Datsun Roadster Forum-311s.org

Left the lights on at work. The clock told me exactly when the battery died. So dead I couldn't push start it. Had to be driven home to retrieve jumper cables !

I have had a couple of issues

Picked the car up in Washington state. Drove it to Winnipeg Canada
with no issues. It sat in a heated garage over winter.
Drove it a bit...clutch slave went. I put trans fluid in and managed to get it home.
Another day...points went. Had to be towed home. At home within 15 minutes back on the road.
New EI...now...no issues.

When you say that the points went, exactly what happened? Often, they can be burnished and reset on the roadside and you can get back on your way.

Besides the usual human error dead battery.

Once. We were meeting a group in Green Bay for a weekend trip. Drove a couple hours no problems. Just got to GB, stopped at a red light and the car just died. Cranked and cranked and no love. I pushed it into the triangle of space between the turn lane and regular traffic. Couldn't see anything, but wouldn't start. Finally a group of guys happened by, pushed the car down the street, and around the corner to their shop where they were working on a bunch of clunkers to fix and sell. They rolled over their tool boxes and gave suggestions. Finally realized the glass fuel filter wasn't sealing. By this time it's midnight. They cooked a frozen pizza, and shared their beer.
I ran to a local auto parts store first thing in the morning, bought some generic filter and hose and worked around the problem enough to continue the drive.
Nice guys. Didn't want a thing for their help and all the trouble.
Gave them $100 to share and drove off into the sunrise.

Fuel gauge read 1/4 tank left… but car sputtered and died on the way home today. Luckily I was moving so I was able to roll onto someones driveway. Notified the owner of what had happened and he was super nice about it. Turns out he is the original owner of a sweet all original SL330 convertible… sexy. I just love how my roadster is connecting me to an amazing community of people that I would have never met otherwise. Walked over to a gas station and got some gas, filled her up and I was back on the road. Time to troubleshoot the fuel gauge...

When I first got the car, the gauge read E at all times. I cleaned the connections and voila! But apparently not a full voila... is it possible to calibrate the gauge? Or does it sound like the gauge is kaput?

Well ... lets see ... long ...

Bought some wheels in 73 and the yahoos did not check the brake line clearance. Wheels running ate through the lines and no fluid so no brakes so I parked it.

Three days before the black otter hill climb race (74) I exploded a clutch going up a hill too fast.
Replaced it in three hours (4 guys) the night before the race (raced it) funny how roadsters have created comradery.

Returning from a 2000 mile road trip and 200 miles from home (74), the rear axle pops out and chewed up my tire in the wheel well. Car went straight thank goodness. I could hear squeaking when I drove through bridges. It was the rear bearing going out. Drove down a month later with my best friend in his roadster (RIP my friend I think of you every day) repaired and drove home.

On the return leg from another 2000 (with my 2000 cc 1600) mile trip (76), the alternator began charging like crazy 28 amps or so. Made it home, driving around town one night and the ammeter glowed bright red with smoke. The insulation on the hot lead to the alternator had been eaten through by some battery acid (?) so dead short to the battery hot to ground. Racing suspension and the bumps did this. Fortunate I had cutoff switch in the main line in the glove box (my anti theft in 75) or I might have needed a whole new wiring harness. My girl friend (now wife) said she would not ride in the car with such a rough ride so I took out the racing suspension front and rear springs.

And last and not least ... on our last TDROC (Texas Datsun Roadster Owners Club) trip in Texas (96), one of the bolts from the air filter holder got sucked into the intake valve it was nicely polished by the running valve and finally held the valve completely open. Got a tow home from a club member while his brother happily drove his roadster. I use silicone on the bolt heads now so they won't wiggle loose! Lock tight would work too. If the roadster cam was stock it probably would not have done this. I added a couple of pics of the offending bolt below one above its original position.

Fairly long list for a newby aye? ...

Okay, it finally happened, my roadster stranded me yesterday.

On my way to the pizza meet up yesterday the wire inside the distributor broke. And of course even after I took the cap off the first time to inspect the cap and rotor and points and didn't see it. Looked like it was still hooked up.

Thought the fuel pump went out so went home and got the electric pump and another coil just in case. Nope no go. So after calling AAA for a tow I decided to pull a spark plug and see if I had spark. Hmm, no spark. Pulled the cap again and started poking around and found the broken wire. Stripped the wire and screwed it on and vroom, roadster runs. Cancel the tow and home I went some 3 plus hours later and dragging my wife out to pick me up so I could go home for the pump.

