Datsun Roadster Forum-311s.org

Sid,

Look at the same reports from a few years back. While I was taking my Ford back to the dealer for numerous repairs and having my Chevy towed back to the dealer for numerous repairs and recalls, Toyota was kicking their ass all over the place. Now that Toyota has damn near doubled their sales and therefore production numbers in the last few years, their quality is begining to suffer as seen in recent reports. Why have their sales been so good?..Reliability. GM is going to have a hard time getting over their reputation, though, and vice-versa for Toyota...

Hard facts I have endured, not my feelings:

Ford truck - In the shop all of the time, the reciepts were so thick, I have no idea. Luckily, most of it covered under warranty. Drank oil like it had a habit. Had a horrible knock noise in the engine from 75K to 85K miles, and terrible performance. Made a horrific noise one day and then ran better! Broadsided at 95K and totaled so I didn't get to see what that noise in the engine was.

Chevy Blazer - The hands down worst POS I have ever spent hard earned cash on. Numerous electrical failures left us stranded many times. When it was in the dealer, it would sometimes take more than a day to fix all of the "recall" items they were fixing in addition to the item du jour. 104K miles and the engine blew the intake gaskets and the tranny was surging and there was a new electrical gremlin with the ignition that the dealer, an independant shop and myself were unable to diagnose. Donated it to charity. Total write off at 104K miles...

Toyota Tacoma - 65K miles, oil changes and had to clean a bug out of the MAF. Oh, and tires and gas.

Toyota Sequioa - 15K miles, oil and gas.

As for (on topic) roadster R-series, U-series reliability...Look at the odometer of many of the cars that have sat in some garage for years because of some little problem...65K miles is what I see all of the time. Not bad for a cheap import car of the day, MG's and such would never even make it that far, but I bet Miatas go a lot more today...

How about hockey? TR

Ok, people ask me how I know about cars. I don't, just Roadsters, andl it's because the following happened to me and my previous Datsun, leaving me "stranded" until I, or someone else, could figure it out and fix it:
dead battery
Loose or corroded battery connection
dead starter
bad voltage regulator
broken pigtail wire in distributor
bad fuel bowl seal
dead fuel pump
blown water hose
blown heater hose
bad underdash regulator
plugged carb fuel bowl inlets
dead alternator
dead coil
burnt points
frozen ignition
dead windsheild wiper motor
stuck thermostat, overheating
many flat tires, some with no jack
Then there was the timeI stopped for gas, checked the oil, drove off and heard a huge Boom! The battery blew up. I forget how (hood prop shorting battery?) but it was a mess.
Dead wiper motor necessitated disconnecting the linkage and reaching under the dash to HAND turn the wipers in a downpour. Lovely
Then there was the 2 times it was stolen...stranded!
That was my dear departed 67
Good way to learn having things go wrong.
Know what I mean?
Linda
68 100

not just saying this for the sake of arguing...but i know numerous people who have had old ford 300s last 1,000s of miles upon miles, and chevy 350 is like the most popular motor...my uncle has a toyota tundra i believe? its got some v 6 and its a manual, i believe a 99....he has had the head ghaskets replaced round about 4 times on it so far in a matter of 15,000 miles, the shop offered him a grand for it, it has 70,000 miles

Through it's several engine and transmission combinations over 20 years of ownership, the two times I had to walk were when the brass transmission locked in second gear and the time I parked it into a tree. Until I learned what I was doing wrong rebuilding a brass 5 speed transmission, it had a habit of sticking in gears. Drove 100 miles with it stuck in 4th gear, blew numerous head gaskets until I went to studs, cheapo electric fuel pumps die, used spare tire to pressurize fuel tank. I suspect it would be less problematic if I didn't push it to it's limits on a daily basis .... but what fun would that be?

That is interesting about the Tundra, because if it is a V6, it is probably the same motor that is in my Tacoma! I wonder what the difference is...? TR

Roadsters Reliable? - No. Oh, I feel comfortable driving mine anywhere only because of the intimacy I've developed over the years. What could possibly go wrong to leave me stranded is a very few items, Most of which I've maintenanced to lessen the failure possibility.

What Has failed over my 11 years of happy roadstering is much like Linda's list. Stranded? No.

On my inagrural drive, in 95, the hot wire fell off the dizzy. Took me a while, but because of the simplisity of our cars, I was able to find it.

Or cars ARE tough. I melted a piston on the way to Solvang. I made it to the show and made it home on three cilynders.

