1978 B310 Datsun Sunny 140Y Coupe **NEW UPDATES** (Read 1,849 times)

[tss240zg]

Feb 24, 2013 8:44:35 GMT 1 unclesilvia said:

Feb 24, 2013 0:41:21 GMT 1 tss240zg said:

Looks good...loads of progress since you first got the car...I like the watanabes.
There were a couple of pics of the datsun stand in the fast car magazine

Really? Cool

Any shots of my car??

There might be...i am not to sure...i will have a check

[unclesilvia]

2013 UPDATES

Time to do some work to get the Datty on the road for this years show season and to make some little enhancements

Well the main problem I was having before the winter was the front brake calipers were starting to sieze up. On stripping them down I found the pistons to be very corroded. I figured that instead of rebuilding or replacing the standard and quite frankly rubbish brakes I thought Ide get on and do some well needed upgrades.
I looked into different brake upgrades that will fit onto my B310 struts, BUT I have now decided to go the whole hog and replace the front suspension and brakes with the much larger and vented 280ZX brakes and shorter, coilover converted struts.

I also decided I wanted to convert the rears to coilovers as well to match the front and so I can remove all of the cut springs that was currently on the car.

So I went on the hunt for parts and came across a guy breaking a 280ZX on Ebay (Also advertised on here afterwards).
I contacted him and made a deal on the complete front strut/brake setup for the bargain price of £50 if I arranged collection
Luckilly a guy in Retro Rides lived near him in Birmingham and brought it down to the Retro Beach meet for me last week that I was going to... WIN!!


Also a mate of mine on RR had some unknown fitment coilovers lying around in his garage and said I can have them for beer tokens.
Im not sure If they will work but have an idea how to convert them. Defo worth a try


So before I got them I commenced the strip down on the front end of my B310.....










Once everything was stripped out I decided to remove the plastic arch liners and underseal everything in prep for going a little lower lol




Then It was waiting for the new parts.......


All the parts collected......


And the Honda Civic Coilover kit arrived from Ebay....


Now for some comparaison and measurments that I promised.......

Left: 140Y Small solid front brakes and suspension
Right: 280ZX Larger and vented front brakes and suspension


Right: 140Y Small solid front brakes and suspension
Left: 280ZX Larger and vented front brakes and suspension


Left: 140Y Small solid front brakes and suspension
Right: 280ZX Larger and vented front brakes and suspension


Left: 140Y Small solid front brakes
Right: 280ZX Larger and vented front brakes


This lot will be removed from the 280ZX struts!!


140Y Brakes and suspension in 14" Wheel


280ZX Brakes and suspension in 14" Wheel


length of 140Y Struts (470mm) compared to the 280ZX being shorter at 420mm


140Y Suspension clearence with 7.0J Watanabe wheels




140Y Suspension clearence with 9.0J Enkei wheels + 15mm spacers




280ZX Suspension clearence with 7.0J Watanabe wheels




280ZX Suspension clearence with 9.0J Enkei wheels + 20mm spacers




Back to work but the weather changed... Take that rain.......... I will not be defeated!!!






Havent got a big vice?? Park a 4x4 on it LOL
These were lower bolts were bloody tight........... even this didnt work so nipped down to my mates garage to use their air tools!!


While I was there they let me borrow their hardcore coil compressor


Struts stripped of top mount, springs, lower mounts and calipers.


Cut off standard spring perches


Grind down welds and remove paint coating from all of strut shaft




Annoyingly one of these struts has been replaced in its lifetime so i have one sealed unit and one with a removable insert which is much easier to work with!!




Removable insert


Sealed unit?!?!?!?!?!


Insert type retaining top cap


Sealed unit top cap with oil seals


I'm hoping that the sealed unit will be ok when the new spring perch gets welded onto the outside of the strut. Im going to empty the oil out first and refill with new after. Any advice as Ive not seen Datsuns with sealed struts before??

Next I decided to trial fit together the coilover kit onto the prepped struts, using the B310 topmounts (dont know if the 280ZX ones cut down will be better??).
Ive tried using 2 blue plastic top spring caps together back to back as it does fit nicely into the B310 top mount. This will prob change when I eventually get some S13 adjustable top mounts. (Any other ideas for the current setup??)




(lower threaded tube only fitted to support top tube prior to welding the perch on)


Trial fitting on car...






Trial with 9.0J Wheels on (yes they catch with lower threaded tube fitted but should be fine with correct perch weleded on)


Thats as far as Ive got this week..... IF you have any advice on the highlighted areas that would be great

[Ricky180B]

Good work there

[Al Ramone]

what you refer to as the "sealed unit" strut, is accutuly the original nissan damper. the reason it hasn't come out is because there is a rubber seal at the top of it. give it a good yank and it will all come out and spill oil all over the place.
depending on how gently you remove the rubber seal, it might go back together again without leaking.
the removeable insert is after market.

you can cut down the 280zx strut top and use that if you like.

whats much more important though, is that you use the top bearing in whatever top you use.

[unclesilvia]

Apr 14, 2013 17:22:56 GMT 1 Al Ramone said:

what you refer to as the "sealed unit" strut, is accutuly the original nissan damper. the reason it hasn't come out is because there is a rubber seal at the top of it. give it a good yank and it will all come out and spill oil all over the place.
depending on how gently you remove the rubber seal, it might go back together again without leaking.
the removeable insert is after market.

you can cut down the 280zx strut top and use that if you like.

whats much more important though, is that you use the top bearing in whatever top you use.

