After growing tired of listening to my exhaust pipe bottom out every time I mashed the throttle, I decided that I needed to raise the ride height of the rear suspension on my 510.

I looked under the car to see if I could figure out what I could easily change, and took this picture:



From the picture, it looked like the isolators on top of the springs were toast. I asked around on various forums and on the 510 mailing list about what I needed to do, and got this tip:

It's 2 bolts Josh!! ... You have a crossmember that goes from left to right mounting points.. you have a left and a right control arm , each with a spring in front of axle .. both sides are held together with the lower shock mount to limit they're travel in the back of the control arm.. undo the 2 shock bolts and bang the control arm hangs down, and you can take out the spring and isolator.. Just go out with a wrench and get your hands dirty.

Figuring that two bolts couldn't take much longer than a half hour, I decided that this morning would be perfect for installing the new set of insulators I picked up from T.E.P. Between the lift I'd get from replacing the trashed insulators already in the car, and the additional 1/2" lift that the new ones would give me, I could get the lift I needed in the rear.

As it turns out, two bolts was only the beginning. The two bolts was enough to disconnect the shocks, which allowed the control arms to hang down, but they didn't hang down low enough to simply pull the springs and isolators out. It took a LOT of work. And in addition to disconnecting the shocks, the only way to drop the control arms low enough was to also pull the half-shafts from the wheels. And even then, I had to pull the wheels off to have enough room to work. This worked just fine for the driver side suspension, but on the passenger side, I actually had to use my floor jack to force the trailing arm down!



As it turns out, the isolators weren't as bad as I thought they'd be. I expected them to be flattened out, and I assumed that replacing them would give me more lift. So, to make sure I got the additional lift I wanted, I decided to use the old isolators as a spacer on top of the new isolators. (I cut them so they'd fit on top)



After another half hour of getting the springs back IN the car, the result is perfect. The car is entirely level. Additionally, the driving experience is much better. It won't bottom out no matter how hard I slam on the throttle pedal, which allows me to be quite a bit more aggressive with it. Fun.



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It was a nice day outside, and since I'm giving some thought about changing the ride height, I figured I'd take a couple of photos.

The rear end is really too low. I know that some people like the slammed look, but I'm actually bottoming out on hard acceleration. My rear sway bar and exhaust pipe are taking a POUNDING on the pavement...

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In my previous 510 post, I mentioned that I found an interior window crank from a 210 that fit my 510. Today, I picked up an exterior door handle for my driver-side door. Until recently, I've had to enter the car through the passenger door... which has been a little annoying. I still have a hole in the door for the lock mechanism (I might weld up that hole after I install a wireless door popper), but I can now get into the car the way I'm supposed to. Nice.



I also found an uncommon valve cover that I pulled, and will probably sell on eBay or trade to another 510 enthusiast for some parts. I'm not too particular about "rare" or "JDM" parts for my car; I generally prefer function over fashion.

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I ran to a couple of junkyards today with a few things on my wish list. I still had no luck on the L-series intake manifold, but I did manage to pick up some door bits.


The locks on my doors lacked caps, which was more than just a matter of appearance. Without the caps, the rod that actuated the lock would actually sink below the deck of the door; you'd need needle-nose pliers to pull the rod back out. I found a pair of lock caps on a Datsun B210.


I also picked up another window crank lever from that car; the old one on my driver-side door was missing the knob. This one works.


My 510 is currently missing a hand brake, so I pulled this one off the same Datsun B210. I'm not sure if the cable is the proper length, but at least the front assembly looks good and works properly. I'll update when I get the hand brake installed.

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Today, I finally headed out to the BIG junkyard I mentioned in December looked around for some parts that I could use in my 510. In particular, I wanted an L-series intake manifold (to adapt to a Z-series EFI intake), a fuel filler neck/cap assembly, a fuel guide valve (controls fuel-line vapors, among other things), and some misc. door bits.

My wife suited up and came to the junkyard with me (awesome!) and we zeroed in on the Nissan/Datsun region of the junkyard. As large as the yard was, the section I needed wasn't really that large, and most of the cars were circa 1980 and later, which made them less useful me than I had hoped. Lots of Sentras, a couple of Z-cars, and one 1979 510. I had this false picture in my head of endless Datsuns or something, but it didn't end up playing out that way.


1979 Datsun 510. I don't like them.

The 1979 Datsun 510 isn't really much like a "real" 510 at all, save that it came with an L-series engine and was rear-wheel drive. Apart from that, the similarities end. Because this one had the L20b motor, the intake manifold I needed was on the car, but after about 20 minutes of wrenching, I gave up on pulling the part. There were too many things in the way, and this particular intake had a lot of vacuum-related accessories that weren't really worth the trouble.



In the meanwhile, my wife was backing screws out of the fuel filler tube I needed (awesome!), and after pulling we pulled that part out, we figured we got what we needed. Because the previous owner shaved the sides of my 510, the filler neck is in the trunk in this photo. I'm not sure when I'll get around to cutting a new hole into the side of the car to install a proper filler access, so in the meanwhile, I'll just have to pop the trunk any time I want to put gas in the car.

I didn't see a fuel guide valve; I think that the vapor system was probably changed over the years, and because I wasn't familiar enough with the 1979 system, I wasn't quite sure what to look for. I did, however, pull the charcoal canister which is a part of that system, but decided to leave it. If I'm going to use a charcoal canister to scrub the fuel vapors, I might as well get a new one.



I also picked up a new fuel pump from Kragen for $29.99 (price-matched to Autozone's current price), since I'm now confident that I thrashed the one on the car when I failed to install the fuel pump spacer. And lastly, I tightened up the alternator, since one of the mounting bolts was rattling around.

Once summer rolls around, I'm pretty sure I'm going to hate the heat... but being able to go to the junkyard in a t-shirt in January is pretty awesome. And having a wife who is willing to join me is pretty cool, too. Thanks, dear. :)

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