Well, Reliability in a roadster... Let me see, everytime we go to a car show I more often than not have to help someone fix their roadster. This stranding thing is a common occurence. I have had car's in caravans break down also. It all really boils down to this really. If you do enough preventative maintenance on your car you should not have any problems, even with that you have occasional setbacks, like the time I had to change a starter on my car on a car show weekend. For the most part they are reliable in my opinion. The R16 engine is really good and the U20 is as well as long as it is serviced properly. For the most part the most common cause for problems in the SU cars that I have seen is having the float stuck in the carbs. Great Thread.
Gerardo

A few years back, I was driving my '64 1500 from Sears Point raceway back to San Francisco. Just before the Waldo grade (a long climb up to the north end of the Golden Gate bridge) the car lost all power and a huge white cloud of smoke erupted from the tailpipe. I coasted to the last offramp before the grade and pushed it into a parking lot.

The head was cracked and I had a rather expensive flatbed tow back home to Parkside.

The car had at least 140,000 miles, maybe more. Found a new head and had it machined. Car ran fine after that.

shifty wrote:The car had at least 140,000 miles, maybe more. Found a new head and had it machined. Car ran fine after that.

Not trying to get off roadstering, but same thing happened to my bro.s truck.... 117k miles and the head was cracked, so he got one off a cavalier and put it on. A couple thousand miles later the oil pump stopped working and screwed some bearings up.... $870 later and he has a nice running truck

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I liked that post Mark! Ive come to realize when/if my motor goes Ill find a swap to fit me but while i have a running U20 with 47k miles Ill keep on keeping on.... well, soon as I get a good 5spd

Like Mark, I've owned a lot of roadsters over the years. As I've gotten older and have less leisure time (now have a job/family/responsibilities) I have less, and less time to work on my cars. At times, I've found the service/fixing time vs. drive time ratio has been way off tune...Like 5:1.

I've had tons of breakdowns in my roadsters over the years. I attribute much of this to the fact that I never have kept a single roadster long enough to work out all of the kinks. The most reliabile roadster that I have owned was a 66 spl311 with a L18/5spd combo. I drove this car full time during college. I was able to just change the oil and go without many worries, at all.

Like Mark, I own a stock SPL310 and I also own a 1966 KA24de swapped vehicle (still being worked on).

1964 SPL310 - Stock vehichle which is quite nice and original. I just love the 1500s classic look, the 3rd seat and unique style. I'm also a sucker for wide white walls on a roadster. Though it runs well, in 1964 Datsun expected pretty frequent servicing of the car, and I believe frequent servicing will still be required.

1966 SPL311 - Restored. I've owned this car for about 7 years. Though this car was restored, I was never happy with the freeway drive/power of the 1600. Since I plan on keeping this car for many more years to come, I've opted to to swap in a newer KA24DE drivetrain. This swap requires no modification to the frame of the car. Once completed, this will be my main Roadster driver.This is my long term car which will flip the service/fixing time vs. drive time ratio to 1:10.

I expect to see much easier reliability out of my swapped car because of the new engine (with fuel injection) which probably needs very little maintainance. Also, DGR has changed EVERYTHING out on the car.. the full drivetrain has been reviewed and inspected...

I've got another couple of roadsters, but....I'll save that for another day..

My car has never left me stranded. Its had its issues in the driveway, but I can't be stranded in my own driveway. I have always reached my destonation without any trouble.

Will

When my 67.5 1600 was stock, I only had one failure: I T-boned a car that ran a red light. Other than that, no failures until I started modifying the car, and even then, very few failures.

One notable one was at Santa Maria for the Golden State Grand Prix in about 1976. The GSGP was an autocross between the Southern and Northern California car clubs. I blew the #3 rod out the side of the block. I learned a little about preventative maintenance that time. Good times. <shrug>

Years ago, had just replaced all the brake hardware on my 69 2000, except for the pedal and hard lines........ took the car out for a test drive and threw the timing chain on the way home, horrible noise....
I stopped at the side of the road, didn't even open the hood, just looked underneath the car and DIDN'T see a pile of parts and oil !
Definately stranded, had to be towed home.

On the other hand, I used to auto-x the car hard, would drive it 350 miles to Wendover Utah (WWII military training airport, middle of nowhere, down the road from Bonneville Salt Flats) for Divisional auto-x, race two days, drive home. Twice I blew head gaskets at the race, nursed the overheating car home each time. On the highway across the Bonneville Salt Flats with heater running full blast, I would stop every 20 minutes to let the motor cool down, add water to the rad and motor on down the road a ways. Would stop anywhere I could find an overpass for some shade. Once I would reach the mountains and cooler elevations, could drive straight on home. Wounded, but not stranded.

After the second time, I towed the car to Wendover.
Pretty much lost interest in auto-x, started running more hillclimb races.

Finally lost a rod bearing at a hillclimb race, 69 2000 had to be towed home again. Never felt bad or let down by this car, as we made MANY long distance trips and scenic drives, along with many races.