About Me
Hey guys! You have found Gary Savage's Datsuns (& more) webpage. (My personal & professional page is HERE. ) I thought it would be a great idea to network all the Classic Datsun owners (510s, Zs, & roadsters) through a central site, so we can all get to know each other's faces, cars, projects, etc. I think this is a great way to get to know others with the same common interest in cars, what mods have been done, what other cars you have, etc. So, let's keep networking and get everyone on here!
As for me, I bought my first 510 (the blue car) back in '90. I had bad paint, but had an L16 with SUs, was lowered, 13" Libres and custom interior. Over the next 10 years and over $20k later, I had a nice, custom car (click here) that I autocrossed to a couple class championships, set a few hillclimb records in, did a dozen or so track days and was my daily driver. It got to a point where the car just seemed too slow and it would cost too much to do a major power upgrade, so I sold the car to Chris in Portland and bought Mike's "Strutless Wonder", which I then named "Casper" (click here) . With VG30 turbo power, it was a fun car, but the plan was to use it as an "interim car", until the next project was going. I did some rear suspension work (penultimate & 5 way tokicos) on Casper, added a Jim Wolf ECU upgrade, painted the engine compartment and roll cage, added RX-7 R1 black suede seats and just had fun with it for 2 years. That one was sold to Kurt down in the bay area, where it still resides. I'm now building the monster Z car, that will have an LS6 (Corvette Z06 powerplant) with over 400 HP. It's currently in the paint shop and should be getting assembled in the next month or so. I've been playing with Datsuns for nearly 15 years, learned most of my early stuff from Kelvin and have made a ton of great friends in this circle.
Aside from those cars, my first vehicle was a custom '79 Datsun Pickup, then went to a built '67 Chevy short-wide Pickup (hot rodded), then the blue 510 and so on. I've driven different cars on the track, from open wheeled cars, to sedans, big cars like the '70 Factory Trans-Am AAR 'Cuda and a Petty Challenger on tracks like Daytona, Laguna Seca, Sears Point, Goodwood (England), Mosport, etc. I recently sold my '97 Nissan Maxima (nice car) for a '00 BMW 540i 6 speed car. Just had to get back to V8 power & rear wheel drive. It's just my driver, as the Z will be the "ultimate" car. The 280Z-06 is being built in conjunction with a Children's Cancer foundation program, where we will be taking sick kids to car shows, events, the track or just spending time with them at the hospitals. It's going to be a fun project! Anyway, keep up the work, guys! Like they say at the end of American Muscle Car on Speed TV: "Don't crush them, restore them!" (and race them!) ;^)
