DATSANITI - 1980 Datsun 210 Wagon VQ35 Swap - $2018 Challenge

In reply to maschinenbau :

PPE checks out “OK For Challenge Build”

More NAWZ install progress. 

How many hose clamps in your fuel system is too many hose clamps in your fuel system? No leaks after tightening everything down and the engine still runs like normal. 

Freshly painted bottle maybe goes here. The hose I have in budget isn't long enough to put it behind the seat and I probably won't have a passenger anytime I spray. Plus I like having access to the valve in case things go poorly. That floor needs a coat while I'm at it.

Nitrous only works if you wait for the other guy to use his first and then you have to mumble “too soon” before you hit the button and leave him in the dust.

As someone that daily drove a 210 coupe with the 1200 and a jdm 5spd, this thread gives me so much pleasure. My dad bought ours new in 80, stripper, not even a radio. And I took it through college and beyond. To 350k miles.. abandoned in a SF doctors parking spot when the electrics gave up. Later spotted it going down 101 in my Porsche. The guy was driving at O dark 30 to pick up his sister cleaning offices in Redwood City.  I still had the spare key with me. 
The 210 is immortal in my heart. 

Zip tie flip flops are all I'm seeing right now. Going to make a pair on my lunch break, thanks for the inspiration.

maschinenbau said:

Car show today, autocross tomorrow! I made a subtle livery change last night. Just need numbers now.

Came out better than the last set of BRE stripes you put on!

(Actually the stripes themselves were pretty good both times, but the car looks way better now, is what I'm saying )

In reply to GameboyRMH :

Throwback Thursday! I may need to clean up the roof rack and put it back on, at least for the Concours...

maschinenbau said:

And now we have foot models on GRM, too. This site has everything.

Again, simply amazing car.

 

Sketchy $200 nitrous kit is installed and working. I'm going to the big boy drag strip tonight, which will be Datsaniti's furthest drive to date at 150 miles round trip. Coming home with either time slips, a list of ways to not fail tech, or a towing bill. One of the first two, preferably.

Feels good working with metal again. 

Summary of the night: Nitrous. Is. AWESOME.

Loaded up for the big road trip to the Atlanta Dragway. It took over 2 hours to go 75 miles thanks to Friday afternoon Atlanta traffic. This car sucks to drive in traffic. No A/C, not even a fan, no floor insulation, feet are hot, everything is hot, seat too stiff, loud raspy exhaust (ear plugs the whole way), fingers crossed that pot hole doesn't hit the oil pan, and a constant high-stress state of "what's THAT new sound??" But it did it. Coming back home around midnight was a much nicer drive, maybe even enjoyable.

Tech was pretty lax. Actually too relaxed, honestly. I was hoping to come home with a list of things I should do. They didn't even look under the hood at the sketchy fuel tee situation. They only had quibbles over the battery box, which I really should replace with a plastic sealed container instead of my crappy filing cabinet drawer. I'll fix the fuel situation anyway and read the NHRA rulebook again.

Forgot about an incident on the drive up. Right as I was getting off the interstate, the hood suddenly started "floating" up a couple inches. Uh oh. Part of the hood latch piece was expoxied back on after the hood gutting, and I guess that bond broke. The other half of the latch was welded from the factory, so it probably wouldn't have detached, but it's not a good look. Luckily another racer had a rivet kit. 

I'm honestly a little disappointed in the times. I was hoping for 13's all motor. According to some calculators, the motor is down compared to the advertised 260hp crank. For these ET's, MPH, and weight, that's roughly 175hp at the wheel and I'm not sure how much better I can get the 60' since the tires are hooking pretty well. Try to stall higher? Spray down low and cross my fingers?

...But a pig-rich 35?40? shot really cut that time down! I have bigger jets I'm itching to try, but I knew this would be a safe first-time spray. My goal from the start of this build has been 11's, but I'm not as optimistic after last night. Still, that was a ton of fun and I'm overall happy with how the car did tonight both on and off the track.

Fastest run crappy dashboard view

Im back in competition with you!

Sorry it was slower than hoped. I know your pain. And i still habe almost a second to pick up to get to your na time.....

Pretty sure the obvious answer is more spray! But honestly that's not a bad time. More practice and more runs will Help too I'm sure. 

Two things you might not have accounted for in online calculations...

1) power loss due to auto

2) driver weight included in vehicle weight

#2 might be less of a factor for you.  Still, being down 100-ish hp (?) does seem extreme

nice job getting the testing in

In reply to Dusterbd13-michael :

I'm really looking forward to racing you! I think it will come down to who makes the dumbest jet decision. Full disclosure: I have no plans for this car after the Challenge...

In reply to maschinenbau :

The man with nothing to lose is the most dangerous man in the room.

You have nothing to lose apparently. ...

maschinenbau said:

In reply to Dusterbd13-michael :

I'm really looking forward to racing you! I think it will come down to who makes the dumbest jet decision. Full disclosure: I have no plans for this car after the Challenge...

Full disclosure, if you don’t blow it up and want to move on I would maybe like to talk to you in October 

no, bad patrick.

i would not hesitate to jet it to 100 then step up to 125 if your math says it’s worth the chance

In reply to Patrick :

You don't want this car. It's awful on the street. Unless you want to pay only $2000 to compete for FTD at any local auto-cross and probably go 12's in the quarter. And look cool doing it. In which case you do want this car. 

