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Title: Our car is better than your car [red 710 hardtop with other Datsun in background]
1974 full range B210
Format:two full pages Size:magazine Publication Number:unspecified
Our car is better than your car.Every car maker in the world tries to build a car as perfect as time and money permit. Some of them come pretty close. A lot of them don't. The only way to tell the difference before you buy is to take a really hard look...which is what we are about to do with our car.
The point we're trying to make is that Datsuns are built better. Not just the big things we usually talk about, like fuel economy and performance. Little things, too. When you have to spend years with a car, little things mean a lot.
We're looking at a Datsun 710 because it's in the middle of our price range and we sell a lot of them. I'd say the same kinds of things about any other Datsun from our most economical Datsun B-210 to our most desirable Datsun 260-Z. The question to bear in mind is this: How many of the same things can be said about the car you now own or were thinking about owning?
Means of support
The crankshaft in an engine takes a beating you wouldn't even like to think about. Every time a spark plug fires, "WHAM!" the crankshaft is jolted by a piston rod. That's why we have five places of support — five main bearings — for the Datsun 710 crankshaft. Lots of engines try to get by with three. But the crankshaft is so important (and so awfully expensive to replace) we decided that two extra bearings were well worth it.
Upstairs, downstairs
Most cars have pushrod engines. A camshaft down in the bowels of the engine makes push rods go up and down. which make rocker arms rock. Which — finally — open and close the valves on cue. That's a lot of activity to open a valve The Datsun 710 has an overhead cam engine which uses 42% fewer moving parts thus cutting power-eating inertia and friction. What's more, even if your car does have an overhead cam, the odds are that it is driven by one of those rubber belts instead of stout, enclosed oil-bathed twin chain like the Datsun's. Know why? Because rubber belts are lots cheaper to make than stout chains.
Golf balls vs. luggage
We must admit that there are bigger trunks on a few cars. Not many, mind you. But cubic feet do not tell the whole story. You see, trunk capacity usually is measured with golf balls. You put as many as you can get into the trunk, then you calculate how much that is in cubic feet. Never mind that there's a spare tire sticking up in the middle or a jack protruding from the side. All our trunk space is usable. There's a flat bottom, vertical sides a straight up and down back wall, all closed up with a more or less fiat trunk lid. Other cars may hold more golf balls. We hold more suitcases.
Is it a motorcycle or a car?
If you blow a headlight fuse on the Datsun 710, you still have headlights working, complete with your choice of brights or dims. The two on the side with the blown fuse don't throw an awful lot of light, naturally, but they will tell oncoming drivers that you're a car not a motorcycle.
A long and zappy life
Datsun's standard battery is a really heavy-duty 60 amp/hour one Most others come with low-power, cheap batteries standard and often don't even offer a heavy duty option at extra cost that's as powerful as our standard equipment battery.
The old spaghetti factory
On most cars, when you open the hood you look at a lot of plastic spaghetti. There are wires draped here, drooped there, clamped over yonder, going Lord knows where. Even experienced mechanics have their hands full tracking it all down when there's a problem. On the Datsun 710 all the wiring leads neatly and cleanly to a big black box covered by a weather-protecting lid. Open the box and there you have all the resistors, cluster connections and relays that the mechanic needs to get at. What's more, we even take the trouble to install all the hose clamps right side up for the mechanic. Why be so nice to the mechanic? Simple the easier it is for him to do his thing, the smaller your repair bill is likely to be.
The moral of the story
We could go on with examples like this for page after page. But there's really only one surefire way for you to find out if Datsun really is better: Put down this magazine get your coat, go to your nearest Datsun dealer and take a test drive and a long, hard look at the Datsun of your choice. Look at the little things like how the doors fit, how the paint covers what it should and keeps off what it shouldn't. Check out the details as well as the big things. It's the little things that make your car a friend or enemy, over the long haul. And the long haul is what Datsun is all about.
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