Quote:Coilovers are just springs -- the stock 1200 front springs are coilovers too. The small diameter aftermarket coilover springs can be soft or harsh. They affect handling in combination with the rate front/rear, lowered amount, etc. Usually a litttle stiffer will help a datsun handle. Or softer but with a larger anti-roll bar. Or a lot stiffer and make the rear a bit stiffer too. Lowering helps all around unless the roads are bumpy where a lowered car can handle worse (but other things can be done to counter that).

Pigdog what are your goals for using the aftermarket coilovers?

The bearings from what i can see have no real way of beinh tensioned. Ans rely on the seal pushing on the back of the rollers to hold them in position. Nothing actually keeps the inner part of the bearing in check. If you compare the picture i put up with how a conventional tapered roller is used in a commersial diff and you can see the difference

main goal with the coils is to get a softer ride whilst having maximum diff control
Adjustable height and dampening is a good bonus

$300 odd worth of rear end stuff has now been ordered. ended up going with the X series QA1 chromoly PTFE/Kevlar lined self lubricating and self sealing rod ends for the rears with chromoly weld in tube ends

3/4 inch double adjusters for the main arms, also with chromoly tube ends and 5/8th double adjuster for the panhard

also got some new chromoly rod ends for the front control arms, just greasable ones as they were cheaper than the rears

will get onto ordering some boots for all the rod ends as well as the ends of the shocks so that they dont flog out as quick as the last set of rod ends i had in the front of the car, they were non greasable commersial ones though.

so looks like there will be a 2 or 3 week wait on that stuff unfortunately. but should be able to get everthing else done by the time the order turns up

rear crossmember is in and the fuel tank is almost ready to go. should have it driving again by the end of the day

And its driving again, when im not working on it flat out i'll chuck some pics up

have to redo the exhaust, after i just made it fit last night. had the diff jack up while the car was on the hoist to see roughly how much clearance stuff would have. car dropped another 1-2 inches after is was on the ground so the clearance i thought i had turned into no clearance at all.

so will hopefully get that sorted after work tonight and make a start on the front mounts for the control arms....hopefully will make it home before midnight tonight

Looking good now its all together mate.

pigdog, trying to picture the rear end setup in my head, will it be similar to r31 setup with extra bars/coilovers? Great job getting to this stage so much work involved.

this should make it a bit easier to visualize, this is a jeep y arm/long arm conversion

new rear crossmember is in, fuel tank is in and got the front mounts redone






















the standard front leaf mounts

no quite in focus












they took about an hour or more each mount to just cut the things off and clean up the chassis around it as there is no real room to get in to the spot welds to grind them off

next was the chassis reinforcement
















once they were on, new mounts to weld onto them. were was a little annoying to make the mount as there isnt much to use a a reference for where the hole should be, so it took a bit longer than i would have liked it to
















so it took around 8 hours to do the first mount, from when i started undoing the standard stuff to having the mount at a point where i was happy with it

other side only took about 5 hours as my brother was home from work by then so he could do the welding while i made stuff

also had to make up some special bolts to use with the leaves as the holes through the mount are 13.5mm to suit the control arm bolt, but the ones for the leaves are only 12mm. so had to lathe a step into the head of the bolt so it located itself and doesnt flog the hole out while the leaves are still in there. had to do the same with the nut on the other side

will have to do the same with the nuts for the control arm bolts as the standard ones aren't long enough to go all the way through, as the mount is wide enough for the leaves which makes them about 10mm wider than the control arm bush

going to to reassemble the car now and maybe start sussing out the panhard mounts

also have to redo the rear section of the exhaust, for the 3rd time. as the first time i didn't really think about it and just went off what room i thought it had. so ended up hitting the diff all the time, did it again on Thursday night and its as tight to the floor as it can be and still hits the diff. so going to just run it under the diff as i'm tired of it squashing the exhaust between the diff and chassis, makes the ride less than comfortable

got another 2 weeks or so till all my stuff for the rear end turns up. so will concentrate on getting all the diff mounts figured out and made up by them

also will probably remake the tank out of 2mm stainless as im not really happy with how it turned out

Once again some very clever engineering under this little beast. Well Done mate Go into business for yourself you will be flat out.

panhard rod and shock position mock up