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New to the 521 crew!


DatWifey

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Hey all. Figured that I'd introduce myself (Jenn), along with my husband (Brody aka Brodster). We both come from Datsun families, and are now broadening our horizons within the line. My dad owned a 1966 Roadster 1600 from when I was pretty young and use to let my brother and I drive it quite often throughout our high school years. Brody's dad bought a four-door 510 when he too was quite young, and got Brody into working on it and keeping it on the road throughout his high school years as well. The 510 was my daily driver for a bit in the mid 2000's while we lived in Redding and Sacramento, but ended up being garaged around 2007 or 2008 after running into some engine problems that we didn't have the funds to put into it at the time. We held onto it throughout our move up here to Washington and are finally getting around to getting another engine rebuilt and doing a decent restore from top to bottom on it.... .but that's for another thread.

 

So, recently we sold an older Subaru wagon for a newer Subaru sedan for our reliable snowboard/family roadtrip car. With the introduction of the sedan we've been a little claustrophobic not having space to fit shit into the car, so we decided to use some money that we had recently received and start looking for a small Datsun pickup to use mainly as a hauler. We looked at two locally (a 620 and 720), but didn't buy. Brody was checking Craigslist on a daily basis, and ended up seeing a Craigslist post in the forums here on a 521 listed in the Spokane area. We packed up our two dogs and drove from Seattle to the central part of the panhandle of Idaho (damn near Kellog) to buy this puppy. It was further than we had intended to go, but this truck was well worth it. The body is about as straight as they come, it purrs like a damn kitten and has no rust to speak of (with the exception of some small surface areas that are well within control). We had a slight issue with airflow to the gas tank on our journey home, but dealt with it and finally brought it home to Seattle about two weeks ago now.

 

The week that we bought it I insisted that my husband name it a woman's name, as I fully anticipated this to become his 'mistress'. Well, he's been out of town all week and I have been making excuses daily to drive it to the grocery store and anywhere else that I 'need' to go while working from home..... I think it's quickly becoming mine instead! :sneaky:

 

Alright, enough of the bullshit, here she is, in all her glory. We're bound to do some fixes and upgrades, but we're going to keep it as stock as possible, yet also not so ridiculous that we're afraid to use it for what we initially got it for.

 

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L16 freshly rebuilt

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This will be cleaned up and probably lined

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Bleeding the brakes last weekend and probably pissing our neighbors off with how redneck this looks in a decent area of West Seattle :fu:

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Dogs LOVE Trucks!! Our boys enjoying being real truck dogs.... even if it is while sitting in a garage ^_^

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Thanks, we're both really excited to have it and stoked at all of the original shit on/in it still. :D It sounded like the past owner treated this with great care and it was his baby. Sadly, he couldn't pay his rent, so he traded the truck to get the landlord off his back. We bought it from the landlord who had no idea what he had. He was telling us how surprised he was to have so many people call him with the ad listed for only a day, and even had someone from San Fran wanting to fly up to BFE North Idaho to buy it. In the grand scheme of things, this was a frickin steal and we're going to do as the past owner was trying to do and keep it quite stock for the time being.

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lol... yeah, people kept crossing the street to walk by. We rent a house in a relatively nice area of West Seattle (yuppyville), so it was kind of funny to see the sideways looks we were getting. :rolleyes:

 

I didn't notice that spacer in the steering column before, but I guess there's a possibility. Maybe the guy was short and lowered it a hair to see over it. I remember having issues in my dad's old Roadster. I use to take a couch pillow and sit on it in the bucket seat so that I could see over the steering wheel. :blush:

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Wayno, we're missing the mirror on the passenger side. I'm determined to find another set to put on it. The one on it now doesn't have any text on it.

 

Ken, would you mind taking a photo and posting it up some time of what your steering column looks like to give us a reference?

