Mud's newest ride

[MudPuppy]

I know it's not AMC related or even remotely close...

Earlier this year I said (a very hard) goodbye to my '87 Limited wagon & '82 parts wagon, '82 Sx/4, along with my '57 Spyder dune buggy... trying to thin down a bit, be a little more realistic and be able to focus more on the keepers.
Still have my '81 (& the '81 parts car), my Loser & my dad's truck.

But have been wanting a nice little mpg car for awhile now.
And with some research and a few other desires thrown in there as well, I found what I wanted.
I have never had a car that was a convertible or with a moonroof, sunroof or t-tops... so that desire was high.
So my requirements were:
- good mpg's
- reliability
- ease of maintenance & easy to work on
- and some sort of air flow from the top (but was leaning more towards t-tops just cause I think they are awesome, something that should definitely be brought back imo).

Bit the bullet this week by driving down to DFW, Tx (I don't recommend this to anyone, drivers & roads are insane!)
Left on 9/1/14, made it home on 9/3/14. Drove it through Tx, Ok, & Ar on the way back.
This is what I made it out of DFW (alive) with...





Haven't got to enjoy her much yet since we didn't make it back until Wednesday evening and I had to recover from the trip.
The car was taking bumps hard during the ride home & my back suffered greatly.
Looked at her closer yesterday and seen that someone had put coil spring clamps on the frontend, removed those and the ride improved significantly.



ETA: Almost forgot possibly one of the coolest things about these...

[eaglefreek]

I don't think I've ever seen nor have I ever heard of a Nissan NX1600. I have a Ford Festiva for my daily driver. I love it. Even though it only has 60ish horsepower, it's fun to drive and gets 40+MPG.

[MudPuppy]

I am absolutely in love with this little car so far.  It has 115hp and can average 30+mpg.  With just bolt-ons I could get it up to 130hp. And it weighs only about 2300lbs.

I had a 94 geo metro years ago (w/5spd) that I enjoyed driving around but I was forced to sell it shortly after I got it.

[Draekon]

I used to own an '88 Nissan Pulsar NX, which was the predecessor to the NX1600.  Was a fun little car.

[MudPuppy]

I used to own an '88 Nissan Pulsar NX, which was the predecessor to the NX1600.  Was a fun little car.

Yeah the Pulsar are neat, always liked how you could take the hatches and ttops off those and it's practically a vert.
 

[Mernsy]

Almost like a Sundancer, eh? Beauty!

[vangremlin]

Very cool!  I don't think I've ever seen one of those either.

[MudPuppy]

Thanks everyone!

I had initially told myself the next car I get needs to have bad paint because I had plans and this ones isn't great but my problem is, is that it's kinda a rare color and only offered for 1 year... electric blue. So guess that's not going to happen now lol.

Almost like a Sundancer, eh? Beauty!

Thanks
lol Mernsy... I guess so. But A LOT cheaper! I never could afford a Sundancer for sure.


I am probably liking this car more than I should already. Been fixing maintenance (or lack there of) items from one of the po's.
She needed new rotors & brakes up front, 1 axle (left front), a tune up (<= we had all this done before leaving DFW), tie rod (right), a boot on the inner tie rod, rear control arm (bent), an oil sending unit (leaking) and an alignment. Still working on the latter 2 since the alignment shop didn't want to touch it with a bad tie rod.
Got the tie rod, boot on the inner tie rod and control arm fixed today... thank goodness we already have a b13 parts car!
Also awaiting an exhaust header & air intake to come in, going to prep the pipe for a new muffler and go ahead and cut it off until I can get the full 2" pipe from header back... open her up and let her breathe a bit.
Hoping to finish everything that's left and get those parts on when they arrive and by my next days off be able to get her out more and enjoy!!
Cleaned her up inside and out and in the process of painting the valve cover to match the car (blue with black lettering).


I haven't had much time the past few months to mess with my Eagle but she might be put on the backburner for a bit now lol.
I'll get back to her eventually though.

[MudPuppy]

I know most don't care and that this isn't a Nissan (or import) group. But thought I'd update....
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09-11-14
Took the valve cover off to repaint...

