Dave WM

hmm found this

the head has between .003 and .0025 gap in the middle (presuming the straight edge is flat). I was thinking of bolting to a block with .001 spacers on the ends, then torqueing down. Perhaps figure a way to heat to say 300f, bake it for a few hours and check again.

seems like the only thing you can do. Good thing is if you are like me, it gets easier and faster to remove. IF it does indeed turn out to be a hung up balk ring (again the only thing I can think of and I have no 1st hand knowledge of this happening) you may want to take a close look at it to see if any wear has happened. Could even start by just shinning a light in the gear oil to see if you can detect any shinny looking particles.

Nice work, like the fool proof design to align the gasket.

my dash is in pretty good shape, one fairly large crack right in the middle that stops at the beginning of the gauge cluster, still it just really takes away from the looks of the car to see that every time I get in. Big question is do I baby the new one or just let it bake with no cover up? What are though thought on this?

mine is on the way scheduled for 8/62019 delivery!! Tracking it left Tracy CA fedex today

That movie had a lot of good lines, esp from the late Bill Paxton. oh back to the orig comment, run it without the valve cover to check function of the spray bar very long and you will think something was nuked from orbit from the mess it makes.

Ripley

the final test is to "briefly" start the car with the valve cover off, it will sling oil everywhere so take nessasary precaution. "nuke it from obit its the only way to know for sure"

I used a reg hole punch like used in an office, its a little large for the oil hole, but I prefer that, less likely to block. Perfect for the bolt hole. I used some oil resistant gasket material I picked up at auto zone, hmmm looking at the video it seems I used a brass tube sharpened to make the oil hole. I think it pretty important to use some tacking agent to make sure the gasket does not move. just make sure its no where near the oil hole and only a very light tack. I mention that in the video You can buy brass tube at most hobby shops (used in making fuel tanks). You place it on the material and spin the tube to cut. I am sure there are tools just for this but its what I had handy.

passenger side

OP did you keep the sycro hubs on a dowel or make some other provision for keeping the Front pointing front? on mine I put a mark on the hub to make sure it went back correctly see step 3 in the middle of the page sychro.pdf

rebuilder thought is was a head bolt hole, and chased it.

The function of a balk ring is to "lightly" couple the input and output shaft. this lets the disconnected input shaft (clutch pedal down) match the speed of the output shaft for the gear that is "about" to be engaged by the shift fork. as the speed match up the gear dogs engage the hub, you get a smooth crunch free engagement. They are sort of like a small clutch between each gear change. My guess is something is wrong and a balk ring is not allowing free spinning on one of the gears while in neutral (all the balk rings should be fully disengaged in N). I don't know how this could be done during a reassembly, I do know the only place that was mentioned to be extra careful with respect to the 3rd/4th sychro hub. I am not sure if you could be put it the incorrect way and get the gear box together, but there was a warning in the FSM about direction.

looks like an aftermarket evap, I like the use of a standard expansion valve, not the NLA stock Nissan.

both would peak out if lost the ground.

if the temp and oil both act odd (peak out) check to make sure you have not lost the ground to the case of the gage. It has an internal voltage regulator to deal with voltage swings and it needs the ground to work properly.

Ok clutch pedal out, car in N, hand brake off, start and no movement. Next did you see my post about the 4/3 sychro hub?

oh and one more thing to the OP, I always start my car with the clutch press in and hand brake on, why add the drag of the transmission (even in N) to the starter, and the brake is a safety thing. That being said I guess I will have to go out and start it with brake off and clutch engaged just to see if I can get the car to move while starting.

would that account for why even when in neutral he has problems? If it is the trans, I guess the take away is to always spin the input shaft while in N and see if you can hold the output shaft still. I assumed this would have been done, as a check out of the rebuild (shift thru all gears and confirm nothing it binding and gears are all working). Does the OP recall doing that?

she is a beauty!

do some research before you start replacing bushings, that is if you go with aftermarket stuff. Lots of folks here complain about polyurethane. Noise and ride quality can suffer from what I have read. Floaty maybe just from blown dampers in the struts. I rebuilt mine (new oring) added oil and the improvement was very noticeable.

still going to post up my made for CO video... coming soon, wait for YT to finish upload and publish.