HS30-H

It's OK Kats, I was only joking about European mainland testing - although we know that did come later, and that a rally test car was certainly in the south of France in January 1970. Of course, Belgian 'pavé' surface was always one of the auto industry testing standards. Many test courses include a pavé section. It's very harsh to drive on, and hurts the driver just as much as the car. I had to take a short cut across a section of pavé at the Longcross test course here in the UK (it was for a magazine photo shoot) and immediately my interior mirror fell off...! Here's a clip from the film you mentioned, showing one of the disguised test cars on that Belgian pavé surface at Oppama:

Carl, If you think the 'Fairlady Z 160' emblems were a reference to the L16 then you are already barking up the wrong tree. As was noted in the source of the original photo, the '160' referred to the 160PS rating of the S20 (G8B) twin cam engine. I very much doubt that any emblems were produced for the (single...) L16-engined prototype, as it was soon dropped. Kats, GREAT stuff from Uemura san! Thank you. Remember we talked some time ago about the rumours of an early prototype being tested in mainland Europe? Seems it was true... I think we know what happened to the LHD S20-engined car, don't we...?!

Many people, on several different forums, have been telling you about the L20A / L20(a) / L20 thing for months. So what happened? Did you hear the same story from your favourite 'expert', and only then did you believe it? And you wonder why people feel frustrated to deal with you...

Kerrigan, you're like some kind of Cicada. You seem to spend months under ground, then emerge, climb a tree and make a lot of noise. I can't understand how you can have owned your car for so long and yet know so little about it and its siblings. Does everything go in one ear and then straight out of the other? We've told you plenty about your car and the Fairlady Z / Z-L in general over the years, and yet nothing seems to stick. As I'm sure I've explained to you before - either on this forum or on one of the many other forums you seem to pop up on from time to time - the engine in your 1971 Fairlady Z-L was called an 'L20A' by Nissan. The 'L20A' came in single carb form ( as used in umpteen Japanese domestic sedans that you have never heard of ) and in twin carb form, as used in the S30-series Z - which you have heard of - but also in umpteen Japanese domestic sedans that you have (again) never heard of. Read this next part slowly. Read it out loud if it helps. THE TERMS 'L20' AND 'L20A' DO NOT DENOTE WHETHER A PARTICULAR ENGINE WAS SINGLE DOWNDRAUGHT CARB, DUAL CHOKE SINGLE DOWNDRAUGHT CARB OR DUAL CARB TYPE. Is that clear? I don't know if the little factory literature you have accumulated over the years includes one of the engine manuals that covers the different types of L20A engine for the Japanese market, but I assume not. If you refer only to the English language factory manuals that cover the L20A engine then you will - probably - only see single carb versions. Guess why? ( clue: it's not because the twin carb L20A didn't exist... ). The joke's on you old chap. Your car had what Nissan called an 'L20A' engine. It's in all the (Japanese) literature. No need to take my "expert" word for it. Just believe Nissan themselves:

Not officially. But some UK & European dealerships offered their own selection of aftermarket parts for the cars, just like many of the dealerships in the USA & Canada did. 'Wolfrace' was a British company, and Wolfrace slotted alloy wheels were mostly seen on UK market cars.

It's a ( well known ) replica / lookalike, built by staff on J's Tipo magazine in Japan. The whole build - and subsequent exploits, including taking the car over to the USA for one of the national conventions - was covered in the magazine. The 'Flying Feather' was actually Ryuichi TOMIYA's idea, and Ryuichi TOMIYA's design. Katayama - a friend of Tomiya - supported him and was involved in the marketing of the car, which was manufactured by SUMINOE. So once again we see Katayama being given sole credit for something he was not actually responsible for. The video at the beginning of this thread is heartwarming, but it's also a load of old baloney and should be flagged up as such. It's hard to take seriously a production that captions Katayama as "Nissan's first president in the US", and has him stating "I started Nissan Motor Company in the United States." It also has Fred Miller claiming [about Katayama and the "240Z"] that "...that was his baby. He designed that car.....he created it...". This is the kind of garbage that marque and model enthusiasts ought to call out, not heap praise on. Katayama was - still is - a great man and a seminal figure, but giving him credit for things that others did, and building him up into something that he wasn't, is a mistake and ought to be pointed out as such.

