Junkyard Find: 1980 Datsun 310 Coupe

Murilee Martin
by Murilee Martin
Nissan sold lots of the original Datsun 510s in the United States, and so the remainder of the 1970s saw a whole series of model names ending in “10” showing up in Datsun dealerships. Some (e.g., the 610 and 710) were Bluebird-based cars like the 510, but the 310 was really a Cherry-based Nissan Pulsar.Here’s an optioned-up 1980 Datsun 310 hatchback coupe in a Denver self-service wrecking yard.
Some 310 owner bought the doors from this car, but left these gorgeous Full Disco seats behind. Why? How?
The A14 engine powered many rear-wheel-drive Datsun B210s and front-wheel-drive 210s. With 1,397 cubic centimeters and 64 horsepower, the 1,970-pound 1980 Datsun 310 wouldn’t win many drag races, but it looked sporty and sipped gas at a time when Americans were gearing up for $20/gallon fuel.
We can’t determine the real mileage from this five-digit odometer, but this car looks fairly clean for its age.
The 5-door hatchback looked like the yen-pincher it really was, but the bubble hatchback window on the coupe looked cool.
Wow! It’s a long way to empty… iiiiin a Datsun!
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Murilee Martin
Murilee Martin

Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.

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  • Volvo Volvo on Jan 22, 2019

    That was something we did occasionally on older Volvo 240s when the driver's seat bottom started to fail and simple rebuild was not practical.

  • WildcatMatt WildcatMatt on Jan 23, 2019

    I like the clean design of the instruments.

  • ChristianWimmer It might be overpriced for most, but probably not for the affluent city-dwellers who these are targeted at - we have tons of them in Munich where I live so I “get it”. I just think these look so terribly cheap and weird from a design POV.
  • NotMyCircusNotMyMonkeys so many people here fellating musks fat sack, or hodling the baggies for TSLA. which are you?
  • Kwik_Shift_Pro4X Canadians are able to win?
  • Doc423 More over-priced, unreliable garbage from Mini Cooper/BMW.
  • Tsarcasm Chevron Techron and Lubri-Moly Jectron are the only ones that have a lot of Polyether Amine (PEA) in them.
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