My Life With A Dubiously Modified 1972 Datsun 510: Early Lessons In Car Collecting

Moving from Columbus to Akron, fall of 1978, I had cash from selling my house and so began my first lesson in car collecting. With cash on hand, it was a let’s get a “fun car” moment: my Impala coupe was nice, but I missed driving a small car.

I checked the classifieds in the then great Akron Beacon Journal, and could have bought one of these, in silver:

The owner had bought the Datsun roadster for his daughter, but it wasn’t working out for them. However, the car wouldn’t have been practical as a winter commuting car, living on the fringes of the Lake Erie snow belt and driving 30 minutes each way to work at a brother-and-sister typesetting service in Parma.

Then, I came across an obscure Datsun dealer in Barberton, where some early ’70s “customized” Datsun 510s were for sale. It was an old line car dealer owned by a family — “Walter Senior,” the father, and “Walter Junior,” the son — and was the first Datsun dealership in Ohio. The layout of the dealership reminded me of an old-time car dealership of the 1950s. (Though, it wasn’t the only Datsun dealer in town, as another was on Manchester Road at a former VW dealer.)

The dealer’s son, Walter Junior, had customized two 510s: one was gold with wire wheels, for which he was asking $3,000 — too much to spend on a used car. The other 510 could remind anyone of one of the famous SCCA cars from the early 1970s.

An Internet search found the image above, an imprint from a 1950 calendar. This partly explains why there were modified Datsuns for sale at that time. (The building is currently for sale. The real estate listing said it was built in 1946 and remodeled in 1990.)

The 510 I bought had a JATCO automatic. This picture must be right after I bought it because there is no front license plate yet.

With anybody over 200 pounds in back, the raised white letter rear tires rubbed against the chassis — my nephews, ages 8 and 11, could sit there OK. The tires were Firestones that were part of the infamous 500 tire recall of the late 1970s.

When I went to check out the car, I didn’t take my brother — the family expert on used cars. Soon, he told me the car didn’t pass the tailpipe test — run your finger around the exhaust pipe and look for dark smoke residue — the telltale sign of an engine that is burning oil. All was well otherwise, but my “girlfriend” at the time didn’t appreciate this car compared to my Impala — one strike against her. (To be fair, her father and brother worked for Ford, but she drove a Malibu because her friend’s father worked at a Chevrolet dealership.) Still, I kept driving the Datsun off and on over the next few months. With those oversized tires, it was not a good snow and ice car.

I didn’t have the car for more than a few months when, on the way home from Randall Park Mall in Cleveland (RIP) one Friday evening, I was rear-ended. This was the third time in six years (Our Corona Mark II was hit by a Dodge Monaco and the family’s Oldsmobile 88 was hit while we were traveling in Massachusetts). The insurance adjuster came one morning and a local body shop said $1200 of damage, a perfect opportunity to cut my losses; the insurance company could have declared the car totaled.

However, when I came home from work, I found that Dad had given the go-ahead to the body shop to work on the car. The body shop said they were slow and needed the work… But why didn’t I call the body shop and tell them to stop work? One of the mysteries of my life.

I won’t deny that the 510 was very fun to drive. This selfie involved setting the camera on a tripod and hitting the self timer button — usually took these pictures to send to my longtime friend, then living in the Pacific Northwest, and he usually responded with a typically snarky comment. This was the disco era, and I dressed accordingly.

In the summer of 1979, we were trying to raise cash for a house down payment, so I figured it was time to sell the Datsun. By then, the timing chain was coming loose and hitting the oil pan, plus the oil loss was getting pretty bad. Dad and I drove it to the Datsun dealer on Manchester Road, but had to stop at the Sohio station on the way to put a quart of oil in it. The Barberton dealer said they weren’t interested, but one of the mechanics in the back was; he said he would call me later at home. However, the car had barely made it to the dealership. So instead, Walter Senior bought it back for $500 and gave Dad and me a ride home.

When the mechanic called that night, I sadly told him I had sold it to the Barberton dealer. For all know, maybe he bought it — I hope so, because I think he would have given the car the care it needed. (Today, while editing this article, I talked to a retired mechanic with a 1962 Corvair convertible with great body work but mediocre mechanicals. He said some car restorers emphasize beautiful bodies and neglect the engines and other mechanical parts. Food for thought.)

Without a doubt, this was my worst car purchase in my lifetime, but it also coincided with the start of my “get my crap together” period. Next installment will be about trading a perfectly fine Chevrolet for a new type of Ford product.