Yes, you're right. I don't think I put that very well did I? The L20 six got the 'A' suffix well before the L20 four arrived with the 'B' suffix. The story that was related to me when I looked into this was that it was a case of killing more than one bird with one stone. Yes, they needed to differentiate between the early style L20 six and the updated L20 six, so they started to use an 'A' suffix on the updated design. A good illustration of this was in the factory parts manual for the GC10 Skyline: This had sections for both the 'early' / 'old' type L20 six and the 'new' L20'A', as the earliest GC10s were equipped with the 'old' type L20 sixes, and then they switched to the 'new' L20'A'. It must have been quite confusing at the time to have the same model of car fitted with two versions of what was essentially the 'same' engine. Those first 'new' L20'A's had the 'A' stamped into the pad on the block that carried the engine number. No doubt this was an effort to make sure there was no confusion, but it's possible to see Nissan's period advertising and other technical descriptions not differentiating between the two types. I don't know whether that was deliberate or not? And just a year or so down the line ( late 1969 ) Nissan were churning out what were clearly 'new' type L20As without the 'A' being stamped on the block as part of the engine number. Quite confusing. Again, the story I was told was that the 4-cylinder L20 was 'on the drawing board' - or at least being mooted - during the 1968/9 period when the L20 six was updated, hence the 'A' and 'B'. Even if they were not ready to make it yet, we can imagine that they could see a 4-cylinder L-gata engine of two litre capacity being necessary somewhere in the near future. If that wasn't part of a long-term plan then it would have to be a big coincidence, no? One thing is for sure: Those 'A' and 'B' suffixes did the job of differentiating between the six and the four, and the 'old' and 'new' sixes. But anyway, Kerrigan's Fairlady Z-L was fitted with the 'new' type L20 six, which the factory called an 'L20A' at the time.

Absolutely not. 1969 production: 969 'Domestic' S30-series Z ( Fairlady Z, Fairlady Z-L, Fairlady Z432 and Fairlady Z432-R ) and 543 'Export' ( Datsun 240Z ). Bear in mind that the numbers for the 'Export' units do not discern between different export market models ( a few 'Europe', UK, Australia, NZ etc cars WERE made before the end of 1969 ) even though we know that most of them were North American market models. The Fairlady Z-L for sale in Holland doesn't necessarily look like a 1969-build example to me, as there are many non-1969 build parts on it. The car has clearly been modified. I've asked the vendors to supply the chassis number for this car ( if it WAS a 1969 build, then I'd be interested in buying it ) but they have so far avoided making a clear answer.

As is often the case, this is something we have discussed on this forum - in detail - in the past: http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/misc-s30/14422-home-market-s30-factory-options.html http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/misc-s30/14501-home-market-hs30-options.html

The engine your 1971 Fairlady Z-L left the factory with was called an 'L20A' by Nissan. The 'A' suffix was added to the L20 sixes when the L20 four debuted ( 'L20A' = 6 cyl, 'L20B' = 4 cyl ) in an attempt to avoid confusion. You won't necessarily see the suffix codes written anywhere on the car itself.

In a word, no.

What was an LHD speedo cable doing in the UK? Did it get lost? RHD one is shorter than LHD.

Oh dear, is "The Automobile Capital of the World" suffering from short term memory loss? Electronic test equipment. This is all quite well documented, as are the 'Kaku U' team's activities with the S30-series Z and the 510-series Bluebird before it. We've discussed it here many times before, with Kats bringing a lot of first-hand data and anecdotes from some of the Nissan Shatai 'Kaku U' team members. The test equipment ( data logging, and partly to do with torsional dynamics of the unibody structure ) was exactly the same as that used in the cars in Japan during development and pre-production testing. Rear window defroster was always part of the design and engineering of the S30-series Z, and was available on some ( most! ) Japanese market models from the beginning of production. Some export markets got a somewhat de-contented spec. package thanks to cost-cutting measures and perceived needs... Again, a subject we have discussed in-depth on classiczcars.com in the past.

