‘71 Skyline Hakosuka

After washing the exterior it was time to wash the undercarriage and see what’s going on with the small leaks that were left on the garage floor. It was the first time I got the Hako on jack stands. I ended up getting rubber jack stand pads later on to help the stands lay flat on the subframe. First I checked for wet spots underneath. I found that the gasket around the oil pan was wet, the rear main seal was also leaking, and the reverse light sensor on the side of the transmission also had a small leak coming from the middle of the sensor and not from the threads. As for now I think those are the only spots that was leaking. The under carriage had apparently gone through some restoration and was coated with black paint; most likely to prevent from further rusting. There was some surface rust on the dual exhaust, half shaft axle, and some rusting on the bottom of the trunk. There were some parts of the paint coating g that were also flaking most likely from old age. Nothing too concerning at the moment but I’ll have to tackle the trunk from completely rusting through in the future. A whole re-coating on the under carriage wouldn’t hurt but dang that’s going to be a big job in the future.

Overall the undercarriage wasn’t too bad. Not sure when the last time the under carriage was rinsed but just got to make sure to blow dry it after.

So glad that she isn’t having such a hard starting up now.

A few days later on November 4, 2025 I got a call from Matthew at Prestige Companies Auto Upholstery saying that the seats are done. I headed over there and was completely satisfied with how the seats turned out. The Napa leather and basket weave with the horizontal stitching was a perfect fit for the interior. Now it looks close to what it did from the factory.

Kathrina and I went for a long awaited test drive with the rebuilt carburetors and new seats! First destination, gas station!

The Hako was running 93 octane in Australia but here in California the highest octane at nearly every gas station is 91 octane. She drove decent considering I have not balanced the carbs with a synchrometer yet. On medium throttle it seemed to stumble around 4k rpm so I babied her back home to do more research after driving around a nearby plaza. I checked the spark plugs and the carbon color seemed pretty good. I guess I did a decent job on rebuilding the carburetors. I tested the gap tolerance of the spark plugs and found out that one of the plugs had a larger gap than the others. Maybe I’ll start with replacing them with a whole new set.