Slartibartfast

Sounds normal to me. When the engine was just barely ticking over, it wasn't pumping oil fast enough, so the oil pressure was low. Then it caught properly, the pump started spinning fast enough to do its job, and the light went out. So long as the oil light doesn't stay on or come on while driving you're good.

The fuel pressure regulator is there to keep the fuel pressure to the injectors where it should be and bleed off excess to the return line; stop flow from the pump and it'll just close up and hold that pressure. My dad sprayed himself trying to troubleshoot my '95 once. If you're just doing a filter or something you can pull the pump fuse and run the motor until it stalls to use up that pressure, but clearly that wouldn't have helped in your case. The symptoms aren't ringing any bells for me. Any new codes? How's the vac line to the pressure regulator?

IMG used to work, now you use the photo icon above the posting box (sort of below the smiley) and post a direct link there.

I don't think I've seen someone Bondo a door shut before. Too bad, looks like it was a pretty clean truck before the rock. Do you know how knackered it is underneath? You might be able to hammer stuff out, replace a few things, and get the doors working well enough to use if Bubba didn't weld 'er up real good under all that putty. There's no body lifting it, it's unibody, though you can do a subframe drop in the front. Unibody makes a chop top a little problematic but of course a cage would help with that. This guy did kind of sketchy ragtop on a WD21, if you want to check that out.

Huh. Check the fittings/clamps/etc, make sure it's not sucking air. How's the fluid look? Clean, dark, bubbles? IIRC there's a screen over the end of the line from the res to the pump, so if you suck the fluid out, check that this hasn't gotten clogged up. Could be that putting the truck on its side dislodged some gunk elsewhere in the system and it all ended up in the same place.

Interesting it's got all that at once. I suspect the trans computer got confused by the engine running like crap, though I haven't heard of it doing that. I'd focus on getting the motor first. Is it a consistent miss like one cylinder isn't firing at all or does it come and go like a fuel mix problem? If it's one cylinder that's not firing, figure out which cylinder it is and make sure it's getting spark, check the plug, make sure it's not something like the plug wire not seating properly.

Looks like it didn't. You have to host it elsewhere and paste the direct link.

Looked at 50 cal ammo cans on eBay, looked at the spot where my console box used to be, took a few measurements...

I'd be surprised if Rockauto didn't have them.

Wow. Yeah, that explains it! Next time I'm into a driveshaft I'll make sure and change the snap rings. I might trust it for short distances with the bearings packed but you wouldn't want one of them overheating and locking up when you're at highway speed (or more). With no grease seals I don't think they would hold lube for long.

Looks like it dropped onto a rock or something given the scuffs around the breakage, unless a thrashing front driveshaft did that. Whatever it was, I'm guessing you figured out what happened pretty quickly! I'm looking at the exploded diagram (seems appropriate) for the ATX14a case and while you might be alright as far as locking up the shaft, I'd worry about the bearings. I don't know if the main bearings are sealed but the needle bearings are clearly not, so they rely on the fluid that's not in there anymore. I guess you could try packing all that with trailer bearing grease and hope for the best, but I think you'd have to take it out to do that... and at that point it would be less work to replace the whole case with one that doesn't have a gaping hole in it.

Maybe the third one goes in your spares bin? Might be a typo, I know I only found two camshaft seals in mine.

I don't think the top of the res really seals, so the best I can guess is that the system got air in it when it was sideways, the air is taking up space/being whipped into foam, and that is pushing fluid (or foam at least) out of the res. I'd just take the cap off, run it, and see there's any obvious foaming or splashing or something along those lines.

Check this guy out: http://www.nissanpathfinders.net/forum/user/36383-v8path/

It's been done. I remember a thread where the guy had a couple of wood A-frames with straps holding the body up so he could drop the chassis out from under it and roll a new one under. Unless there's something horribly wrong with the donor though it might be easier to just fix it with parts of the wrecked one.

Huh. Gotta love alarm systems and the hacks who install them. Hopefully all is well when you get it back!

I got replaced mine with this: Bolted through so it can't go anywhere.

Depends on what all you're swapping and what the damage is, whole front body isn't that specific. Pictures would help. The hood comes off easily once you've pulled the cowl. The cowl comes off after the wiper arms and the vents. The vents are held down by little rectangular clips, press the center dot on those and it should release them. Or break them. Mine are held in by zip ties. Fenders are easy (bolts and a little seam sealer) but you have to pull the bumper first. You can get to the bumper bolts through the wheel wells. IIRC the silly fascia piece under the bumper has to come off too, or at least you have to unclip it from the fender flares (if you're keeping those) before you pull the fenders. That's about the limit of what unbolts. If the rad support or the inner fenders are munched, you're going to be cutting and welding. If it's munched further back than that you may be better off swapping the whole body and hoping the frame's straight enough to bolt up. On, and don't worry about the trim levels, that's only got a vague connection to the options the car came with and shouldn't change the sheet metal any.

Sawzall, beer can, couple of hose clamps, good as new!

Best bet here is probably the service manual. The AT section shows some of the wiring but apparently not all of it; I imagine the rest is buried in EL somewhere. It may well be different in the TD version than in the gasser version manual I've got, making things that much more entertaining. Shouldn't be too hard to track down what's the overdrive switch with a meter. If you can work out what wires from the R50 shifter connect when the button's engaged, and what wires do the same on the WD21, you could go from there. Not sure how it would do three things with two wires, though... maybe it uses the mounting bolts as a ground? I vaguely remember the shift lock having some kind of cable hookup on it, but it was a while ago that I screwed around with it.

Not sure if common but certainly not unheard of. My dad found quite a few people who'd had the same issue when looking to fix his '03. I didn't get to tear that motor down so I have no idea what the problem actually was. We were thinking maybe valve guides because it only smoked on warm starts, but I've heard everything from ingested valve screws to the PCV valve somehow siphoning into the intake. And yeah, the power valves are in the intake, just swap that out and you should be good to go.

So you've got a wheel vibration that's not in the steering wheel. My first thought would be to rotate the tires and see if you start feeling it up front. If the tire place didn't balance one of the rear tires right, and you move it to the front, then you'd feel it in the wheel. Rotating them would also give you a chance to visually inspect for uneven wear, rim damage, or other weirdness. If it's not that, then yeah, crawl under and start checking out bushings and U joints. I would also check the front wheel bearings while you're at it, though if they were going I think you'd feel that in the wheel. Same on the bushings, really, any issue with the front bushings would probably show up in the steering and if the rear link bushings were crapping out I think you'd notice more than a vibration. If it's not the tires, the U joints would be my bet.

I've never heard of the dizzy shaft breaking. The sensors crap out, but there's not much to go wrong on the shaft itself. If you do pull the dizzy, put the motor to TDC and mark its position first, it'll be one less thing to try and figure out when you're tearing the motor apart. Chances are it'll have a misfire on at least one cylinder where the valves have bent. People do occasionally get lucky but unless you've got the Lucky Charms guy tied up in your basement you're probably looking at valve work. Or an engine swap.

There are a hell of a lot of things it could be, but let's start with the big one, the timing belt. Remove the distributor cap, crank it, and have someone watch the rotor. It should spin with the engine. If not, you've got a bad belt and likely damaged valves as well. If it's not that, check for spark, check for fuel, check for codes.

+1 on making sure the JY engine has good compression before swapping. My dad checked around locally for a wrecking yard motor for his '03 and couldn't find one with decent/consistent compression. His had oil consumption too, though the engine still pulled just fine. Hopefully you have better luck at your local yards.