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Your First Datsun? What was it? When was it?


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My father had Z's and 620's when I was young, but my first purchase was in 01/2012, I was 31.  It was a package deal with a '69 2dr and '72 2dr 510. It was the first time I had seen a 510 in person, so naturally I had to buy them (not too many in KS).  Those led me to buy an '82 280zx parts car.  A late-night hapless bid on eBay brought the '71 2dr 510 home.  Selling off a set of wheels brought around another package deal with the '70 and '71 521 with a '79 280zx.  Then came the '73 620 and '91 Pathy up here in AK.  I feel a Z31 parts car is in the future for the possible VG swap.  All that was within 2 years.

No thread is any good without pics so here is my share, in order:

 

I sold these first two to justplainjoe.  The '69 was stripped and sold as a shell.  The '72 went to STOMPIN A TOAD. Hopefully he gets it on the road.

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Parted out:

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The money pit:  Do the wheels look familiar?^^  Trans, struts, and brakes too.

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Sold both 521s to a local guy restoring one.  I figured selling them, would be better than letting them sit in the woods until we made it back down to the lower 48. Sold the zx to a kid who was fixing up another.

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The other money pit:  I wanted to part it out, my wife wanted to daily drive it.  A $200 620 is now a $2500 620. :no:  Shipping parts up here costs more than the parts!  When I sell it for pennies on the dollar, someone is going to get a great deal!

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So KlassicMotion, where in Alaska are you? I just moved to Anchorage in December.

Eagle River man!  Are you on FB?  A couple of us started up Datsun / Nissan Enthusiasts of Alaska  a month ago.  We have seven members so far.  We know of 7 or so other Datsun owners in the anchorage area that aren't on FB, or just haven't found us yet.

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The first Datsun I owned was a '73 180b (610) 4 door. I was a junior at Vocational Village high school in Selwood,near Oaks Park in Portland,Oregon. About half the people I went to school with drove that car at some point. We put 12 people in it on the way to a party after prom. I've often wished I had never sold that car,starting with about a half hour after I sold it.

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Eagle River man! Are you on FB? A couple of us started up Datsun / Nissan Enthusiasts of Alaska a month ago. We have seven members so far. We know of 7 or so other Datsun owners in the anchorage area that aren't on FB, or just haven't found us yet.

Not on FB anymore, I wanted to get that 810 goon up here for $1000 but hadnt started work yet. If you sell that 620 lemme know lol

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My first dat was my first car I drove it in highschool in the early 80's. It was a more door 610. Had it dumped and asked all the time why my rear tires leaned in so hard at the top.

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The first Datsuns I rode in were taxi cabs in Tokyo in 1963 to 1966. Did you know that thanks to the "small car" status that a 410 or 411 can squeeze between 2 opposing street cars with room to spare?  At least in Tokyo.  I asked the drivers of the independent taxis, who invariably drove Datsuns, why they picked Datsun.  Franchised drivers had to drive the brand that their parent company was part of their "daibatsu".  The answer was always "Strong car!  Strong motor  Never break!"  Not a bad endorsement from a group of drivers that put a lot of miles on their cars.  When I returned to the USA with my Japanese wife [an initially unexpected bonus of 3 years in Japan] and my wife got her USA driver's license the real search for a car that she could sit in and reach all the controls and pedals began.  Datsun was the answer, so I bought her the RL411 because she fit perfectally, and so did I, and it had a "REAL" automatic transmission [british Borg Warner], not a rubber band like the then Toyoglide equiped Toyotas.   She didn't fit the Corvair we had bought because the seats could not slide forward enough for her to operate the pedals, and the Corvair had a manual transmission.  We still have the 1967 RL411.

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First vehicle and first Datsun was a 1974 62 that I got for $350 running. Had four of the back cab mounts rusted out and the cab would bounc around on bumpy roads haha. Something got sucked into the engine and smashed around in #1 & 2 cylinders. Ended up getting my 71 521 and toke the the parts I wanted and sxrapped the rest. Dam thing was a pretty big rust bucket.