I know of a magazine that shows you step-by-step how to put an LS on this subframe. Heard you might be into that sort of thing.

Edit: Wait, you already have a Datsun that does all of that!

How many more months until October???? I can't wait to see this go down. 

Might have found something here. Take a look at my pedal stop. I put this in back when I was having the Accelerator Pedal Position (APP) sensor issue. I thought maybe I was over-flexing the pedal when going WOT, causing the sensor to short/open and put the car in limp mode. I also doused the thing in contact cleaner, since the sensor getting dirty/dusty from bodywork and paint was the more likely problem. 

Maybe it's limiting the total sensor range, possibly keeping the ECM out of WOT? Let's find out for sure.

The APP has potentiometers inside, which are basically resistors that change based on movement. The ECM reads this in as pedal position and does stuff to the engine accordingly. 

Sensor 1: 

• Idle position: 2.83 kOhm
• "Floored": 0.41 kOhm, 0.35 if you push really hard
• Actual WOT: 0.13 kOhm

Sensor 2:

• Idle position: 0.28 kOhm
• "Floored": 2.71 kOhm. 2.76 if you push really hard
• Actual WOT: 2.91 kOhm

I don't know what exact TPS% this all translates too, but looks like I never went WOT at the drag strip, or at the most recent autocross. D'oh! This is potentially very important because this car, like many other modern EFI cars, goes into an open-loop "power enrichment" mode at WOT. How much power difference can that make? I guess I won't know until the next time I go drag racing, but I adjusted the pedal so I get the full sensor travel and my hopes are definitely back up.

That makes sense. That MPH is definitely low for the weight and power you should have.

From what I've seen the pedal position sensors on those nissans are very touchy. Just watching a few people with builds on z cars and I've seem 3 or 4 of them have issues with that sensor.

If you can still plug an OBDII reader in then you might be able to see what the computer is actually reading from the pedal and how far open the throttle body is.

Adam

I haven't checked this thread for some time but the latest paint job looks awesome!  Hope you can get the pedal position sensor figured out and use all of the horsepower is has to offer.

maschinenbau said:

Might have found something here. Take a look at my pedal stop. I put this in back when I was having the Accelerator Pedal Position (APP) sensor issue. I thought maybe I was over-flexing the pedal when going WOT, causing the sensor to short/open and put the car in limp mode. I also doused the thing in contact cleaner, since the sensor getting dirty/dusty from bodywork and paint was the more likely problem. 

Maybe it's limiting the total sensor range, possibly keeping the ECM out of WOT? Let's find out for sure.

The APP has potentiometers inside, which are basically resistors that change based on movement. The ECM reads this in as pedal position and does stuff to the engine accordingly. 

Sensor 1: 

• Idle position: 2.83 kOhm
• "Floored": 0.41 kOhm, 0.35 if you push really hard
• Actual WOT: 0.13 kOhm

Sensor 2:

• Idle position: 0.28 kOhm
• "Floored": 2.71 kOhm. 2.76 if you push really hard
• Actual WOT: 2.91 kOhm

I don't know what exact TPS% this all translates too, but looks like I never went WOT at the drag strip, or at the most recent autocross. D'oh! This is potentially very important because this car, like many other modern EFI cars, goes into an open-loop "power enrichment" mode at WOT. How much power difference can that make? I guess I won't know until the next time I go drag racing, but I adjusted the pedal so I get the full sensor travel and my hopes are definitely back up.

Typically TPS's are set up as a voltage divider where 0-0.5v and 4.5-5v are out of range (clamping region) so the available voltage output is 0.5-4.5V.

See if you get something close of 4.5V out at WOT with the sensor connected

Mild update. Went to Caffeine and Octane two weekends ago. Datsaniti got a LOT of attention! Dad doesn't quite get it, but was surprised by how many people recognized the engine and appreciated what was done.

This whole I've still been unsatisfied with the brake pedal feel. I have also never been able to fully bleed the LR caliper because the bleeder screw broke off forever ago, so I've just been loosening the hose connection. Turns out that caliper has also been sticking. I noticed it last time I went drag racing. Brake smell and a HOT hub means I was dragging a brake each run. I'm guessing the burnout got the caliper hot and it seized while pulling up to the line. Luckily it loosened up on the highway. So I went ahead and replaced both calipers and pads. Also the parking brake was in standard Midwestern shape, rusted to oblivion and missing half the friction surfaces, so I cleaned that up and put new shoes in. Everything feels so much better and more confident.

This past weekend I went autocrossing. The car felt amazing and I drove pretty well! 30th out of 146 overall. Nowhere near FTD, but right up there with some very quick cars. Check out this E-Mod Jeep!

And I finally got around to de-sketchifying the nitrous fuel tap situation, now with minimal hose connections. This is actually cheaper than the original solution, and now NHRA legal.

Oh and the accelerator pedal sensor issue popped up again on the highway once. I can't risk this happening during a drag run so I put a different junkyard unit in.

So, what kind of drag times are you pulling? I need to know.....