SOLD 1/3/2011! LIKE MY LAST RIDE, SO MANY PEOPLE PASSED ON THIS EXCEPT FOR THE NEW LUCKY OWNER WHO I'M SURE WILL REALIZE THAT HE'S RUN INTO A GEM OF A PICKUP. THE ONLY REASON WHY I LET IT GO WAS BECAUSE MY SON NEEDED A CAR WITH AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION EVEN THOUGH HE LEARNED STICK ON THIS TRUCK, BECAUSE HE PREFERRED A CAR THAT COULD SHIFT ITSELF, LOL! ANYHOW, SOME VIDEO MEMORIES IS ALL GOT LEFT OF THIS LOYAL AND TRUSTY STEED:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FRCPQcuxfc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk_mcXGF_FM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbW7gaZ4lzc
I picked up this clunker three years ago to teach my son how to drive stick shift. Needless to say, it became another one of my projects. As you can see, it's not too pretty at the moment, and I named it "Rusty" because it was rusty on the hood and on the roof, but not on the inside and underneath. But this Nissan pickup truck is mechanically sound, drove it almost two hours to bring it home, and the AC works extremely well. At 108,000 miles for a 17 year old truck, that works out to be around 6300 miles per year, which is much less than the average annual mileage of most cars. The second owner who had it since 1995 obviously didn't take good care of its looks, but kept it mechanically maintained to do its "work" chores, hauling around stuff for the house and landscape, and daily commute to work less than 10 miles. When he turned over the keys to me, he told me, despite how it looks, I won't regret owning it. So far, I certainly do not. So I decided to undertake this project, and here's some BEFORE shots to start with:
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Progress update 5/1/2008:
I removed the driver's side front fender and pounded the dent out.
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Progress update 5/8/2008:
Moving right along the past couple days. Rust-treated the hood and primered it, but will still need to add another coat of primer and smooth out. Also got the fender back on, but the flat black paint I got was some dusty crap, so will have to sand, smooth, and re-prime as well.
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Progress update 5/19/2008:
Ok, though I can probably try and get this perfect, I came to realize I'm not a body person nor do I have the money to pay someone to do a great job at this. So at my tight budget, I'll do what I can and do the Poor Man's Paint Job to cover up the flaws. I primer-blacked the hood and as you can see it can still use more smoothing out, but I'll do what I can with what I got. I do think it still looks better than when I got it. I'm going to take a break from exterior work and do a little interior work, starting with upgrading the radio from cassette to a CD player and cleaning up the engine.
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Progress update 6/07/2008:
Changed the front brake pads at approximately 108,400 miles.
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Progress update 09/28/2008:
Cleaned the throttle body of carbon deposits to improve idling, as it was running a little low after having sat for almost two months. Also replaced the plugs from Autolites to stock NGK's.
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Progress update 10/11/2008:
To fix the slight leak around the valve cover, I removed it and replaced the gasket and seal and while it was out, decided to repaint it with some spare aluminum engine spray.
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Progress update 11/16/2008:
Here's the newly painted valve covers installed with the new gasket:
I'll get a better pic with the engine bay all cleaned up.
This weekend, I also replaced the original door speakers with 4" PowerBase door speakers with deep bass, $20 for a pair at eBay! I had to cut out some of the sound deadening material to accomodate the deeper speakers with larger mags for enhanced bass. They sound great! 
Rather than re-wire the connectors, I just took off the connectors from the old speaker and soldered them on the terminals of the new speakers, so they just re-connect to the original harness on the door. Check it out below:
Forgot to mention sometime a few weeks ago I also replaced the defunct radio/tape player with an identical one I got from eBay. I know I said I was going to upgrade to a CD player but I still had some cassette tapes with some cool tunes from my high school days so I thought I'd keep this truck retro. It sure is nice to have tunes again while driving to work!
