The Saga Of The Datsun In Words And Pictures

This is all Todd and Faith Hare's fault. Ok, a little of it is Linda, Mary Lynne and Lela too. Or course none of it can be attributed to me; nope not taking any of the blame.

The Hares do some autocrossing; they seem to enjoy it. Several years ago they invited the above mentioned ladies to go see and participate in an afternoon of racing. We took them up on the offer and it exploded from there. The kind folks who are autocrossing will allow spectators to ride along on some of the rides. Each of the ladies took advantage of the kindness offered them and took several rides with a number of racers; including of course, Todd and Faith. They had a great time, enjoying every minute of it. I loved seeing my girls having fun and appreciated all who allowed it to happen.

A couple of weeks later I happened across an old friend while perusing the wares at a local auto parts store. We spent some time catching up and when it came time to tell him what we'd been doing lately the story of the autocross adventure came up. I mentioned that maybe I should get a sports car so the ladies could do some of their own autocrossing. He said, "Boy, do I have a car for you."

In the course of the ensuing conversation the story of the Datsun roadster you see here came to light. It seems that someone had owed my friend some money and instead of cash, the Datsun became the payment. The car had sat out in the high desert south of Ashfork, AZ for many years then east of Flagstaff, AZ for a few more years. The car had been partially taken apart in preparation for a restoration. My friend determined that although not in good shape, the car seemed to be complete. His plans had been to either part it out for cash or restore it himself. Like many projects, this one sat for a long time.

These are after we drug it home and cleaned it up a little. It was so full of pack rat droppings that they covered the tops of the seat cushions. 

My powers of persuasion convinced Linda that we needed this car. She agreed to go look at it so we hooked the tow dolly up to my Ford Explorer and made the trek east of town. When we got our first look at the car, my powers of persuasion seemed misplaced; even I wasn't sure this was the car for us. It had an engine in it; but it was sitting in the passenger seat. The transmission was in the trunk. The dashboard was so cracked and split that it was hard to tell it was a dash. Seat upholstery cracked when touched and the carpet couldn't be seen because it was totally covered with pack rat droppings. I mean totally covered, so deep that they covered most of the seat cushions too; I had to brush it off before I could sit on the seat to steer it onto the tow dolly. 

We drug it home, left it on the street on the tow dolly. Maybe that wasn't a good idea; the neighbors all stopped by asking if we intended to leave it there and could we please put it behind a fence somewhere or maybe just haul it off to the junk yard. Twice we hauled it to the local car wash to use the vacuum only to fill the canisters both times. Seriously, there was that much rat poop and chewed pieces of cotton that it filled the big canisters of the car wash vacuums twice. After cleaning out as much as we could, we put the car behind a gate (the neighbors insisted,) to be used as a future project. My darling wife said we couldn't start on it until the current project was complete; the current project was my 1966 Thunderbird convertible. We had been working on it for several years and Linda didn't think it wise to scatter two cars at the same time. I think she was worried that I'd try to put a Datsun bumper on a Thunderbird. Or maybe try to stuff the front seats of the 'Bird into the roadster. In any event, it was agreed that the Datsun would wait.

In due course the Thunderbird was taken to Mesa for a bit of body work and a paint job. That freed up the garage and Linda said, "We may as well do what we can on the Datsun while the 'Bird is gone." As this is written, July 1, 2018, the 'Bird is still in Mesa and the Datsun is up and running. 

We had a misadventure with some itinerant Romanian "body men" who used yellow as a primer. The real body men we took it to later had a devil of a time removing the yellow. You live and learn. The top photo is of the dashboard removed from the car. Visible is the deteriorated state of the foam and vinyl. Bottom photo is me trying to remove detritus left from nesting rodents.

We began disassembly, carefully bagging things as we removed them; Linda's really smart about that sort of thing. The more we took apart, the more I decided the little car was worth saving. Nothing was really bad, it just needed freshening up. There was a small rust area in the front floorboard and a couple of spots on the body. Didn't take much to cure those issues, the rest was a question of taking off bad stuff and installing new stuff.

Oh, if it were only so easy! Example: When we attempted to take off the bad electrical connectors, they crumbled in our hands. We thought we'd install new connectors and all would be good. It didn't quite work out that way. After days of attempts, we decided an entire wiring harness was the best way to go. Of course no one makes a new wiring harness so our only choice was to find the best used ones we could. The wiring ended up being the most challenging part of the entire project. Part of the issue is that the harnesses would be changed mid-year; so an early '69 harness is different than a late '69 harness. None of the suppliers told us that and we went through two harnesses before we got it figured. (By the way, we have an early '69 Datsun roadster under dash wiring harness for sale if you know anyone who might need one.) 

Linda carefully marked all the connections as they came apart. We then transferred the markings to the replacement harness. Made it much easier. It was still difficult but much easier.

The under hood wiring was difficult as well. The lights were the biggest issue. Several email friends had the misfortune of following that adventure as it progressed. I'd think I had one thing worked out only to find that when working on the next thing it changed the first thing. Months of work, several parts and a different wiring harness later and it all works; even the turn signal indicators in the dash.

The engine, supposedly the hardest part of a car rebuild, was fairly straightforward. I'd never been into an overhead cam engine before so I conned a good friend into being the overseer. He'd give me instructions and Linda and I would carry them out. He was around for the truly difficult parts and his help was invaluable; it wouldn't be running now without him.

Linda helping guide the engine/transmission into place.

As long as this missive already is, I've skipped some of the story. To capsulize, the car was taken to a paint shop in Flagstaff for the body work and paint. They did very good work and the car is beautiful. The painter asked what color we wanted and Linda pointed to my Ford Escape and said, "That color." The painter took the paint code directly from my car so now we have two Ruby Red Metallic cars at the house. 

While other work was being done, we took the seats to a local upholstery shop for rebuilding. Again, Linda chose the color and made a wonderful choice. We ordered carpet but Linda built the door panels, rear 1/4 panels, kick panels and to top it off, covered the steering wheel. All in leather, by the way. The seats are leather as well. 

The little car came together pretty well. There were challenges along the way, but so far we've been able to work through them. It's been around the block a few times, probably 30 miles on it total. We drive it, discover an issue, then bring it back home to sort the issue. Mostly minor things but things that need sorting. 

We put larger brakes on the front which necessitated bigger wheels. We bought 4 wheels but then I thought, "What if we have a flat on the front? The spare needs to be a bigger wheel too." So we bought another set of wheels to match. 

Before and after pictures tell some of the story. It's come a long way, looks amazing, runs well and is going to be a fun car to drive. I've already had a blast watching Linda enjoy the car. She has more hours of work on the car than I do. She takes joy in driving it and should be proud of her accomplishment. At some point we'll be ready for an epic journey; Linda's mom says she'd like us to take it to Denver so she can see it. If you come by and the car is running, we'll take you for a ride.