critical. Depending on how you plan to tighten the belt ,ie are you swinging the compressor in slots in the mounting brackets or using an idler pulley, the compressor will rotate anyway. And yes, as if Derek needs any confirmation, the engine leans 12deg east if you’re driving north.

Assuming the wipers were properly parked when the motor was last turned off, then the first picture shows the correct orientation. The stub arm is in line with the long arm, not doubled back as the seen in the last two pictures. To check after assembly, don’t put the wiper arms on the splines, just turn the motor on and watch it run. Turn it off and let it park. Then put a little masking tape flag on one spline in place of a wiper arm and turn on the motor, and watch the tape flag to see if its doing the right thing when running and when parked. THEN you can feel confident putting the real arms on and letting it run. I have in the past done this wrong, put the wiper arms on and had them crash into the wiper cowl spoiling a nice fresh paint job, so I always use the flag method after re-assembling this mechanism.

I’ve had guys come to me with the fuel supply plumbed into the vent lines, The vent lines T’d and joined to the fuel supply lines, and every other combination of crazy things It’s not like 4-5-6 were dead, they were alive, BUT the imbalance of richness or lean-ness or power was not making the engine run all that bad, it was just making such an interest exhaust note. Anyway, file this one away. Either leave your fuel vents open, or connect them to the air cleaner through hose with an actual hole that does all the way through.

Over about the next 10 seconds, at idle, the engine went from sounding like bad rap concert to the most beautiful symphony orchestra playing a soothing waltz!! The transition was the most astonishing thing I’d ever experienced working on these things. Like I’d laid a hand on it and it’s cancer was cured. I’m sure I heard angels harps too. Well, maybe that was the sound of my breath as I sighed a huge sigh of relief. So the rear vent hose was kinked closed. It was very short and ran out the back of the plate horizontally, then 90 degree up, then 180 back down to the breather nipple. Kinked right there at the 180.

Ok, what madness is this? I touched nothing else, what the **** did I disturb? Ok, what did I do befween the time it ran fine and when it went to crap…. Think….. Well I put the air cleaners on. Notice I said cleaner”S”. They look more or less like this. I did not take pictures of the actual situation. Anyway, These flat pancake air cleaners fit just fine, AND they have a knipple ob the back for a rubber hose to run to the fuel bowl vents. I had faithfully put these back on with the air cleaner bodies of course, good little boy that I am. Little short black vacuum like thick walled hoses. So on spec, with the car idling madly, roaring away, and not from high RPM, I pull the rear fuel vent hose off the top of the fuel bowl. And then the most magical thing happened.

Three minutes later he’s back. And the sound of the thing is something quite atrocious! The exhaust note is distinctly different than when he left. He has this crazy system where the muffler tip is turned down 90 degrees BEHIND the rear valance, which has had the exhaust exit hole filled it. It’s slighty overlappig the underturned lip, so I’m wondering if the exhaust shifted. The exhaust note is now easily TWICE as loud as before and extremely sharp and staccato is how I describe it. Like a 13:1 race engine! Something isn’t right, so I start scratching my head thinking what did I do or forget to put back? It revs up and runs not back, but there is a hint of misfire in the sound. Is it the new rich mixture that’s just burning more distinctly for the first time in a long time, Is it plugs that were burned up from the lean mix that are now misfiring from the new mixture? I change the plugs to some fresh BPR6ES and while it’s a bit smoother, it’s still making the intense racket out the rear.

Greetings! I’m in the sharing mood again, so thought I’d share an episode from the series “I have no idea what just happened, but you won’t believe what the solution was”. Yesterday, local Z owner wants to drop by for an SU tune on a recently acquired late 71. It’s “running” but is overheating and doesn’t run “Well” overall. Suspect mixture too lean or fuel supply lacking. So do the usual, no need to bore you with details, but here is the overview, no order intended. Bowl fuel level Fuel pressure air flow sync linkage evaluation. How many turns down for the knozzles, Nozzles were down 1 turn on the front and 1.5 turns on the rear. Aha. Too simple. Turn them down 2.5 each. As I have decided in the past, got the AFR gauge out finally, stuff it in the tail pipe, 12.5-13 at idle. Much better. That should do it. Get the owner to go for a quick around the block test to see if there is a noticeable change in performance. Goes around the block and comes back with big smile. I could here him enjoying the hell out it, the exhaust is not subtle on the car. Says there is 50 more HP and while it was short drive, the engine temps were much lower than before. We are DONE I say. About this time another friend drops by, so the inevitable conversations ensue and finally I decide the put the air cleaners back on and send the young man on his way. I do so, he starts the car, and it sounds a bit rough, but off he goes.

First I respect the level of effort put into your process. The results are enviable. I will use the screw head reforming idea, thanks for that. Another day, another new thing learned. I am very lucky. I have a plater that does all the prep work for me. I feel like a cheater now…