Captain Obvious

Last thought... I think that welding the buckets to the fenders and removing that seam line is a great improvement to the looks of the car. When done right, of course.

The headlights are removed from behind. Inside the wheel well. So yes... You can remove the headlights without removing the bucket. In fact, there is no "maintenance" reason to ever remove a bucket. Only ever removed when doing bodywork on the car. It is my theory that the only reason the buckets exist in the first place (instead of making the fender and the bucket all one piece) is that Datsun could not manufacture the fender that way. The metal is not able stretch and shrink enough to make that possible. I think that if it were possible, they would have made it all one piece from the factory.

@Mike As the title of this thread suggests... It's hammer time. It's time for you to wield the ban hammer. Wield it like Thor. ☠️ *If you wield a tool or a weapon, you handle it effectively. Picture a gallant knight wielding a sword or a skillful chef wielding a whisk. Or picture Thor. Or Mike.

I have high confidence that Ellison is friends with Patel. In fact, I'm pretty sure they were both born in the same software lab.

@Mike

I really needed one more week to work on the OG before I left for Zcon. Just one more week would have made the whole drive so much less stressful. I would have known that I had a radiator problem and I would have mitigated it before I left. But I lost that week waiting for struts because Amazon screwed up. So here's where I am today. I took the leaky radiator I got at the show to a local radiator shop. They sealed up the leaks and pressure tested it. I swapped it into the car, and.... Driving around with no thermostat, it wouldn't even reach proper temperature!! Way better than what was in there! So just to see where the gauge would land, I put a 160 degree thermostat and went for a drive. It stabilized about here: So next chance I get, I will swap out the 160 for a 180 thermostat and check again to see where the gauge lands. But the bottom line is I'm a whole lot better off than I was with the previous radiator! I blame Amazon. And photobucket.

That's exactly what I did. Perfect!

That little adapter hose with the banjo is great for later round tops with the drain fitting. Same for the float-sync device. If you have earlier carbs without the drain, a little piece of tubing on the bottom of the bowl works. Down side is you can only use it static with the engine off.

Haha!! No, but I learned a new trick... I can hot spot my phone. So I bought a tablet thing device* that can do navigation so now I can GPS on the tablet THROUGH the flip phone. That's also how I was able to take a pic of me drinking beer on the patio at the hotel at Zcon. Hot spot the phone, tablet to the web, and show off my favorite shirt while guzzling beer: *It's a phased out Lenovo thing. Cost $40 closeout. Best forty bucks I've spent in a long time.

Put the tube on and crank the motor over.

Hahahahahahaha!!!!! ☺️ That's awesome!

Wait... I'm supposed to have straps under the seat bottom? So THAT'S what those stiff crusty things hanging down were supposed to be!!

The circumference of a 185/65/14 is about 95% of the original size. So your speedo should read high by roughly 5%. The 185/70/14 I'm running are about 98% of stock and (according to GPS data) my speedo reads a little high as well. Couple mph, but nothing objectionable. Honestly after sitting for so many years, I'm actually quite surprised how accurate it really is. I would not have been surprised if it were way worse!

Just before the trip, I replaced all the tires. Four corners, and the spare. I got them at Firestone, but what I put on was dictated more by "what was available near the size I wanted" than anything else. The original tire size was 175 SR 14, and the web says that back then, when the aspect ratio was not spelled out, it was 78%, So using that, the original tires were 175-78-14. The closest to that size I could find near me was 185-70-14's, which is a tiny bit smaller than the original size, but only about one percent different. Close enough considering the availability. I went to Firestone and got "Suredrive Touring A/S 185/70/14" on all four corners and the spare. Nothing special, but very close to the original size. And the date codes were from late 2024 which was a whole lot fresher than the tires that were on there before.

If you would have asked me that question before I drove to Nashville and back, my answer would have been more definitive. Now, I'm cautious about how my back reacted to the journey. The rest of the car, however, worked great! Other than the radiator needing to be cleaned out, everything was rock solid! He drives like a dream. Starts almost instantly*, handles well, electricals were perfect day and night. Really a pleasure to drive, even at speed. But my back has me a little spooked. My 280 has different seats, and I didn't realize how much I appreciated them until I spent extended time in the OG. And putting different seats in the 240 flies in the face of the originality aspect. Haha!! Maybe I'm still stung from the road... Ask me again in a week or so. ☺️ *During the banquet, I made a comment to Madkaw about how easily the OG started, and he said he might challenge me to a "start-off" with his car. Well after seeing just how quickly and easily my car started, he withdrew the challenge. LOL!