KB10

OK, OK, I have just re-read the whole thread & realised that a couple of things need to be added. The adjustable cam sprocket & timing cover with access panel have gone. A friend up the road has been racing a 1200 coupe for quite a few years with great success, but his A15 went off like a grenade, so he fitted his spare engine. My parts will be used in a new 'spare' engine. & I will run a Rollmaster timing set instead. It looks like I will recondition my original 1200 GX twin carb induction system & run that for a while before fitting the EFI system. I have secured two of the factory competition oil pumps from which I will make one unblemished good-as-new example & I will run a small oil cooler. It will be totally un-needed in a street car, but will justify the use of the pump & will look cool. I have sourced an exelent pair of the correct original head rests, so everything on the factory option list has now been found. We are attempting to have an instrument maker do a faux factory competition tach. There was a 1200 race tach & I managed to source a new one. Carefull study has revealed how the factory did it & it is really only a modified stock one with a new face & with the internals rotated slightly to allow the needle to start in a downward pointing position. This 1200 tach reads out to 10,000 rpm. My faux factory comp tach will look like a KB10 stocker but will read out to 9,000 rpm instead of 7,000rpm & will be redlined at 7,000 instead of 6,500 rpm. Very few will ever pick it, but I love the subtlety. This is the 1200 factory comp Tach, not my fake one. I have decided not to go with the A14 stroker crank, which will be used in another 1200 engine instead, but have found the original A13 crank for my engine. These later cranks are dimensionally interchangeable with 1200 cranks but are a little lighter. I was worried about the strokers torque output on the little gearbox & decided to go with more rpm & less torque. This concern was elevated when I was able to source not one, but two of the factory competition five speeds. [Option 1 or F5C56A] First gear ratio is now up to about the same ratio as the stock gearbox's second gear but top [5th] is still the same 1 to 1 ratio, so it has five closely spaced ratios. The stock 5 speed [F5W56A] was such fun to drive in my previous B10, so the close ratio gearbox should be even more fun. We'll give those Hyundi's & dinky little Honda's a run for their money & all with dinosour technology. Anyway, I now have a set of custom made 'H' beam rods & a set of 2mm oversize flat top, cast race pistons. This pushes the bore size out from 76mm to 78 which is a paltry .5mm larger than the max factory oversize, so no dramas are expected there. These factory Nismo hollow competition lifters should also help things along. They were the last available set when I bought them, however I believe they have now gone back into limited production. This aftermarket bracket will allow me to run the alternator in the same position on the engine as the stock A10 engine. The original position is low on the left side of the block, but the later engines, including my A13, mount them high on the right. This will save me some wiring work & will tuck the little sucker neatly out of the way. I have placed an order for a custom made harmonic balancer but have not heard back from the manufacturer, so I guess i will need to follow that up. Stock A series used a cast pulley but a proper balancer can save a lot of grief at high RPM, particularly when one is performing a 'flat shift' & misses the gear. [flat shift, ... racing change at full throttle without lifting the right foot.] Looks like I have not been as slack as I had thought.

