Datsun 180b

oooof


oooof

buy it just to find out what a marina should have been like in the first place

seriously tho they seem to be pretty good cars with plenty of marque interchangability to make them something special. just chat to antdat and ratdat on here.

On a T reg this will be an 810 model. From a purely technical standpoint the 180B is the better car. The macpherson strut front and semi trailing arm IRS beats the Marinas Morris Minor hand-me-down setup by miles. The stock L series engine is pretty much unbreakable but tuning options are limited unless you want to import parts from abroad. If you are happy to do that then it's about as tunable as a Pinto. Of course theres also the option of engine swaps and there's loads of choice there. Although the older Marina engines are archaic, they are tunable with parts available here which is a bonus.

Styling is purely subjective. The 180B is much less common and largely unfamiliar to a lot of people but wether or not you like the styling of that or a Marina is up to you. It might suprise some here, but I don't actually think I prefer one over the other in terms of styling!

The way the values of japanese cars have been going of late, I'd say the 180B represents a better investment long term. As for parts, i can't really comment on Marinas but 180B parts shouldn't be too much of a problem bar a few hard to get bits (saloon bootlids are rare for example). AntDat is really the man to speak to about 810 models

I'd pretty much echo what Ratdat said re: the technical side of things... 180B will have macpherson strut front end and IRS, much better proposition than a Marina as far as having a bit of fun in some twisties goes (I know it can be done though!). I am lead to believe that later model Nissan engine swaps into the 180B's and so forth are RELATIVELY simple compared some other makes, so if you're looking at that sort of thing it may be an option....

Plus of course it's a wicked base for a supreme J style cruise machine.