remember better to spend money competing than spend money on the latest bling for your car in the first few years.
as for the car make it safe and make it reliable and learn how to drive fast and safe and have fun.
then make the car quicker by starting with Brakes and handling then add power later.

Not as much as that Kharman Ghia though now that was scary.

Just make sure you have enough adjusment on the panhard mounts to play with the roll centres though when you do it.

Just go to the Wreckers and measure up and use any Factory Fan that fits as any Factory spec fan will be bulletproof because it is made to OE standards, Plenty, Well actually all late model cars run electric fans and that will be the best and cheapect way to go unless you really want a brand new one, factory ones are reliable and often have nice mounts as well.

Look at this link for the How to Modify your 510 Engine and Chassis Book in PDF format officially sanctioned by the Original Publisher and now on Google Docs as a PDF Downloadable it will give you all the insight you need into building a good L series Engine.
The download is roughly 180 Megabytes and I just linked it for the Chassis section on this thread.
http://datsun1200.com/modules/newbb/v ... p?topic_id=63290&start=10

Go here and download this for a start as the chassis section will basically tell you what you need to know.
https://docs.google.com/uc?id=0ByCvxnH ... ZLd1V0Q3c&export=download

Found here thanks to Dime Quarterly.
http://dimequarterly.blogspot.com.au/ ... o-modifyand-digitize.html

This is a digitised varsion of the old How to Modify datsun 510 (1600) Engine and Chassis but the chassis bit is applicable to a 1200.

A few pointers seam weld the chassis rails, Diagonally brace the upper cantrail (the upper rail the guards bolt on to) where it meets the A Pillar (the vertical section the front doors hinge off) and most importantly find a 1200 photo with a Roll cage fitted and work out where the Roll cage will eventually mount and then plate that area with at least 2 mm ~2.5 mm sheet metal across the floor pan and up across the inner side of the inner sill panel to give a strengthened area where the main legs of the Roll cage will eventually mount.
Same for the front legs where they will sit on the front floor and again on the rear parcel shelf where the rear legs of the cage will eventually sit and remember that at the rear parcel shelf area you really need to continue the cage down under the rear parcel shelf to pickup on the rear chassis rails.

If you do this plating before it is needed you can then bolt in a Roll cage onto an already reinforced section ready to go when needed, Otherwise you face the risk of upending the car and seeing the Roll cage legs punched straight through the floor where they mount and I have seen that happen as most cages only use a relatively small section for the mounting plate usually 5 mm thickness and about 100 mm x 70 mm size wise at best which is OK if it bolts to an already reinforced section, But not big enough for a major roll hence reinforce the shell where the cage will mount, The total area for the Main Hoop mount ends up being about a square foot in area to spread the load over a large enough area to work properly

Been there done that, A Z18 Turbo into a 1200 Ute years ago for Wayne Selby, Yeah one of those Selby's of Suspension fame one of my mates.
This Ute was Burgundy with Simmons wheels, Custom dash, Formula Ford Master Cylinder mounted on top of the Steering column support (Hooks up perfectly with the standard cable clutch pedal and use a BDA escort type separate fluid reservoir)

VW Passat wagon rear Koni shocks, Armstrong Stanza struts (The Grey Aussie made ones used the bigger stub axle compared to the Jap ones but had the small strut bodies)

Custom mounts for the cross member but the big killer is the need to replace the whole Tunnel and part of the Firewall to properly fit a Z 18 Engine but particularly the gearbox into a 1200.
We used a whole front cut from a Bluebird SS to do the Job and I still have a translation into English of the Japanese Wiring Diagram for that ECU setup for a Z18 that we did for the Job.

Heaps easier is either the Nissan C18 or a Toyota 4AGE done them all into 1200's and all the turbo's have the same issue, Because the Ute is so light it is real hard to make the Turbo load up properly and make boost so 3.7 Diff gears and sandbags in the back help.

You may have seen the Ute as it was featured in Fast Fours and Rotary's but the Mongrel who put it in claimed he and his mates built it, There was a reply regarding that aspect in the next issue of the magazine but like on page 58 what a Joke, Even the Engineer who certified it wrote to the Magazine on our behalf as he considered it one of the best and neatest conversions he had ever certified but as usual somebody else claimed the work as their own.
Happens more than people realise

I think you will find it is actually an 1800 engine out of a Laurel C30 Model, they were an OHC 1800 that looked a bit like an early Mazda 1500~1800 (Bertone Body style) from the early seventies.
The Laurel looked a bit like a 1600 but the panel lines went the other way and they were a bit longer,The Coupe even looked somewhat like a 1600 Coupe as well, But they used an engine called variously G15, G16, G18 sourced from Prince Motor Company the people who still to this day are a Division of Nissan that are the Skyline Builders.

Blocked idle passage somewhere, Quick fix is to swap 1 and 4 plug leads over and rev it while backfiring as that reverse explosion often clears a blockage without a carb rebuild.
The problem is the small hitachis have very small passages that do block up this often works to unblock them

And use Loctite to make sure it does not come loose , But make sure there is some thread viable to actually hold the steering wheel on with, It is not funny if it comes off in your hand while driving.

There are both 4 valve and 3 valve KA heads,but the real problem will be the bore size on top on all the usual mods needed.
Plus as you mentioned getting enough compression.

For road use on of the most successful L 16 heads I have modified was in fact an early L16 head with the 40 mm and 33 mm valve sizes simply match ported to a SS manifold, Superior gas speed Torque and throttle response compared to a Genuine SSS 219 casting.

The real head outside of an LZ twin cam or FIA head was the 219 SSS casting but fully modified needed at least 45 mm Weber's plus full port work Big valves 44 mm and 36 mm plus extractors Seton or FIA type plus all the bottom end work to match and really only worked well at over 11 to 1 Compression ratio.

Not an ideal street engine in any way, Port matching to a SSS manifold with a gradual taper in the ports to aid gas speed on the inlet side and a good cleanup and opening in the exhaust side to aid extraction add in chamber work to make sure all are equal in size as the basic design of the chamber works OK plus the appropriate compression ratio around 10 to 10.5 for the street should be good.

Flat Top 240 Z pistons (Do not rev over 7,000 on a regular basis without annual replacement unless forged) or what does work very well is to use an L18 crank and Rods to build a 1688 engine that makes good torque but revs very well with the lighter 83 mm 1600 sized bore compared to the L 18 85 mm size or bigger such as the 87 mm 40 thou oversized L 28 pistons which gives an 1855 capacity that to really benefit needs webers, cams, exhaust etc.