They're creeping in everywhere. Have you seen them? Snuck in between the Minis, Vauxhalls and Escorts in your neighborhood traffic jam you're bound to spot the odd infiltration of Datsun, Toyota or Mazda, all gleaming and replendent with their EuroAmerican styling and plastic upholstery motifs.

But, at the moment, you don't see many tuned versions around, although folk like Janspeed, Old Working Service Stn, and C&T market a somewhat limited variety of bolt on goodies. Now there's a new name on the scene, one Spike Anderson of Race Head Services which is a one-man tuning venture nestling in the sleepy bosom of Harburyᵂ, a few miles out of Leamington Spa. Before going it on this own Spike was chargehand in the head shop at Broadspeedᵂ.

How did the Datsun bit come about? Well Spike bought a 1200 Coupe for his own personal consumption, and after trolling around in it for a while, realised that both the visual and mechanical specifications could benefit from a little work. ...

elliptic leaf springs with solid axle dangling at the rear. Whees are steel pressings with strange 155 x 12 [Dunlop] SP3's made from an apparently hard Oriental compound at the Japanese Goodyear factory.

Ah, but it ain't like that now. First thing Spike did was whip off the 8-port head and ports and see what was what. No, it didn't have slant ports. What it did have was a specification which really lent itselft to some really deep tuning. But that's for the future. For this stage of tune Spike limited the work to gas-flowing and careful seating of the valves, aiming for good operating efficiency. The Jap carb was slung on the shelf and replaced by a brace of 1-1/4 in SU's on Janspeed inlet manifold, that Salisbury firm also supplying the special exhaust manifold.

While this was going on, Carl Shenton of ...

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bit amiss carb-wise, and in fact Spike later found that one of the SU needles had dropped.

Handling is very good indeed, despite those strange tyres which are really poxy in the wet although not too bad in the dry. The rear Spax are on ultra-hard settings, which are just great on a marble-smooth surface but could do with softening for normal road use. Driving at restrained speed the car corners fairly neutrally, but on bends fast and long enough to discourage a 'chucking' technique understeer dominates. However, the you're pressing on a bit, a sharp lift of the right foot causes the tail to swing out quickly but predictable, and the car can be set up for tighter corners by flicking the nose in to the apex while simultaneously stomping the accelerator pedal.

Well that's just about what it is and what ...