I have two 1200 sedans here in Portland, Oregon, both '72 models, both converted to electric power, and both kept in garages. I haven't seen another 1200 on the road for some time now,
though I do occasionaly see one. I am considering taking both of my 1200's to the Datsun meet at Shasta this year, and if anyone can supply it, I'd like some info...date, time, place,
etc.

See Ya.....John Wayland

Hello 1200 freaks,
I'm still rolling on the floor over "30 years of "Butt Funk'! Yeah, the mention of factory seats is pretty much mute after 30 years. For my electric soundoff car Blue Meanie, I was lucky and
found a wrecked Soob wagon with just 1500 miles on the clock that had 'as new' grey cloth seats that I scooped up in a hurry. These seats are shaped similar to the factory 1200 seats, but
are far more supportive and look vaguely Recaro-like. I had the Soob rear seat cover fitted to the 1200 rear seat frame. With cutom door panels covered in grey cloth with violet vinyl
insert, matching rear quarter panel covers, and salt & peper style grey carpet that also covers the kick panels, the Soob seats blend in nicely, and are still in mint condition today. A trio
of MB Quart separates are also mounted in each door, and they have custom painted grills that blend in well with the interior scheme.
For those who may not have seen Blue Meanie, it can be checked out at:

<http://www.austinev.org/evalbum/036.html>

I guess I should add some pictures of the interior to this page....

See Ya.......John Wayland

Hello 1200 freaks,

>I m having trouble logging on to the website you
>posted. Maybe its just me, but my screen
>read:"404, website not found"

OK, go to the following:

>http://www.austinev.org/evalbum/>

Once there, scroll down past the first 10 opening pictures to the alphabetized listing section and select 'BMW to Dodge'...once there, scroll down until you find the Datsun
section and click on Blue Meanie. You can also check out my other Datsun EVs while you're there

See Ya.....John Wayland

Hello 1200 fans and Steve,

>...but you ll have to admit theres a reason
>most people picked the coupe over the sedan.
>Besides, most car styling these days is still over
>designed. Take a look at the Hyundai Santa Fe, for >example

Actually, I totally agree with you, especially on that butt ugly Santa Fe! Yes, over-styled and tacky looking cars rate right up there with today's boy bands and their over
embellished singing styles where they can't just sustain a clean and on-pitch note. Simple and clean has always fallen behind over-styled and cluttered. I felt the 1200 fastback had
way too much of the latter and that the sedan was like a breath of freesh air. Apologies if I offended any fastback fans.

See Ya.....John Wayland

A test drive comparing the sedan to the fastback confirmed my thoughts about the fastback

Body design differences:


(1) What some of you fastback guys may not know, is that the sedan has nearly two more inches of headroom over the fastback, due to its less raked windshield angle and taller roof line. As a
result, the sedan is far less claustrophobic feeling on the inside, and instead, has an airy feeling and spaciousness that defies the car

Hello 1200 fans,
On the styling subject of the fastback vs sedan thing....I certainly don't want to offend my fastback 1200 friends, so please, just take this as my opinion and my personal preferences. Some
of you may have already seen my two electric 1200's, so you already know that they're both sedans. Back in the early and mid 80's when I acquired both cars, I made a concerted effort to find
clean and straight sedans, not fastbacks. From the first introduction of the 1200 through the 80

Hello Datsohollics and 1200 fantatics,

>What are your thoughts on pure battery power vs
>hybrid (gasoline generator powering the motors)?

Well, I'll start out by saying that besides my two electric 1200s, I also have a 2000 Honda Insight hybrid, too!

>Sorry to keep asking about hybrids, they just seem >like the way to go for me. I would think that a
>generator would weigh less than all those
>batteries or am I a dimwit?

It goes like this...one of the main reasons for many (including me) for building and driving electric, is to get away from OPEC dependent, air-polluting gasoline. Using a gas generator instead
of batteries, defeats the purpose instantly. Additionally, a pure electric is totally vibration free...why would I want a shaking, vibrating, reciprocating gas engine back in the car to ruin
this? An electric is almost totally silent (makes it easier to hear the tires burning!)...why would I want a shaking, vibrating, reciprocating gas engine back in the car to ruin this? When
charged by hydro electric, wind electric, solar electric, etc., EVs that run on rechargeable batteries are pollution free...zero emissions, and I like that very much. Even when 1000's of EVs
are driving around that were charged off of the grid that may be supplied by fuel-fired generators, the resultant pollution is about 1% the level compared to 1000's of gasoline powered cars.
OK, I'm now off my high horse enviro-mode....from a power fiend's view, batteries pack WAAAYYY more whollop for high performance EV driving, than a gas generator could ever produce.I can pull
2000+ amps intantaneously from a battery pack....to do this with a gas generator, the generator would need to be the size of an appartment building. The gas generator is a good idea though,
for extending the limited range of an EV's batteyr pack, because in this mode, the generator only needs to supply enough 'oomph' to keep the car rolling down the highway, so the generator can
be fairly small. But, keep in mind that you now have a gasoline car again, not an electric anymore.
My Honda Insight is a wonderful hybrid that gets an easy 75 mpg on the freeway, and over 100 mpg at 45 mph! It is also one of the cleanest cars on the planet, next to a pure electric. Because
it has an electric motor and a small battery pack on board, instead of being a guttless wonder with its tiny 1000cc engine, instead, it gets crisp 2nd gear rubber and accelerates pretty good
(especially for a car that gets 75+ mpg! All this said though, when I don't need the range of the Insight (it can go 800-900 miles ona a 10.9 gallon tank), I can most often be found driving my
electric 1200 instead, as it will blow the doors off my Insight, is much cooler looking (though the teardrop Insight is pretty rad), and is smooth, silent, and oh-so-torquey!

