Light reading about the Silvia

[Rex]

The Nissan Silvia CSP311 made it's public debut at the Tokyo Motor Show in September of 1964. For the design of the Silvia, Nissan engaged the services of a German designer by the name of Count Albrect Graf Goertz. Goertz was trained in Germany and in the 1950s traveled to the United States where he worked for Studebaker, designing the Studebaker Starliner. He then returned to Germany, where he was employed by BMW. His work at BMW included the gorgeous 507 convertible. He then moved to Porsche, where he was part of the design team working on the 911. In the 1960s he was on his way to Nissan. His first job there was to take over the Silvia project. According to Goertz, the Japanese designers saw the design process as being an amalgamation of seperate ideas. Goertz designed the car as a single entity that included many of his trademark features seen previously on cars like the BMW 507, such as a long bonnet line that lunges forward of an open grille, large wheels and wheel arches and small, delicate bumper bars. The Silvia was the first Japanese car designed using a full scale clay mock-up. Goertz later worked on other projects for Nissan including a four seater version of the Silvia that never reached production. He also came up with the concept and initial designs for the Datsun 240Z, unfortunately Nissan chose to heavily redesign the 240Z, eventually settling on a blander design for the production version, rather than the bold design by Goertz.

Silvia Body Construction and Mechanical Details The Silvia's body work was all hand built, with hand beaten panelwork of extraordinary quality, every Silvia I have seen has near perfect panel gaps and flawlessly straight panels. Unfortunately the parts of the car you don't usually see, such as behind the interior upholdstery, behind the dash board and in the wheel arches, are all incredibly rough. They feature vaguely fitting sheetmetal with big daggy lumps of weld hanging off and sharp edges where you can see the tin-snip marks along the edges. (I've recieved many injuries from sharp edges under the Silvia while working on the four Silvias I've restored) As a result of this behind the scenes roughness, the Silvia is the only Early Datsun to encounter rust problems, usually causing some headaches with the sills, the bottom of the doors, the foot wells and the bottom of the wheel arches. Having said that, the Silvia is still better than many cars of the same era and can be easily modified when restoring the car.She is built with quite thick gauge sheetmetal which is great for the quality of the car but the extra weight detracts from it's performance. The Silvia sits on a modified Fairlady 1500 SP310 chassis, the main differences being the addition of new bumper bar mounts and some changes to the mounting points for the body. The floor pan is mostly derived from the SP310. She sat on 14" wheels that were 4 1/2" wide (the 14" wheels fitted to the later Fairlady 1600 SP311 were only 4" wide). She was the first Japanese production car fitted with disc brakes, using Dunlop Sumitomo twin piston callipers (the same as those used on the E-type Jaguar and the Ferrari 330) operating on 284mm rotors. These were later used on the SP311. At the back were the 228mm drum brakes from the Fairlady 1500. Most of the front end and steering was carried over from the Fairlady 1500, the only major differences being spring rates and different hubs. This meant she had double wishbone independant front suspension and a leaf sprung live rear axle. Steering was via a cam and lever box with a 14.8:1 ratio. Power was delivered via a 4.11:1 ratio hypoid bevel diff. (optional 3.889:1) The electrical system was a departure from the norm for Nissan, being the first of their cars to be fitted with a 12 volt negative earth system (all previous Datsuns had 12 volt positive earth). She also used an alternator instead of the usual generater.

Silvia Engine & Gearbox The Silvia was the first car fitted with Nissan's new R engine. The R engine was a further development of the 1488cc G engine, which was a massively improved version of the Austin B series engine, which was borrowed from Austin during their post war alliance. The R engine was a 1595cc over head valve engine with a 3 bearing crankshaft. The bore size was 87.2mm and the stroke 66.8mm. It was fitted with two 38mm Hitachi SU carbs and a light weight pressed steel exhaust manifold. It produced 96hp at 6000rpm and 103ft-lb of torque at 4000rpm. Later cars had an R engine with an alloy head and a 5 bearing crankshaft. The Silvia's engine was later used in the Fairlady 1600 and the Bluebird SSS RL411. A single carb version was later used in the Datsun Homer truck, the Datsun forklift and numerous other vehicles. It was later bored out to 2 litres and called the H20, this was used in commercials until the 1980s. The Silvia was the first Datsun to have synchromesh on all forward gears. She had a 4 speed close ratio gearbox with Porsche type servo-synchros and a floor change selector. Ratios were:- 1st 3.382, 2nd 2.013, 3rd 1.312, 4th 1.000 and reverse 3.365. It was also the first Datsun to have a single plate clutch with diaphragm springs, previous ones had single plates with coil cushioning springs. Clutch diameter was 200mm.

