johndej said:Very nice build.... saw this today and made me think of it.
https://www.duncanimports.com/used/Datsun/1937-Datsun-Type+17-5292d3690a0e08bb394b00e012635bac.htm
Hope to see some updates as it looks like a blast.
He turned down $45k earlier this year. I don't know how many people are looking for one, but I would have sold it
In reply to Steve_Jones :
It is a gorgeous car. Hard to find a buyer who wants to pony up big money for a 16 horsepower vehicle, however. Honestly, it deserves to be in a museum. I would be talking to the North American branch of the Nissan heritage museum near Nashville.
There's one in the main branch of the museum collection over in Zama, Japan
https://www.nissan-global.com/EN/HERITAGE/datsun_17_sedan.html
JoeyM said:I'm thinking of incorporating a backlit lens into that frame horn cover, with the leaping hare image on the lens.
I will use licence plate lights that I can put inside the frame horn to illuminate the lens from the back. This will require modifying the mounting bezel so more light gets out, and building a bracket inside the frame horn to attach them to.
A bus bar like this is a great idea when you have to ground a whole mess of stuff. I have one of those behind the dash, and the one here at the back of the car.
I'm about to run a whole mess of wires through the frame rails, and it would be lovely to have one of those on each side in the tube, but I don't have that kind of room, especially when I need to also put a bracket to hold a light inside the same tube. This pigtail with a mess of female ends is the solution I came up with to go inside the driver's side frame rail, letting me ground lots of stuff period if it works, I'll build another one to go on the other side of the car in that frame rail.
nice haggerty article on the history of phaetons:
https://www.hagerty.com/media/car-profiles/pheatons-were-a-staple-of-pre-war-car-design/
JoeyM said:This pigtail with a mess of female ends is the solution I came up with to go inside the driver's side frame rail...if it works
It definitely didn't work. The thing was way too big to go in the frame rail without rubbing on everything. Adding more protection made it bigger, exacerbating the problem. I've decided to scale back; instead of trying to tuck all the wires into the frame rail, I'm reducing that goal and only running the wires for the running light and the logo light.
I made Y-adapters for the parking light wires so I can temporarily run the logo light off the same switches.
the plan is to eventually run additional wires and add a switch to the dash for the logo lights
I've been toying with the idea of trying to build a convertible top for the car, and I'm feeling inspired enough that I am considering trying to make my own frame for a folding phaeton top. The examples that I have seen at LocostUSA and the HAMB have used conduit. That's grassroots enough to make me happy, but I may be able to do even better, using the frame of a sun shelter that I took to a few autocrosses many years ago it is now broken, and sitting in the corner of the garage. Most of the frame is half inch tube, which is too flimsy to be useful. It did, however, incorporate several lengths of one inch steel tube, and I might be able to use those to fabricate the frame for a top.
Some of those bends are pretty tight, though, and I will need to find a way to make them
I'm really hoping those tubes turn out to be 7/8" and not one inch. It's a lot easier to get Bimini Top hardware for boats in that size.
Back on the subject of logo lights, I'm wondering about the feasibility of using mouse trap springs as lens retainers. If that would work, it would be satisfyingly on brand.
Here's my first mock-up of what a spring clip made from mousetrap parts would look like. This is stuff that I welded to a piece of box fan scrap that was left over for making the semaphore turn signal housings.
The plan would be to build spring clips like this on the inside of the frame rail covers, and use them to hold the lenses in place for the logo lights. If the spring clip is strong enough to hold a screwdriver, it ought to be able to push a lens up against the metal
Planning where to put the hole for the backlit lens
There's a lot of filing left to do so I can remove the metal all the way up to the line, but this will give you an idea
Clearly, The mousetrap spring works. now imagine it holding a piece of translucent white acrylic that we can put images on.
I went to Harbor Freight this morning and got a set of files to open up the logo hole all the way to the line. Not perfect, but not bad
JoeyM said:I'm really hoping those tubes turn out to be 7/8" and not one inch. It's a lot easier to get Bimini Top hardware for boats in that size.
It turns out that there is hardware for one inch tubes.
JoeyM said:It turns out that there is hardware for one inch tubes.
Well, I just ordered those ends, and this tubing bender. I guess that means I'm going to try building a frame for a phaeton top.
When I start on the top, I'll probably be trying to replicate the look of the original car, with the back bow positioned slightly forward so the back of the curtain isn't quite vertical. You can see that the front bow/rollbar area is a TINY bit taller than the windshield. I can't say for certain, but I *think* it is also a touch higher than the back bow.
Now the end cap for the frame horn is starting to look like something. Test fitting the lens
Disassembled to spray paint
Today I turned this....
....into this
I'm putting more pictures in the show us something you MADE thread
The fittings and tube Bender are here. The splined upper portion of a floor jack handle fits the tube bender, and the fittings match the pieces of the broken sun shade, like I was hoping.
I have plenty of other projects on this car before I start bending up a frame for a top, but I think I am ready
JoeyM said:
Oops, those were drawn wrong. The nice thing about metal is that I can drill a new hole
...and fill the old one
I realize this is a really minor deal, but I'm proud of being able to fill that hole. I used to suck so much at welding thin stuff, and I feel like I'm finally starting to get the hang of it. I didn't even break out the copper backing plate that I made to use in places where I'm worried about burn through
Whatever wire gauge and alloy mousetrap springs made of is easy to overheat. I melted through two of them today....
....before I was able to get one welded to the frame cap.
The lenses on both sides are ready for images
.
OK, the acrylic lenses are cut and mounted in the (not quite finished) caps....
....which have been delivered to my sister. She'll be cutting the vinyl to put these images into the lenses
.
I'm going to bend those into L-shaped brackets, and weld them to another L-shaped piece of metal up high on the side. That should let me position the bracket inside the frame horn and hold it in place using an existing hole in the side of the Dakota frame.
The switches I ordered have arrived. They will control the semaphores (aka "trafficators") and logo lights
We also reached the "light on bracket and inside frame" stage of making logo lights,
but the bracket is rubbish and will probably need to be redone
Okay, these switches may not be as difficult to wire up as I was expecting.
At midnight, I was having trouble sleeping, so I went out to the garage and ran some wire on the street rod.
The earlier test of the dashboard switch used a wire running over the windshield and across the engine bay to power the logo light. Obviously, that was *just* a test, and the wires needed to be run properly.
I got out of bed and snaked the power wire for the logo lights through the split plastic flex tube like it should be, all the way up to the front on one side. I still need to add a second end for the logo light on the other side of the car, but that was a good use for insomnia
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