Well, it looks like I should have been checking in a little more often. Here's the situation. The KB10 is now a KB10GL & it is at home. A little over two years back I took a package & left my employer of 42 years. I decided to retire & take a break from everything, ... but that got a bit boring, so I started to get back into my bicycle collection which has been laying dormant for about 15 years or so & to this end I started collecting more 'stuff' About a year back I thought I would add a single BMX to the collection. BAD IDEA. I sourced a 1981 Mongoose frame & started learning. What I learned was that I had stepped through the door to a whole new world. I subsequently aquired an Aussie made Quicksilver hulk, & this was quickly followed by a slightly earlier Quickie that was almost rideable. Nobody seemed to know much about the serial numbers which appeared to be somewhat random so I joined a forum & gathered about 60 serial numbers from fellow members & cracked the code which was really simple once you have a list of serials to work from. Anyway, I have now tracked down almost all of the people that worked for the manufacturer [less than 10] & I hope soon to write up the history of this small maker of BMX frames & bikes. I now have six of the seven production BMX models that they produced between 1978 & '83. including the only known example of the "Limited Edition" model [December 1981 only] & I also have the only known survivor of the three hand made, lightweight factory team riders bikes that were made in December 1981 It gets worse. I have built another one into a racer for our Retro Race Series [up to 1985] & I formed a race team with one rider. I do all the work & pay all the bills while the young feller [he's 43] gets to have all the fun. The plan is to eventually campaign three bikes. We were able to compete in five of the six race meets & won the over 40 class by three points. Last Saturday was round one of the second season & my new rider won all three moto's [races] so we are off to a good start. As for the KB10GL, it sits quietly under a cover in the garage waiting for me to retire again. Again? Well, ..... it's like this, I went to a bike shop 42 miles away to buy spokes last November & vollunteered to fix a wheel for the boss who was snowed under with customers at the time. He liked what I did & asked me to work for him, so at 3pm on a Friday afternoon I became an employee once again. I now build & maintain Italian made Pinarello & Wilier bicycles that range in value from about $3,000 up to somewhere near $20,000. [yep, almost twenty grand for the very best that money can buy on two wheels without an engine] I'm currently working between 50 to 60 hours a week so finding time to mow the lawn is a problem, let alone maintain a race bike & build a car. Never mind, I still have everything & I will have access to my superanuation soon so I look forward to another retirement when I can get to finishing a few things. That's all for now untill I get more time & more money.

Well stone the bloody crows! Blood oath mate, we wouldn't pull ya leg over something as important as a ridgey-didge Ute. These things are as rare as rockin' 'orse sh*t. Fair dinkum, youse blokes should get out there & save this little treasure before it's too bloody late. Yair.

Well, the first picture is of a new pair of JDM Sunny 1200 GX mirrors, while the second is of the Sunny KB10-GL ones. This should give a better comparison. Oh yeah, I lashed out & bought these 1200 GX ones too, & both just reek of late 60's & 70's style. I love it. Icehouse, come on over. I have only one bed, but I can throw a matress on the floor for you in one of the other bedrooms. I'm sure that you will feel right at home in among the carefully stacked Datsun & Dodge hemi parts that I have been gathering. :eek: ;)

I think I will leave the door mirrors in place for now as you suggest as the reasons for placing them there in the first place are still valid. You're right about parts pricing being damned expensive & some of the pieces for this car have given me the cold shivers, but to offload it now would cost me much more that the price to finish it from the present position. Besides, I have wanted a car like this for over 25 years now, so to quote Margret Thatcher, when she was discussing the first Gulf War with Pres Bush [senior] "This is no time to go all wobbly on me", so I just need to suck it up, work all the overtime I can get & pay, pay, pay. [sob, sob] I have chosen to go with factory components because I believe that a right ripping little car can be built this way, & made to look as if it could have been a factory job. The secret to great performance in these things isn't gobs of power [although that works too] but light weight. The weight reduction of a well tuned A series over, say, an FJ20, means that lighter drive line components can be used, including smaller & lighter brakes, ... along with smaller & lighter wheels & tyres. This last bit ensures a nimble suspension & good ride. [minimum unsprung mass] To get a car like this to perform well, you don't need as much power, & a smaller fuel tank with a lighter fuel load will give you the same range as a big engine & big fuel tank. Costs less to feed too. Now you just KNOW that a small & light package will handle well. It will stick to the road like sh*t to a blanket, & all the tyre smokin' performance in the world will not be enough to catch it in the tight twisties, ... so that's the path I have chosen. It's an attempt to build a modestly powered lightweight package, with sporting pretencion's, from 'selected' dinosaur-era factory components. in a [relatively] common Datsun model, but in a rare body type. Can I pull it off? I don't know, but I'm in too deep to worry about that now, however you can guarantee that I'm going to give the whole concept a bloody good shake. The plan is to keep it all under 700 Kg [about 1550 Lb] dripping wet, with spare wheel, & ready to drive. If I can get 85 to 90 Hp at the wheels I will be a really happy boy, because that's all I need to scare myself sh*tless. :eek:

