Electrophysiological, mechanical, dimensional and coronary flow characteristics were studied on papillary strips and on isolated hearts, from spontaneously hypertensive (SHR) and normotensive (WKY) rats respectively, which from 5 to 15 weeks of age had been on either 'low' (LNa, 0.5 mmol 100 g-1 food), control (CNa, 5) 'high' (HNa, 50) or 'very high' (vHNa, 120) sodium diets. With respect to cardiac electrophysiological characteristics, contractility, and maximal stroke volume capacity only minor, if any, differences were observed between the various Na diet groups, both in WKY and SHR. This is in accordance with our earlier findings concerning vascular smooth muscle, where a largely unchanged sensitivity and responsiveness to, for example, noradrenaline was noted. Further, only to the extent that the various Na diets had also caused changes in average blood pressure levels, adaptations of cardiac and coronary resistance vessel design were observed, in general agreement with our earlier findings in other preparations and experimental designs. The largely unaffected functional characteristics of cardiac as well as vascular effector cells, despite 240-fold long-term variations in sodium intake, are in sharp contrast to the marked changes that have been shown to affect the adrenergic nerves, as here chronic low-Na intakes cause reductions of transmitter release/impulse, and vice versa at high Na intakes. This latter type of change seems to be by far the most important functional deviation affecting cardiovascular control during long-term alterations of sodium intake, as it can markedly affect both cardiac and vascular influences on haemodynamics, even though the respective effector functions seem to be surprisingly little influenced directly.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)