Ah I thought they had inserts from factory?!?! One must of been replaced then!

I believe the oil can be drained from the breather hole at the top once the seal cap has been removed by pumping the piston upside down? Can I not just empty out the oil, do the welding then refill without disturbing the rubber seals?? Either that or I just replace the unit with another insert..... But where is the best place to find a standard replacement? Doesnt matter what happens to the seal or oil then. I did try swinging off it but it didnt want to come out!!??

Does the 280ZX top mount have any advantage over using the B310 one? Any variation in heights??

The blue spring holder that came with the coilover kit actually fits nicely against the top bearing when upturned. Im not sure how else to do it as the blue caps the right way up just have a large mating face that wont touch the bearing??

[Al Ramone]

it doesn't look like you have the bearing fitted in the pic?


and yes, there will be a hight difference between the rubber top mounts. if you fit the 280zx top mount you will raise the car 20mm ish?

[unclesilvia]

Apr 14, 2013 18:19:06 GMT 1 Al Ramone said:

it doesn't look like you have the bearing fitted in the pic?


and yes, there will be a hight difference between the rubber top mounts. if you fit the 280zx top mount you will raise the car 20mm ish?

Yea the bearing is fitted but it is up inside the rubber skirt on the B310 top mounts. This makes is tricky for the blue spring cap to sit against it. I may cut off the rubber skirt?!?!

So the car will be 20mm lower on the B310 top mounts........ sounds good to me since im not sectioning the struts.

[Al Ramone]

lower yes. but you should be able to tell us by how much as you've got all the bits there!

i've trimmed down the rubber skirt before, not by much mind. but you don't want the spring top cup rubbing the rubber. the top cup should sit nicely against bearing.

[unclesilvia]

Apr 14, 2013 18:55:32 GMT 1 Al Ramone said:

lower yes. but you should be able to tell us by how much as you've got all the bits there!

i've trimmed down the rubber skirt before, not by much mind. but you don't want the spring top cup rubbing the rubber. the top cup should sit nicely against bearing.

Lower is lower whatever it is so a WIN for me....... Ill use the B310 one then.

How much of the rubber skirt can I remove then? If I remove it all I may not have to double up on the blue caps which I dont really think is ideal.

Ill get better pics of the Top mount this week hopefully.

[Al Ramone]

you might need to swap the struts left to right as there may be a clearance issue with the calipers and the roll bar linkage.

can you not use the original spring top cup? or at least part of it?

i know i used two bearings doubled up on my one of my old cars. a S130 with a smaller B210/B310 one on top. can't remember the details....


interested to see how those coilover sleeves work. are they steel? more pics please

[unclesilvia]

Apr 14, 2013 20:19:12 GMT 1 Al Ramone said:

you might need to swap the struts left to right as there may be a clearance issue with the calipers and the roll bar linkage.

can you not use the original spring top cup? or at least part of it?

i know i used two bearings doubled up on my one of my old cars. a S130 with a smaller B210/B310 one on top. can't remember the details....


interested to see how those coilover sleeves work. are they steel? more pics please

Ill post this again with some edits to show what i mean


Thinking cut the rubber off along the green line so the top spring cup can make contact with the bearing and i can remove the second upturned spring cup.
I do like the idea of doubling up on the bearings tho as I have the larger ones from the 280ZX!! That may work!!

The origional top spring cup is the wrong shape for the smaller spring to sit nicely and its really deep so would sit the spring much lower down the strut and may cause issues with wheel clearence..... particularly if I run my 9J rims

Coilover sleeves are pretty simple. The threaded tube is Alloy so cant be welded on but I have had some sleeves made up in steel which will be welded on making the new spring perches.... Pics and details of that coming soon.
Bit like this though......




Above taken from this useful resource..... dirtys30.blogspot.co.uk/2011/04/how-to-240z-ground-control-coilovers-w.html

[Al Ramone]

well doubling up on the bearing, or running two cups like your picture, will reduce the amount you can lower as the bump stop (i hope your fitting one, even if it's a cut down one) will be closer to the strut housing. so you may as well use the S130 top mounts anyway and save yourself the trouble.

[Damien4884]

On the s12 ones i've done i have fitted a 50mm OD 6mm thick spacer between the top hat and bearing to stop the tophat from sitting on the area around the bearing and stopping it from turning, so whilst i lost a bit of travel i should gain it back and get a bit more drop when i fit the camber plates. I'll be taking them off this week as got to do something a bit different for someone elses 180b so i'll finally get the pictures of it all finished sorted out.

[unclesilvia]

Ill have a play around with the parts I have this week and take more photos

[unclesilvia]

MINI UPDATE

I may of had a result today, but this depends if I can get these to fit!?!?

I managed to get a pair of brand new uprated mk2f Polo front suspension inserts for free just because the guy had no use for them....... Hopefully I can make these fit my 280ZX Struts

Length = 341mm
Diameter = 46mm (Yes I know it doesnt look like it in the pics lol)

I havent yet compaired these to the single 280ZX strut I have but its worth a try for a freebee









Ill try it when i go to my garage this week and let you know