Well, next came the perplexing problem of the mirrors. The JDM version of the KB10 did not come with external mirrors as standard, however, they were listed as an option. The coupe got the rectangular [sort of] mirror head while everything else got a round mirror head with a slightly convex lens. Almost all Aussie B10 cars came with the external mirrors from the dealer as standard, & all of these were of the round head variety. Now, both my Japanese sales brochure & my Aussie ones list the mirrors as an option, but the English text brochures would be a straight copy from the Jap one, so the 'option' part about the mirrors, along with the heater, the radio & the tach would not apply as we got them as standard on all of the Coupes. Anyway, the brochure says, "External mirrors, on fender or door" If someone in Japan ordered the external mirrors, then the default mounting position was the fenders, slightly ahead of the centreline of the wheel. This gave a good view, but was an absolute pain if they needed adjusting after somebody bumped one in a car park, particularly the passenger side mirror. All of the Aussie cars came with this fender mounting. However, ..... the brochure says that door mounting was a factory option mounting point & after some anguish, I decided that I would go with the door mounting as this left a clean fender line, & provided greater ease of adjustment, so, after sourcing a correct pair of new Deluxe Sunny Coupe mirrors, we mounted them on the doors. They look a little funny as every other B10 that I have seen has had them on the fenders, but I figured that I would get accustomed to it. Now comes the dilemma The Sunny GL, which I am attempting to replicate, uses a completely different type of mirror, & worse yet, I was able to source a new pair of them [at vast expense] They look quite similar to [but better than] the 1200 GX mirrors & to find a new pair was an incredible score. The picture below shows a white Sunny GL Coupe. It has both the GL mirrors & the GL blackout grill, which could be ordered on a new Deluxe model if so desired. [Yes, I have the grille] The yellow coupe is a new Deluxe Sunny Coupe with the standard [non black] grille & the standard coupe mirrors in the default location. So what do I do, strip the doors again & remove the mirrors, then fit the GL ones on the fenders, or just hang onto the GL mirrors & see how it feels with the Deluxe ones on the doors? What about door mounting the GL mirrors? I gotta say, they really are a nice looking mirror. What would you do?

Mate, the parts list is longer than this & I have been gathering parts for B10 models since I bought my first one in 1980, so it's only been 27 years. As for being scared to drive it, I already am, & it's still in pieces. It will probably spend most of it's time under a cover in the shed with occasional trips to selected 'Datsun' events as I already have too much money tied up in it. I have a 1200 coupe to drive & I will need to buy a bigger vehicle, either a wagon or a pickup, to cary & tow when it comes time to build my 1933 Dodge street rod. Neither the 1200 or the 1000 will do the job there. If nothing else, my kids will benefit most when the little KB10 realises a good price at my deceased estate auction. :) LOL.