I have quite a story.

Had my roadster (68 1600) for about a year. In that time, I've focused on fuel, carbs and ignition. The rest seemed pretty solid. The local MG group (I live in Denver) does a rally to glenwood springs each year and I was finally joining them with my Datsun. Previous years, we would take my mate's Miata. Ill preface that this would be the longest trip ive done in it with only a few excursions to loveland previously which should have been a foreshadow of what was to come.

The first day, it was running a bit hot but did 8 hours of constant driving without any issues.

The second day, I stalled slowing down for some horses on the road and after a good bit of trying restarted it only to have the smell of burning rubber come from the engine. The alternator belt snapped... well... melted. The alternator had seized. After a bit of fiddling, got it spinning again and luckily had a spare belt in the trunk. 30min later, we were on our way. Everything seemed fine and we finished the rally with our personal best time.

Later that day, we went for dinner and it seized again. A bit of prying and away we went. All this time, the alternator still worked, the bearings just wore out. well on the way back... my amp meter dropped to negative. Pulled into an Auto Zone and after a few hours of searches and calling, we left the car in the lot defeated. I ended up having to call my girlfriend to drive from Denver to pick us up the next day.

Luckily, a fellow roadster owner had a stack of spares. He gave me three of them with the disclaimer that their condition was unknown.Get them tested (finding a place that can test them was another adventure. Spoiler: It was O'reilly's) and... 2 out of 3 were good! The following weekend, up to Glenwood we go thinking it would be a quick turn around. Get there, put it in and.... nothing. Put in the second one and... nothing. The voltage regulator was also bad. Lucky once again, the only one auto zone had available in all of Colorado happened to be in Grand Junction. 3 hours later, with the usual mountain storm brewing, we are on our way home 6 hours after we got there. The last piece of luck was just missing a huge storm that passed over Denver as we got into town. Had we got done sooner, i could have swam in my car as it has no top.

I learned a lot about roadster preparedness on that trip. Moral of the story is to always carry spares of anything that could reasonably break when leaving town.

I'd only had my 66 for 3 months when the clutch slave cylinder puked out about a half mile from home. I sat there a bit with the car off then pushed it into 2nd gear, started it up and drove it home. Lucky I know to be so close.

oh boy I've had some close calls but I've always gotten him running again . the closest one I'd say besides blowing a tire out that actually left it all night on 101 southbound , mines had alot of fuel line clogging (mechanic said tank was dropped and cleaned / not ! ) but it's mostly the exit line that's plugging up the works , weird . but another one of these plugged nights I was stuck on this offramp late night when a nice officer pulled up . well after asking me what car it was , he called another officer over and they blocked off the entire offramp (with lights going haha) and both pushed me up and off the offramp . ( I kept telling them I'll have it going in just a few minutes but they insisted ) haha as they were huffing and puffing pushing my car I flipped on the underglow lights on and acted like I was driving . hearing their feet stomping as they're pushing me I looked back and asked , " hey do I have a flat or something" ? he said, " no ,I don't think so", popping his head to the side to check . I looked forward and said , "huh , it's running kinda slow right now. .. lol lucky they got it and we had a good laugh . turned out to be some condenser I had switch out just before that drive . I got the old one back on and it fired right up . drove home and taped that sucker so I could continue to use it . havnt found what it is yet still . and still taped up in the motor . haha hope I figure it out soon though . it doesn't seem to be in the maintenance manual book . anyway that's it for the 3 months I've had mine .

Barely made it home from school today. Grade 8 alternator bolt sheared clean off!!
It was a good opportunity to test how far you can go without a fan belt. The answer is freeway your fine, 'round town stoplights = not so much.

without the water pump spinning you were lucky! and its march so........

Water not moving is bad, no?


When Peter's alternator seized up, we got a shorter belt, I think it was like 29.5 inches, and drove it home without the alternator, on the battery.. Since it was night, he ran running lights, and tailgated me..

AidanDawn2000 wrote:Barely made it home from school today. Grade 8 alternator bolt sheared clean off!!

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It was a good opportunity to test how far you can go without a fan belt. The answer is freeway your fine, 'round town stoplights = not so much.

Is that the really long one? Do you have the triangle stiffening plate that goes on the front of the alternator Mount? If not, it puts a lot of stress on that bolt and they can break.

I started this thread eleven (!) years ago after a discussion with someone wanting to do an engine swap because the newer engines are more reliable. I think that the results of the poll show that the stock engine is pretty darned reliable. The thread makes for interesting reading.