Yes, the 'net is indeed "full of crap". It's like a Typhoid-infected well at times. It may be a token gesture, but we've spent a lot of time and effort on this forum over the years trying to get the story surrounding our cars right. If there's one place where we should try to get it right, surely it's here? Why should the Goertz Myth be repeated here, of all places? Our well should have clean water in it. So by all means point at the site, but if you know it contains blatant errors then please flag them up. If you don't, it looks like some kind of endorsement. I like the cars and I like driving too ( you think I don't? ). But if more of us were virtual "proof readers" then perhaps we might not have to wade through quite so much nonsense being written - and repeated - about those cars. Other make and marque enthusiast groups don't stand for it, so why should we?

Perhaps you might like to point out the presence of the pot holes to other road users who are following your directions...? You've posted links to similarly flawed articles with no comment in the past. I think it's worth commenting on / querying / correcting the mistakes here ( where better? ) as well as on the original site ( should they actually allow comments to be posted ) as that's the only practical way to promote the truth.

Are you recommending this, Blue? It's yet another short article that makes mistakes. They quote facts and figures for the North American market cars and fail to properly explain the German ( Euro ) market specs. The car in their pictures is one of the 'Vintage Z Program' cars on German license plates ( so it's not even an original German market car ) and appears to be something of a parts hotchpotch, too. "Die 240 Z-Karosse geht auf einen Entwurf von Albrecht Graf Goertz zuruck...." According to whom? According mainly to Albrecht Goertz, that's who. None of the main players in the creation of the S30-series Z attribute even a small part of it to Goertz. The Goertz story relates to another design which never reached production. What a pity we still have to see Goertz getting a namecheck, but no mention of the people who actually were responsible.

I'm 99% sure it's an Izumi. Made by the same people who made the OEM steering wheels for 'our' cars ( Izumi Motor Co. made the 'Datsun Compe' steering wheels too... ) but one of their many aftermarket versions. And I think it's been modified some time in its life too....

The short answer to that is..... absolutely nothing. Never even heard of it! Sorry!

A photo from one of the build-up reports ( issue no.84, dated January 2000 ) shows the same location as the original shot, and some of the build team:

Chris, I'm not a member of that Facebook group so I can't do cavalry charge to come to your aid ( or even Medevac you out of there..... ) but the build of this ( replica ) car was covered comprehensively in J's Tipo magazine in the late 1990s. The fact that the car even appeared at the 2000 Convention in the USA should ring some bells with the nay-sayers. The photo of Katayama san inspecting the car after it had been painted was also in J's Tipo magazine, included in one of the build reports. Proof positive that people ought to at least try to keep original source information with the photos that they right-click-and-save.....

OK, now I remember.... The car was/is a project build by a member of the 'J's Tipo' magazine staff in Japan, and the whole build was covered in the magazine in the late 1990s (!). They even took the car to the 2000 Z Car Convention in the USA. Some scans from J's Tipo magazine. This was issue no.92, dated September 2000:

Chris, It's a replica / 'tribute' car being built in Japan. Covered by one of the magazines, too. I'll see if I can find it and give you a link.

It's not an LY. 'CF-L' is an acronym for 'Cross Flow-L (series)'. It's basically a single-cam RB head converted to run on an L-gata 'block, with dedicated castings and specially machined components. Guy who made it ( them ) in Japan has a blog showing the whole process. ( Edit: Sato san's blog is where you found it..... ).

I think it's a given. A distinct model - quite different in the metal ( and plastic! ) from its siblings - and with somewhere around 25 cars produced for homologation in JAF's 'Prototype' class ( depending which ones you count... ) it has to be the rarest model in the whole S30-series Z range. Think of it as the equivalent of the Porsche 911R - its inspiration - and it starts to make more sense. Next up would have to be the 'ordinary' ( but extraordinary ) PS30 Fairlady Z 432 with around 420-ish built. Then perhaps the other factory 'homologation special' - the HS30-H Fairlady 240ZG with 500 built ( the minimum for FIA Group 4 homologation ) or perhaps slightly more. In terms of distinct factory models that were made to be sold to the general public, I'm sure that the PS30-SB, PS30 and HS30-H are the top three in terms of rarity and current market value. Alan T.

Hardly. Try thinking about the PS30-SB, PS30, HS30-H etc etc before you get into limo territory....