Along the way, like all good students, there were times when it was necessary to 'hit the books'. In my case it was the parts books, & I have several for these cars [different sizes] & the research included original sales brochures. My parts books are for the Australian version of my car, which was sold as the 'Datsun 1000 Coupe', however, the Japanese version, known simply as the 'Sunny Coupe' differed in a couple of subtle ways. Additionally, there were differences in equipment levels, along with an additional model within the range. As far as I can tell [so far] the Japanese Sunny used the 'Deluxe' as a base model, but it was pretty plain Jane at the entry level & the option list was fairly long, while the only version we got was also the 'Deluxe' but with better specs. To bring the base Jap model up to the Aussie spec, they included, from the option list, the following items as standard. Heater, Tach, Radio, External mirrors, & the side stripe looks to have come from the accessory catalogue. I had always thought that the rest of the option was was not sold here, ... but it was & I have found everything from that list, but have yet to acquire the headrests. The car that we never saw here was the GL, [Grande Luxe] however, a fellow KB10 nut has some Japanese brochures that he kindly loaned to me & I scanned them before returning them. Good thing that I did too as my old & senile brain took some months to realise that one of them covered the GL & showed the additional & different parts that make it special. It's about now that you get some pictures. OK, the first ones are portions of a brochure that shows the factory Sports steering wheel, the matching gear knob [GL], the optional clock & the accessory 8 track stereo player. The second picture shows the GL console. This is just an ornament & really serves no usefull purpose. To duplicate the GL model, it would be necessary to aquire all of those parts that were different from the regular Deluxe version, & also those parts that are different from the Aussie version. Fortunately, there are not a large number of differences, so the job is not too hard & I now have about 95% of them. Here are a few. The Sunny Coupe emblems are fitted low down on the front guards [fenders], so the Datsun ones that have already been fitted will need to be removed, the holes filled, then these emblems fitted. [see previous posts for pictures of Datsun emblems on car] The fuel cap was actually listed for the Van [wagon] only as this was the only model without a lockable fuel door. I bought it because it thought it looked better than the original stock one. The front park/ blinker lights were the same for Jap & Aussie models except for the lens colour. Aussie ones were white while Jap ones were amber. My lamp bodies were a bit 'used' so these new assemblies were a godsend. The clock was provided by a fellow 1200 club member in Adelaide [The capitol city of South Australia] which is about 1,000 miles away The steering wheel I bought new through my friendly Datsun dealer back in 1980. I have since aquired another one. The console is really a waste of space, but it looks cute. The new differential is my newly aquired Nismo LSD for the H150 which was used used in B210 models from about 1975 onwards, including the 210 model [b310] The H150 differential assembly will bolt into the H145 axle housing [b10 & B110 models]. It will work just fine if a 2mm spacer & a second gasket is used as the centerline of the differential is 2.5mm further back from the gasket face, so spacing it forward by a like amount rectifies all problems. I paid more for this than I did for the whole car when I bought it & it's the only H150 LSD that I have ever heard of, let alone seen. The knob is a new & is the right one for the GL model. Well, this post has become far too long, so I'll end it here for now. More later.

Damn problem with the engine bay is, .... how do I get the engine in without scratching it. I think I will have to lower the body over the cross member & engine trans assembly, just like they did at the factory. I want you all to understand that this is a project gone HORRIBLY wrong. It was going to be a cheap & nasty 'fix up', but you know how it goes, when you fix one thing, it makes the part next to it look bad, so that needs fixing up too, & so it goes, ... on & on & on until it ends up like this. A smart man would know when to quit, but I'm still going, so what does that tell you.

Well, after a workload that would drive just about anyone insane, I have decided to take a day off [sunday] & I will now see if I can continue with the saga. I had to read back over this thread to see where I was up to. OK, once the body beautiful was completely naked, it was subject to a very careful preparation & given a coat of primer, as seen in the last photo's. The unsightly blemishes [spot welds] that spoilt her good looks are now gone, but you already know that, so it was time to give it a new paint job. This was a time of anguish as I wanted to paint it in a lovely & very classy silver/Gray, but could not convince myself that it would work with the black vinyl top. After some encouragement from 'The Nice Car Doctor' at the 'Car Hospital' I bowed to mediocrity & went for the good old standby, .... the original white. At least I knew what it would look like in the end, but I still have wistful moments where I think that the Gray would have been a better choice. If the car had not come with a vinyl top from new, I would have ditched the white in a flash & gone for the Gray. There is a photo of another KB10 in this colour in an earlier post & I just love it. Anyway, 'Sunshine White' it was to be. This is where the pictures kick in. This is it back on its wheels & we decided to paint the front panel black to avoid the white from being seen through the grille. The headlight buckets are a short story in themselves. I was in the habit of buying lots of Datsun 1000 parts from my local dealer as they were becoming obsolescent & were available to me at a 50% discount on the ten year old list price, so I just bought stuff because, ..... it was there. I called in to pick up something or other one day back in the mid to late 80's & the manager [who has been selling me parts from there for 27 years] threw two boxes on the counter & said, "ya want these?" The boxes contained a matched pair of headlight buckets, so I said "emmachizit" [how much is it] I forget how much, but it must have been cheap enough as I said "yair, ... OK, I might need them someday." Twenty years later, & 'someday' came around, so there they are. Note that the 1970 model uses the longer blinker spear & these are in fact new 510 items. The only difference between KB10 & 510 lights is in the electrical plug on the end of the wires. We decided to use some self adhesive insulating material under the bonnet [hood] to tidy up the looks a little & to reduce the heat on the panel as well as reduce the noise level a little. So here we are at the stage where it is beginning to come back together. It's still at the panel shop, but there is more to report, so stick around for the next update, ...... soon.

