Well, the meeting of the "titans" happened today
The car is 1981 Datsun Laurel, pre-facelift. Original drivetrain and original engine. Mileage is around 680k miles.
Starts very easy even now.
Amazing! No smoke at all! Shame on mine with 148k.
The guy told me that he got rid of the black smoke after replacing the IP belt. The only problems he has with the car is that the vacuum pump is not working and he is loosing some oil at the differential. ( he's adding 1 liter every 1200 miles)
Check out some pictures
LD28 power
And the legendary engine
I was very excited about this meeting. I think this is something that never happened before. Having in mind the rarity of this car around here...
Today I got the IP belt I've ordered last week.
It costed 12 dollars
I'm waiting for the next weekend when we'll have a nice weather ( it's raining for a few days) to replace it.
Interesting thing the guy told me about, that the smoke went away after replacing it. Is it possible that the belt gets stretched after a while and change the timing a bit?
I just tried something today. I've disconected a rubber line from the vacuum pump going to a sensor ( I think is the low vacuum alert witch is acually sharing the light with the parking brake on the dash)
Upshifts didn't seemed to be much harsher than before, but instead I could feel every down shift.
Remember my problem with 3rd to 2nd shift when slowing down? Not this time. I couldn't reproduce this problem anymore.
After I connected back the rubber line, I put a little electrical tape over it and shifts are smooth now. However, I'm not sure about this yet, maybe is the placebo effect. I will look more into it tomorrow.
That rubber line seemed a bit loose, it was easy to pull it off...
Yesterday I had to change the front brake pads. They wore out very quickly, only after about 12k miles...probably the intensive city driving has to do with this. Never took a look at the rear brake shoes, I wonder how they look like...
I recently noticed a pretty hard knock coming from the front of the car when going over bumps. Is more like rubber hitting the metal-like sound, so I thought that maybe the rubber bushes from the top of the shock absorber are worn out ( sorry I don't know how are they called). I asked about them when I bought the brake pads, but they couldn't find anything...I wonder if those are NLA parts..Any ideas?
Also it seems that the ball joints are a little worn. Last time a inspected them I've seen that they are still the original ones, welded in. Has anybody tried to replace those?
Those ( shock bushings) usually come with a new set of shocks. As for the brake pads wearing out that fast they are either really cheap pads or the rear brakes are so far out of adjustment that the fronts are doing 100% of the work.
The clunking might be a stabilizer link bushings that are worn out or the link itself is busted. The ball joints can be a bit of a SOB to get out if they are the rivited in kind. The replacement ones will come with bolts to replace the rivits. They may be the type that is threaded in from the bottom or, I have seen some older style Ford ( Escort and Lynx) that you had to change the whole lower control arm.
Good Luck
Last edited by plenzen15 years ago, edited 1 time in total.
Retired Pauly
Problem with being retired is that you never get a day off.
1987 D21-J SD25 KC
KJLGD21FN
I think you have a good point about the rear brakes. My handbrake is still working but I'm not able to lock my rear wheels with it.
Another thing is that the transmission engagement ( both in R and D) is harder if only the emergency brakes are applied while it is almost elusive when I apply the hand brake too.
Do you think that this could be related to the brakes?
1. My speedo cable broke...I hope I can use the one from the other car, but that's with the 5 speed manual and I have no idea if it will work. Unfortunately I can't buy a new one because is not available at any shop.
2. What I was afraid of: I have a leak just under the IP. Worse, the leak seems to be at the front of it...It will be a pain to locate it exactly and of course fix it ( I've read the threads about IP leaks)
I don't know if this has anything to do with the hard cold starts I have lately.
I checked all the glowplugs, all are fine.
What is strange that is starting OK in the morning but when I go home from work (8-9 hours later) is hard to start. When cranking is like there's no fuel getting to the engine.
And I very often have a noise between 1500 and 2000 rpm, similiar to the valve noise, very loud and only under load. If I let off the gas and push it again the sound is gone. Can it be an injector problem? I did a valve adjustment when I first had this sound and it's still there.
There should be a blue tin cover over the IP belt. If the IP driveshaft seal leaks the fuel likes to drip from the area where the tin cover mates to the timing cover, just below where the IP mounts at the front. Remove the air plenum to gain access and run your hand along the bottom of this tin cover. If it is wet with fuel, that is most likely your leak. Likely to leak more when car is pointed downhill and tank is full. May leak air into the system when car is pointing uphill. Mine didn't really leak noticeably until I evidently disturbed it during a IP belt R/R. After replacing the seal, the car starts so easily!
The repair job entails: Remove belts, fan, tin cover, IP belt, IP cogged pulley, replace the seal, replace (new) IP belt UNLESS it is new (65,000 mile life), and replace (rebuild) tensioner assembly. All this is already covered on this forum, and Al just listed a belt for sale, and usually has *High Quality* rebuilt tensioners for sale.
Two filters. Trying to avoid problems from poor quality diesel fuel?
Probably fine as long as the filters are same size and micron rating as original, and kept changed before they clog. Are they plumbed in parallel or serial?
I have heard from reliable sources that excessive restriction can damage the Bosch VE-type internal lift pump. Worst case scenario: Damaged bits can migrate thru other parts of the pump.
Attach a vacuum gauge near the IP inlet, strive for less than 5 in.Hg vacuum at high load.
Yes, I'm trying to avoid fuel problems, the diesel we have here is not of very good quality, many people with modern common rail diesel engines ran into problems because of this...(failed injectors even in warranty period)
The filters are plumbed in serial. Actually there were already two filters installed when I bought the car so I suppose it ran like this for some time now ( the last owner had the car sincer 1994).
The first filter is pretty common around here, used mainly for tractors. It looks like this:
So it's smaller than the original one. Maybe it would be better so keep only one filter? and change it more often? I wouldn't like to risk damaging the pump if that's the case.
lots of australian fit these elements as a conversion or a prefilter.
these are normally the filter of choise often as they are cheep and found at any farm.
the aust army fit these in reverse flow[to the arrow on the filter housing]to improve filter operation.normally crud flows into the top and the filter blocks quickly.the filter has a silcon material that allows water to seporate.
flowing in reverse the crud falls to the bottom of the bowl and forms with water/contaminated product to be drained away...some fit extra large sediment version with warning light.
with normal flow the water is traded in the filter untill the element fails. eventually flows through and into the engine.
often you cant reverse flow factory filters.
WCJR31 Skyline.3.0 manual.wagon
R31 SKYLINE/Passage GT/PINTARA
LPG Ford Falcon 99-06 93 Disco
Local Shire Southern Zone Mechanic.
davehoss, what do you mean by prefilter? That it's used as some kind of auxiliary filter? To help the main fuel filter?
In my case that's its role. I've mounted this to protect the main filter.
I've found out that there are 2 types of fuel filters for the LD28. In the C31 Laurels it is similar to the one used in the diesel maxima. In the C32 Laurels the filter has the same diameter as the one used in the C31, but the hole from the center is bigger.
the filter heads on a nissan are made by several companies that are different design.comercial 720-D21 have a range of filters some include a seporate water trap and a cheep spin on filter.