See Ya.....John Wayland

Hello Datsohollics and 1200 fanatics,

>Hey John, how does the inline elctric motor setup >work?

The two motors are mounted in a long-ish aluminum tray that serves as both motors' engine mounts, and they are bolted and clamped into place, end-to-end. Each motor has twin shafts, with the
ouptut shaft of the forward motor (closest to the radiator opening) connected to the rear shaft of the rear motor (the one that is about halfway into the tranny tunnel) with a toothed colar
that meshes with gear-like spools on the motors' shafts that locks them together so they run as a team. The output shaft of the rear motor has a keyed hub that looks like the yoke of a rear
end, and this attaches to a cutom-made, extreme duty driveline I had made for the car. There is a center carrier bearing mounted near to where the original tranny cross member was. The
driveline goes straight into the yoke of a 9 inch Ford diff with 4:11 gears...no flywheel, no clutch, no tranny.

>Also, where does one get an electric motor for an
>automotive setup?

There are four main players that build EV size series-wound type motors that we 'EVers' use....Prestolite, Advanced DC, GE, and NetGain/Warfield. By far the most popular, are the Advanced DC
motors. They make them from 6.7 inch, to 8 inch,. to 9 inch, with the 9 inch the most popular of all. The 9 inch can make anywhere from 40 hp to over 300 hp, depending on how much jiuce you
want to jam into it. In Rod Wilde's 'Maniac Mazda' RX7 EV, there are two 9 inch ADC motors cranking out in excess of 500 hp....go to <www.nedra.com> to see it pulling a full wheel stand! I
The GE motors have been around for a long time, and they are really heavy duty. The Prestolote motors are more of the same...very rugged. The electric boat racers actually submerge the
Prestolites at the back of the small hydros they race for cooling! I went to Warfield Electric in Chicago to have them custom build the NetGain motors, and I am using two of the high output
8's in my 1200 drag car. I use an ADC 9 inch in my street 1200, 'Blue Meanie'.

>I've toyed with the hybrid idea a few times but
>don't know where to get a motor.

I can sell you a Netgain motor, and if you go to the NEDRA page, you'll find a banner for 'Wilde EVolutions' who sell ADC, GE, Prestolite, and other motors, too.

>As an aside, shouldn't it be Voltman336v or did I >miss the joke? Tim

When my 1200 was featured as the world's first electric soundoff car in the March '95 issue of 'Car Audio and Electronics' magazine, they did a cool picture of the car inside a hydroelectric
dam, and made it look as if lightning bolts were coming from my hands...hence, 'Boltman'...the '336v' part is the voltage of the battery pack in my other 1200, White Zombie, my drag car.
If you want to see this picture, go to:

<http://members.nbci.com/evalbum/>

Once there, page down to the categories and find the alphabetical section for theDatsun-Nissan page...once there, you'll find my Datsuns.

See Ya....John Wayland

Hello Datsohollics and 1200 fanatics,

>The conversion is straight forward if you have the >right car to start with. The prefered model
>is the auto trans model as the tunnel is way
>bigger. I doubt you will fit any of the L series
>gearboxes neatly into a manual trans shell.

Thanks for pointing out what I omitted. Yes, we discovered afterwards, that indeed, the automatic 1200s came with enlarged tunnels. When we found the car in a wrecking yard (it was in
surprisingly good condition), turning it into a drag car wasn't even in our minds. If we had it to do all over again, the autoversion would be the best choice...but then again, for me and
my drag racing habbit, electric motors are now my choice :-0
When I recentlty changed from an 11 inch single motor to a pair of 8 inch motors, with the motors connected together end-to-end, the longish settup has the rear-most motor actually slipping
deep into the tranny tunnel...good thing I don't need to use a tranny!

See Ya....John Wayland