Ggzilla Most of the work on the 1200 coupe was done in the first year when my son had it. I did the work, but he had the car. The new wheels have not been fitted as I want to powder coat them & fit new tyres, & that has had to wait while the bank account slowly healed after the high cost Xmas period. I also want to further upgrade the whole suspension at the same time so I am keeping an eye open for the right shocks. Next on the list would be the S13 front brake upgrade, but I don't know about the H165 rear end conversion. It might not be warranted, even though I now have the missing bearing caps for the alloy H156 Diff Carrier. If I do use it, it would be for the larger drum brakes & I would be looking for some alloy drums for it [Z car?] Gotta keep that unsprung mass down a bit. The engine & trans swap comes last. The only role that I have played in Benny's coupe is to photograph it, so he gets all the credit for its construction & appearance. My 1000 coupe is still with the Nice Car Doctor at the Car Hospital, but will hopefully be home again within a month or so. Datsun 1200, your first 'good' car. [how's that sound?]

Thanks for the kind words, & I assume that you have readily recognises the car & its owner as we should be well known to you by now. ;) More instalments to come, but pressure of work & other issues have taken up all my time for now.

EGR? I think that I will 'fit' it, but just how operational it will be is a matter to be determined. At this time I am leaning towards full funcionality, but through a much restricted orifice. The interesting thing is that at full throttle, there is no vacuum to speak of, so the EGR system becomes non operational, so it has no effect on full output anyway, like so many vacuum operated smog devices. I want to keep it as simple & clean on the engine bay as possible, while trying to be a good citizen smog-wise. It will be a delicate balance, keeping in mind that it needs only comply with 1970 requirements & I should be able to excede that by a wide margin. Something for me to mull over for a while untill time comes for the engine build.

Yes, a Hemi, but Dodge hemi, not a Chrysler. It's a 1957 D500 [325 cube] & when I got it home I discovered it was a Police special. When I found myself on my own again, I had already gifted my ex the house [with its remaining morgage] & all its contents. I kept all my personal posessions, including the contents of the garage, & started again. That was back in about 1975/ '76 or so. Asking for more was beyond what she even dared to even think about. I was just 26 years old at the time. Lets face it, if she had argued, remembering that there was just the two of us, & I was entitled to half of everything, she could only lose, & she had a registered car of her own, I didn't. Now, 30 years later, I have been on my own again for the last 10 years or so & have gifted away another house [fully paid for this time] Maybe this is why I drive a Datsun 1200 & not a new Chrysler 300C. Ahhhhhh Datsun value, ... it can't be beat. Somebody told me that what I needed was a GOOD woman, ... & I needed her 'BAD'. I'm still trying to figure out just exactly what he meant.

Ahhhh, now understand. When you wrote "Canadian Gallon" I thought it was a volume that is/ was unique to Canada, but there is really is no such thing at all. I suppose that this is what happens when someone invents the 'inter'-net & a pedantic SOB from the other side of the planet sticks his bib in. :eek: It really is a global village now. ]2eDeYe [you gotta explain that nick to me sometime] I too have a skeleton in the garage. I love my little Datsuns to bits & have been a dedicated small Datsun man since I bought my B10 in March of 1980, but, well, .... I bought my Dodge in 1967 & it waits patiently for me still. [thats right, I have had it for 40 years] This will be the sixth engine in its lifetime & it's a Dodge. [the original, & a replacement flathead, plus a Canadian 'A' series, a 'B' block & an 'LA' Mopar engine & now this one] I always wanted a true 'Dodge' V8 in my Dodge & now I have one. This project awaits the completion of the current KB10. I can handle only one job at a time. I can't let this car go as it is one of about 35 to 40 in this particular body style that remain, ...... anywhere. I bought the car & took my first girlfriend out in it. I even married her, .... & I still have the car. Hey, one out of two aint a total loss.