Datsun Roadster Forum-311s.org

I would also like to thank Eric, here in Southern California for finding the reoccurring issue with the charging system and fixing the stuck choke on carb number 2. Thank you also for Robert and his continued work getting the car back into a driver condition! I understand my limits, their help is invaluable.

Now that the car in fact is running, as it turns out really well and shifting without issue the front brakes are truly terrible. No, the calipers were not rebuilt. Getting them rebuilt is an option but I am looking at my choices.

I do not need drilled rotors, I have seen them crack, and a solid vented rotor has done the job on my track cars. I have fresh bearings and races in the front hubs, I am hoping to reuse them going forward. The update of the car, continues!

More miles on the car, the rear Bilstein's are on the way and an event next weekend. We found a new potential vender to add the additional bar to the roll hop for the shoulder straps. It continues.

First, the rear Bilsteins are in the car. With the correct larger bushings they fit. They are dramatically better than the KYB's they replaced. Yes they are more money, but it's your back.
The drive to the alignment shop was accomplished using a highway, four lanes with the temperature reading low 90's on the way there and almost triple digits on the way home. NO, zero issues at speed as to coolant temp or oil pressure. In fourth at an indicated 70 plus it continued to pull to 80 without issue. Yes, I was still getting passed by everyone. This is Southern California.
As for a set up, today is a baseline, Both sides of the car now have 5/8 negative camber and the toe is set at Zero.
I need more miles in the car, today was fun!

The next faze of this project, has begun. The saga of the front brakes. Having spent numerous hours researching on this site the options available to reinvent the wheel, on this subject there are many, I have decided to take advantage of some of the older technology available when this car was designed and produced.

My Dad was a Navy pilot and getting to fly numerous planes using among other tools, a slide rule. Time to rebuild what I have, as designed in the day and see my self why no one likes the original set up. I will be using other than stock brake pads. Not much about this car is limited to as delivered by the factory.

The calipers that I sent in to be refreshed are from someones stash of parts that might be used in the future. This allows me to keep my car on the ground and I can limp it around as needed. I will be placing an order for the additional parts that are required, now that it is past the 24th and again no stress on having an immobile car during the build up to this point. I would like to thank Eric for the cores, when done my old ones will be returned, as soon as I get them off the car. We have a great community, thank you.

The rebuilt calipers are back, just under two weeks round trip. Having to work is slowing down getting them into the Datsun, that and the weather. This morning I herd a great quote, two years to restore then a year to forget.

I am not restoring the car. Just getting it running and back on the road as a driver. It's two yeas at the end of the month, September. I can't wait to start the third year. Time to drive this thing.

I continue to enjoy your progress and improvements. Stock brakes when working correctly were actually quite impressive according to the magazine reviews I've read and had little fade. I expect they will meet your needs well. I swapped mine out many years ago for a number of reasons. Mine did not work well and I wanted to try my hand at something different (modified mount for a Toyota 4runner calipers on Maxima vented discs; inherited the Mazda rear discs with the LSD axle swap). Â Datsun Roadster was a pretty well put together car for its time. I've found mine to be very reliable, with most issues coming from my own modifications. And yes, we do have a great bunch here!

I would like to thank Robert for this part of the project. In the quest for a seat belt solution for the drivers of very different heights, one of the issues we faced was a shoulder belt cross bar that would work with the seat and the existing roll bar. The ability to bend a tube of steel and then weld it as required is not one of my skills. Doing the required fitting and tacking it in position on a complete car with the interior in place is much like asking to be there when the guys are making sausage. No, I was not there.

This is one of those parts of this saga that I will just focus on the results.

This view gives you a number of things to focus on as to the added bar and the shop that did the work. What you might see on the front of the Miata is meant for the car that is going to get passed.

Ludacris’ song lyrics on the front of a race car - can’t say I’ve seen that before, but it is funny.

I am getting closer to having rebuilt front brakes. This project is a testament to what can be done, just not in any timeline that anyone would believe.

Glad the parts will help!

Brake pads are on order, the EBC Greenstuff DP2120's. Like many opportunities with this project I have spent way too much time agonizing with numerous "what if" scenarios. Time to enjoy the fall colors and drive the car.

Let the dust be released!

The next step starts with assembling the parts that make up the next step in this saga.

That includes the rebuilt caliper pucks, EBC brake pads and caliper core's. Why spend to money to find what is already on the car? In a previous episode of what is on the car will work, right? No, the hashed caliper pucks that I had on the car would not be worth the effort. I was very fortunate to find a set of complete calipers that included the hard lines that had not been on a car for years. They had been stored away in dry storage and were perfect.

Yes, breaking down the calipers did not go without a little blood spilled. What's new about this, nothing. But this time I also relearned that removing the scale from old, small, fasteners and bits of shaped metal creates heat. With using a die grinder, this one was battery powered and three inch disk proved no match for the build up of other than metal.

The finished calipers are attached. My observations of this refresh to this point are as follows; the brake pads are wedged into the caliper bodies. The pads that I have been working on are not in any way floating when installed in position. Is this correct?

The EBC brake pads do not act this way. How they work on the car is next.