Looks nice in there.

Got this in today (old vs new)...


Finished product, camera flash makes it look lighter. Still have to remove the muffler (which is the original stock muffler) in preparation for a better muffler...


________________________________________________________________________________________________

10-08-14
Found a parts car (worse-case scenario) nearby.
Now for the engine that he said was "torn apart"...
Actually we have no clue... this is what we found- a nasty nest that we did NOT want to dig through.

Dread digging through that!! Gloves and dust masks will be a must!

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10-16-14
Had noticed she felt floaty on the front, so ordered some new struts.
They arrived a couple days ago and put them on.



And what a huge improvement!
So I have just been driving her around and really enjoying her now.


A couple weeks old interior shot. Got window cranks now.


A short drive by clip made today. Nothing special but she is being enjoyed.
http://youtu.be/ZPzYA_uHaeQ


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11-06-14

Got a front strut bar in the other day, painted it up last night and installed...

Then took her out for a spin. Can tell the body roll is down and handling is a bit better as well.
Also confirmed the 1 odd fuel injector was causing quite a few of my issues, that are now resolved.
Still need to replace the water pump as it just recently started leaking.

__________________________________________________________________________________________
Got sidetracked for over a month with bronchitis and the flu but eventually got the waterpump replaced.
The wp on these things are a pita.

__________________________________________________________________________________________


02-10-15
Finally got rid of those big 17's that I hated so much...


I have also been doing small odds-n-ends things along the way.
Installed a center arm rest, put oem lift/hatch struts & mounts back on her & fixed the hatch to where it now pops with the release lever, new auto control shifter cable, and I am sure I am missing some things.
Future plans will be key the spark plugs, side gap the plugs, TB coolant bypass and finishing up the grounding kit (theoretically, it could give me up to 10%hp). And a rear strut bar at some point.

And if the other Nx is not savable then upgrades from it will go on mine- springs, ecu, injectors, maf, throttle body, brakes, etc.
Finally sold my little farm truck so now have a spot to put this one.
Planning on picking that other one up soon. Hopefully this coming week.

Can't wait until warmer/drier weather now.
So, yeah I'm still around and everything.... just sidetracked 

[eaglefreek]

Looks much better with the smaller wheels. The parts car nest is scary.

[vangremlin]

Looks much better with the smaller wheels. The parts car nest is scary.

X2

[Prafeston]

Very cool! Now why aren't you putting that work into your SX/4?

[MudPuppy]

Very cool! Now what aren't you putting that work into your SX/4?

lol I know, I feel a little guilty about that. But I think the rear end needs to be rebuilt on it (a bit of howling coming from the rear) and just haven't found anyone to do it yet.
I need to run it down the road with someone in the backseat and see if they hear it cause I remember hearing something like that in my wagon back-in-the-day and got someone to sit in the rear and they didn't hear it & then we swapped places and I no longer heard it either... so it had to have been just a bit of tire noise echoing around or something.

[MudPuppy]

Just wanted to update this to the point I am at.
I finally was able to pick up that rats nest car back @ the end of March- that worse-case scenario would've been a parts car, but turned out to be rust free... so we couldn't let that happen.
Engine was shot- too much stuff missing (MIA- oil pan, crossmember, a few pulleys, dipstick, rad fans, downpipe. Things the critter chewed- all plug wires, some light wires, windshield washer hose, etc.), critter grossness everywhere even after cleaning up the engine bay. So a new/old engine was in order.

My 1st EVER full swap... not an easy task either, being as it was an obd1 car & harness to an obd2 engine. A lot of hurdles and a lot of learning throughout the process.
Dubbed the Chupacabra

A picture/video compilation of our journey with the Chupacabra:
http://youtu.be/1Jx_24Hb-Vk
How I felt:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VkrUG3OrPc


The day has come for the Chupacabra...


Got small things to do here and there. But IT runs & drives under IT's own power.


And still enjoying the little T-top beast as well. Just been a bit busy to do much of anything else.
But it did get some upgrades as well- SR20 TB & TPS with port matched plenum, grounding kit, port & polished the MAF, advanced timing & I think that's it.