Silvia Dimensions The Silvia weighed 978kg, substantially more than the Fairlady's 920kg, which explains the need for the 4.11:1 diff, so it can keep up with the Fairlady (with a 3.889:1 diff) under accelleration. Silvia's vital statistics are :-Overall length - 3985mmOverall width - 1510mmOverall height - 1275mmWheelbase - 2280mmFront track - 1270mmRear track - 1198mmGround clearance - 170mm

Silvia Sales Figures Many books have refered to the Silvia's sales figures as being disappointing or as one book said "a failure", due to the fact that they only sold 554 of them. I doubt Nissan intended to build many more than that, if they did they would have geared it up for a full production run rather than hand assembling each car, which is a slow and expensive way to build a car, especially if you want to make a lot of them. The other reason they weren't likely to sell a lot of them was the price. The list price in Australia in 1966 was $4390, which mean't it was far brom being a cheap car. To give you an idea of how expensive it was, here's a list of prices of other cars in 1966.Nissan Silvia $4390 Datsun Bluebird $1798Datsun Fairlady $2690 Nissan Cedric Custom 6 $2950Alfa Romeo Giulia $3730 Citroen ID19 Parisienne $3476Holden Premier $2660 Honda S600 convertible $1990Prince Skyline GT $2850 Jaguar Mark 2 $5086MGB $2840 Lotus Super 7 $2900Lotus Elan $4300 Mercedes-Benz 200 sedan $5088Morgan Plus 4 $2880 Triumph TR4 IRS $3580Nissan and Datsun were also virtually unknown brand names in mostcountries in the 1960s, the fact that they sold as many Silvias as they did atthat price against cars such as the Lotus Elan is a testament to the exceptional quality of the car. Nissan gives the following production and sales figures for the Silvia. Thesefigures represent both right hand drive and left hand drive models. They were all right hand drive, with the exception of one left hand drive prototype.YEAR PRODUCTION DOMESTIC SALES EXPORT1964 27 0 01965 422 222 21966 20 161 531967 67 51 21968 18 37 11969 0 8 11970 0 1 01974 0 1 0TOTAL 554 481 59There's a few odd things about Nissan's official figures, one of them being why was a car sold in 1974, a full 6 years after the last one was built. The other thing you will notice is the domestic sales plus the export sales equal 540, which is 14 cars short of the 554 production total. What happened to the missing 14 cars ? Two possibilities are that they went to some executives in the Nissan Motor Co. and as a result didn't show up as sales, or they were the prototypes. The other possibility is the abacus got stuck in the auditer's office! I'm not sure which countries recieved the Silvia. I know that 49 were sold in Australia, so that left 10 for the rest of the world. The Silvia I currently own was sold new in Papua New Guinea and shipped privately into Australia. In my collection of sales brochures I have a Silvia brochure from the United States. It has a USA address on it and the car has badges that say "Datsun Coupe 1600" instead of the usual "Nissan Silvia" badges. This leads me to believe they were sold in the USA, but going on the above info it was no more than 9 cars. In Australia the cars all wore Nissan Silvia badges but they were marketed as the Nissan 1600 Coupe. The Australian sales brochures refered to them as the Datsun Coupe 1600 and some local motoring magazines called the car the Datsun 1600 Coupe or the Nissan GT Coupe (though most called it Sylvia). The Nissan name on the car confused some people, as most cars built by Nissan were called Datsuns. The reason for this is that they were marketing their less expensive cars under the Datsun name (Datsun Bluebird, Datsun Fairlady) and the more up-market cars were being marketed under the Nissan name (Nissan Cedric, Nissan Silvia), a similar situation to today, where the cheaper cars are Nissans and the luxury cars are called Infiniti.