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Thank you Ken, I really appreciate that. I imagine we'll be meeting at some point in the near future if you take part in any of the NW meetups. Now that we've got a running Datto I'm bound and determined to ensure that the hubby and I make it to a few this year. :D

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definitely let us know what you need. I'm always happy to see someone keep their 521 stock. Looks like your hood emblem is missing. The ones on ebay are really nice even though I think they're reproduction's. The package/parcel tray that goes under the glove box but may be hard to find. Some may not care to have it but I use mine alot. Are you thinking of A stock radio and speaker? Whatever you decide dont be afraid to ask.

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Wayno, thanks for the photo. I'm sure we'll look into this a bit more, but I guess it's really not that big of a deal. haha.

 

 

definitely let us know what you need. I'm always happy to see someone keep their 521 stock. Looks like your hood emblem is missing. The ones on ebay are really nice even though I think they're reproduction's. The package/parcel tray that goes under the glove box but may be hard to find. Some may not care to have it but I use mine alot. Are you thinking of A stock radio and speaker? Whatever you decide dont be afraid to ask.

Funny you mentioned the hood emblem, it was one of the first things that my husband ordered, and I think it was off of Ebay. I've been lurking for a while now and have noticed many people's trucks with those trays. I dig it, but at the same time it's almost nice to not have clutter down there (which would happen if I got one... I think it's a chick thing ;) ). Who knows. If one pops up at some point, maybe we'll pick it up. We've also been actively looking for a stock stereo for the dash, and we're still considering what to do for speakers. I think we're also going to hook up a discreet amp with an audio jack (probably under the seat) to run an Ipod or phone off of for some real music :D I hit up Stretch about a stereo that he mentioned having for a 521, but he said he misplaced the knobs, so we're still on the hunt. We also do quite a bit of junkyard hunting, so I'm down with being patient and seeing what pops up with some time.

 

 

Thanks for all of your guys' help and appreciation! I love how welcoming everyone here seems to be. I worked for a snowboard retailer and we had a huge online forum that was full of douchebag elitists that were pretty standoffish.... which gave me a pretty bad taste for online forums for a while.

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Thanks for the photos of the steering column guys! I finally remembered to get out and get a better photo of the setup on ours. It does look like there's a small spacer or dampener in there.

 

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We also managed to get out to the Lakewood Pull-A-Part yesterday and get some hubs off of a 620 out there (and scored some clean wheel rings that were in the bed still), so we're beginning the process of collecting parts to upgrade the front brakes to discs since the current brakes are pretty shitty. Might as well upgrade shit that matters first huh? ^_^

 

And, we went and checked out a clean little '72 that was posted on Craigslist in Fife yesterday to have some references of stock styles for future fixes/updates that we do.

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I have come to the conclusion after looking at this photo that the dash is on the wrong side of the metal piece supporting the column, the black part of the bottom of the dash is supposed to cover the lighter white piece of column supporting structure, then the rubber piece goes on, then the base column piece of metal is next, then you put the rubber piece around the column and put it into position then the main lower piece of metal is put around the rubber piece and then the bolts are put into position and tightened. You should not be able to see any of the white painted metal in this photo, the person who installed the dash last did it incorrectly IMO. wayno

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Thanks Dave! We were actually just trying to look up what the stock colors were for Datsuns in 1971. There are areas of the bed that have the top layer of paint scratched off, as well as the inside of the doors and it does look like the original color was a slight off-white. She's what many would call a '10-footer', as she looks great from about 10 feet away, but once you get close you can see that the paint is matte and there are many areas of drips. Oh well, someday we'll repaint, but for now we lover her as she is :D

 

We also took a bit off her ass end and got the bumper switched to the split bumpers today!

 

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Next mission: find new tail light lenses!

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What is wrong with the taillights?

 

Whoever put on the last bumper with the hitch on it, cracked the lenses all to shit. They are glued together in many areas and look like they're going to fall apart completely any day now. It would be nice to have some clean lenses on them. But otherwise, they work fine.

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