Mate i know what you mean. I had lots of trouble getting things done on my 1200 ute up here too. every where is a rip off and no one is helpful.
For my beefed up A14 I got it built out of state by Errol aka feral (
www.datrats.com.au), rather than get my motor done in townsville!
there are helpful datto addicts in townsville but its hard to find them without going through all the S*#t i had too.
What Datsun have you got? what things are you aiming to do with motor, exterior, interior etc?
only major things I got for my 1200 in townsville were my mags (which was a huge hassle), paint (mates), webers tuned and seats/dash recovered, thats it, the rest I bought from down south and lads off this site. Alot of the little things i got from the usual major outlets like autobarn, super cheap etc.
Cheers
p.s If you want anymore help just give me a PM