Silvia Chassis Numbers Another interesting thing about the Silvia is that the ID plate under thebonnet is printed in Japanese, they never bothered to print an English one. It also lists the engine's horsepower figure as 90 P.S. (whatever the hell P.S. is) rather than as 96hp. The chassis numbering is a little odd too. The number stamped on the chassis and the ID plate begins with the SP311 prefix, leading you to think it is a SP311 Fairlady 1600 chassis. The thing that tells you it's a Silvia chassis is the first of the 5 numbers after the dash in the\ chassis number, all Silvia chassis start with the number 7. for example Silvia number 231 has the chassis number SP311-70231. All Fairlady 1600s have a number starting with 0, for example SP311-01060. (While on the subject of chassis numbers, all pre 1965 Datsuns except for the Silvia, have a middle number between two dashes, example SP310-4-00123, the middle number tells you the year the car was made, for example, a -4- indicates a 1964 car, a -3- is a 1963 car, etc. Many people think they have a very early car, thinking their SP310-4-00005 is the 5th car made, but the numbers start from 00000 at the start of each year,so SP310-4-00005 is the 5th car built in 1964.) The Silvia also has a body number as well as a chassis number, the only Datsun I know of with one. The body number is stamped on the body on, of all places, the small tower structure in the boot (luggage compartment) that holds the striker bar for the boot lock. When you open the boot, look down at the striker. Between the striker and the lip of the boot opening you'll see the 3 digit number, why they put it there I'll never know.If you can't see it you may have to scrape off the paint(ouch) to see it. Also the number is written, with a thick felt pen, on the back of nearly every large non-painted part of the car. The door trims, the metal upholdstered panels in the cabin, the bumpers, centre console, dashboard, they all have it. At first I thought it was a bit odd, and excessive, but I soon learned the hard way, why they are all numbered. At one stage I owned 3 Silvias, all in need of restoration, I thought I'd make one really good car with the best parts and 2 not as good cars with the rest. But when I went to swap parts off one car and onto the other they wouldn't fit !!!!! They didn't even come close. Fully hand built cars have their panels formed to roughly the right shape on a jig (see the photos of the Silvia jig in the photo section), then they are formed to their final shape while building the car, all the panels being beaten into shape to suit the rest of the car. As a result of this method of construction, every part is unique to that car. On a Silvia the bumper bars won't fit properly from one car to the other, nor will the doors or the bonnet. One of my cars was fitted with a replacement (brand new) front guard, this left gaping great 11mm panel gaps. The brand new guard had to be beaten into place to make it fit.

Silvia Interior The interior of the Silvia is quite small, but surprisingly comfortable. The foot wells are very deep, which allows plenty of legroom. I'm 5'11" and if I have the seats in the 2nd of the 2 seat holes and have the seat set all the way back, I can't properly reach the pedals. Headroom is a different story. I have just enough room to put my hand between my head and the ceiling. You learn to duck if you hit a big bump in the road. The seats are barely 1 inch off the floor, and only about 10 inches above the road. The driving position is nearly identical to the 1600 Fairlady, and feels close to perfect to me. In front of you sits a beautifully designed dashboard, similar in design to that of a Ferrari 246GT Dino, with an eye shaped instrument cluster. Instruments include a 120mph speedo, a 7000rpm tacho with oil and amp warning lights, a temp gauge, a fuel gauge and a clock. Sitting on the transmission tunnel is a centre console that stretches up under the dash. It houses a then state of the art push button AM radio with 1 speaker,\ toggle switches for the lights, wipers and map light, knobs for the choke, the manual washer pump and the cigar lighter. In front of that is the gear lever and in front of that, an ash tray. Under the central arm rest is a handy storage box. Under the dash are the heater and vent slide controls, the ignition switch and dash light dimmer rheostat. The dashboards of all Silvias look identical but some are made of sheet metal and some are fibreglass. Mounted on the ceiling is a (really cool) eye-ball map light that can be swivelled around to shine a concentrated beam of light to every corner of the cabin. In your hands is a rather large 400mm gorgeous looking wood rimmed steering wheel, slightly off-set towards the centre of the car. Behind you is a padded parcel shelf. At the rear of the car is a surprisingly big boot, fully upholdstered and carpeted. Recessed into the boot lid is the locking flap for the fuel cap. The fuel filler is easily the worst feature of the car. You can't put fuel into a Silvia faster than about 5 litres per minute. If you try to go faster it will suddenly, and without warning, fire a great gush of petrol back at you, covering you and the back of the car with a couple of litres of fuel. (Though this is handy if you don't like the guy at the petrol station)