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 My grandfather was a superviser in the service department at Ford forever. He new enough about cars to have bought a 79 510 new. he passed it down to my mom, who crunched the left rear quarter into a dumpster. My dad got it and used it while working construction and service as a plumber and spilled ABS glue all in the trunk. It eventually sat in front of the house with a flat tire, dead battery and bad alternator.

   I was told i could have it "as is" for $135 and jumped on it. 16 years old and learn as you go. couple days later i was learning to drive a clutch and rockin that little 2 door all over town. this was back in the late 80's early 90's when it was about mini trucks and 5.0's, so my little beater wasn't all that cool to most people, but it was mine. i did always envy this girl a year ahead of me at school though. her dad was a mechanic and she had the same car but it was all nice, white paint, cool rims, and exhaust. not like mine, dark brown, crunched rear, banged up hubcaps, more dents by me, and exhaust leak...... it sucked because she has to drive past my house to get to hers so i would see it all the time..... :sneaky:

      kept it running for a few years, did a valve job and head gasket but when the clutch went i had had enough and sold it and got a 87 sentra sport coupe hatchback. only to wreck it, and then start all over with a 81 280zx in the same condition as the first 510, dead on the street........ but that is another story... live and learn i guess...

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I was 17 when my dad brought the 210 home. From that day on the 210's been known as Stanley. Poor thing was junked for having a dented trunk. Why would anyone trash a car for a dent  :confused:  He was saved, dent fixed and he's never looked better. In over 20 years he's only died on me once. Alternator went out :mellow: 

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twenty years ago a 1969 521 bought for $500, was painted with a brush, I used sheet rock mud to fill dents and rust and bushed painted over the repairs, Sold a year later to a neighbor because I needed something better on the freeway and my wife didn't like me having such a babe magnet

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My first Datsun was my Dad's that I wrecked when I was 16.  My first Datsun that I bought was a '74 B210 hatchback, bright orange with 2 black stripes painted down it.  The previous owner bought the engine that I rebuilt out of the one that I wrecked when I was 16 but it had sat outside for quite awhile and rusted up.  After he changed the engine over and it wouldn't start, (hell, it wouldn't even turn) he sold me the car and all the parts that went with it.  I changed the motor back to the one that was in it and drove it for almost a year, it was gutless.  To get more power out of it I would mix a gallon of diesel to a tank of gas.  When I was in school to be a mechanic, we began looking into why it was so gutless.  Compression was 85 pounds in all four cylinders.  To determine were the problem was we did a cylinder leak down test.  #1 leaked the most at 10%, the rest were less than 7%.  This really puzzled my teacher, generally even new cars leak about 20% or more.  When we finally pulled the head off the reason was quite obvious to me.  The pistons were not going all the way up to the top of the cylinder.  They were stopping about  3/8 of an inch from the top.  You guessed it, the last person to rebuild the little A13 had put an A12 crank in it.  Pulled the old rusty A13 apart that I had rebuilt in high school and there was a rusty crank in it, but the bearing grease that I had used kept the journals clean and shiny.  So we taped up the journals and glass beaded it, hot tanked it and stuffed it in.  The next compression test was 178 pounds in all 4.  Its get up and go had improved tremendously. 

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It was 1981, I was 17, and I finally scraped together enough money to buy my first car with the whopping sum of $300. it was a 68 Camero... Naaah, just kidding, it was a 510. She was a rattle can black four door that was beat all to hell, the floor board filled with beach sand and rust, and the seats held together with duct tape, but she ALWAYS delivered where I was going. Loyalty.

 

This is actually my second car.

 

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I was 18, bought a "64" 320 uni-body with a 4 speed on the column for $500, Sold it 3 months later to make a down payment on a bright green 1977 B210 coupe 5spd with only 7,000 miles on it. Had it for 3 years traded it in on an 810 wagon to accommodate my newborn son. For the following 30 years the driveway has pretty much always had at least one Datsun in it. And I have to say I miss the "64" 320 and every Datsun thereafter, but alas I have to share.

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