Silvia - On the Road Driving the Silvia. The Silvia and the Fairlady 1600 share nearly all their mechanical components and basically the same chassis, so you'd expect them to feel pretty well the same, but they don't. The Silvia is silghtly faster, even though it's 58kg heavier then the Fairlady, thanks to it's rather low ratio diff. (it could be ordered with the optional 3.889:1 diff) The down side of this is a lower top speed of 165kph compared to the Fairlady's 170kph. The Silvia doesn't handle quite as good, due to the slightly softer springs and the extra 58 kilos it carries. Most of that extra weight is carried high in the car (it has a roof and extra glass) which raises it's centre of gravity. It still handles better than most cars. Where the Silvia is noticeably better is it's ride quality. It doesn't have the Fairlady's harshness and it offers a very comfortable ride. It handles dirt roads much better and is enormous fun when driven hard on dirt roads. She cruises comfortably at speeds up to 140kph, above that the engine noise becomes a little intrusive, and it starts to drum a bit in the cabin. It's quite aerodynamic for a 30+ year old car, and you don't get the wind noise you often get with older pre-wind tunnel cars. The brakes are quite good too. I've had a few emergency stops from high speeds and each time she's stopped dead straight and very quick. Repeated stops will show up a little fade but nothing too serious. If the brakes don't feel too good the problem is more than likely the disc rotors. For some reason these will warp slightly,especially if the car hasn't been used for a few years. Get them machined before you go rebuilding the (really expensive to rebuild) callipers. But most importantly, the main reason you buy a car like this is because of it's looks, and the Silvia looks just spectacular. Beautiful from every angle, especially in the front 3/4 view, she was perfectly balanced with her long angular bonnet and short tail. the overall subtlety of it's look hid the amazingly complex folds in it's panel work. Sports Car World magazine described her as "bold, distinctive and incredibly attractive" and "The pretiest Oriantal so far" and "an indication of Japan's sports car building potential" and "Pretty, pert and petite. Yes, the Japanese CAN match the Continent's best-- AND look original". When compared to other cars from 1964 it was an incredibly advanced design.

Silvia the Movie Star Silvia The Movie Star ! Yes, Silvia was the star of the film "The Karate Kid Part 2". Well, to say "star" might be a slight exageration, she was in it for about 20 seconds. It was the car the "baddies" were driving. The truely amazing thing is that three (3) rather big bad dudes supposedly got out of the car. That would have been a tight squeeze. I haven't seen a Silvia in any other movies or television shows, if you know of any others please let me know. (Old Japanese monster films like "Godzilla" and "Mothra" are usually worth watching just to see the old Japanese cars in the background)

Silvia - After Production Ended In 1974, 7 years after the last Silvia CSP311 rolled off the production line, Nissan resurected the Silvia name with the introduction of the Silvia S10. Often refered to by Nissan as the "New Silvia", it's production figures stand in stark contrast to the original model, with 145438 of them built between 1974 and 1979. The Silvia name continues on right up to today. The 200SX and Gazelle range are sold in Japan as the Nissan Silvia. Unfortunately they aren't a patch on the original model's stunning design, since 1979 they have been another example of conformist new car bland. Only the latest Silvia, released in Japan in 1999, comes close to being as desirable as the original Silvia.

The Silvia is a unique and beautiful car, and with only 554 ever built, it's so rare it makes a Lamborghini Countach look common. It represents an almost forgotten chapter in Japan's motoring history, but thanks to the efforts of her enthusiastic owners, many of those 554 are still in existence and each year a few more previously deceased Silvias are being returned to their former glory and are gracing the roads once again.

(found it, didn't come up with it, feel free to make corrections)
Modified by Rex at 5:30 PM 12/23/2004

[Bruno240]

right....

light reading

[quiksilvia]

i see nothing light in scrolling for a long time, long time scroll = heavy reading, you lied!

[MAXIMUS Nismo]

is there gonna be a test on this cause I think I skipped a few chapters. The one thing I learned from college is that the class/chapters you skip are the ones on the test.

Some good info here though. Possible sticky?

[Rex]

Sorry, it was sarcasm, and I went looking for this as people "miss" the old sticky about the Silvia's history.

More to come, maybe pics.

[underground57]

Sweet article! Thanks for posting it.