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Sayonara, R35: Nissan Japan has stopped taking orders for the GT-R
- t1234s 2y agoUnless you live near a track or some really technical mountain roads a Plaid makes cars like this obsolete.
- rubiquity 2y agoI own an EV and while the instant torque is fun, nothing will ever come close to the joys of driving a manual sports car.
- dinkblam 2y ago> nothing will ever come close to the joys of driving a manual sports car. "joy" basically means: natural aspiration, low weight, manual gearbox, rear-wheel drive, hydraulic (or unassisted) steering and no traction control or ESP
- toast0 2y agoI recently got an 81 Vanagon, it's got all of that except hydraulic steering and low weight, but I only have the two front seats which helps with weight a bit, and it's probably close to a light truck weight, back when they made light trucks. It's a lot of fun. No power steering, no power windows, no power from the engine, but I get to stomp on the throttle all the time. Later model years added all sorts of bells and whistles like water cooling, power steering, and signs of life from the engine, but who needs that.
- 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Type_2_(T3) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Type_2_(T3) Huh.
- rubiquity 2y agoThat’s right! There’s a reason nearly every city has a club of gutted Miatas.
- ethbr1 2y agoAs a six speed NB owner, am hard pressed to disagree. I haven't driven another car yet that focused so well on the things that make driving fun, while minimizing the downsides.
- jamiedumont 2y agoAgreed. We bought my wife an NC last year when the criteria was “cheap, petrol, naturally aspirated and Japanese”. The criteria was in response to my Land Rover (Discovery / LR4) which is none of those things and becoming a bore. After stealing the MX-5 whenever I get the chance I now wish we could run two. That would make family trips troublesome though…
- ethbr1 2y ago> That would make family trips troublesome though 100%. As someone who drove said NB for a 6-hour trip twice a week for a period, it isn't the best grand tourer. ;) It did make my heart sing to dust angry jacked up trucks with 3x+ the displacement / power, but who obviously didn't understand power:weight ratio.
- ur-whale 2y ago> rear-wheel drive meh, I was never a fan of those. I still remember the day I took an audi quattro (not mine, a car like that was way out of my league financially back then) for the first time up a mountain pass road near my home in the 80s. What an effing rush that was. Strongly agree for the rest of the list though and would add: "mechanical handbrake" to the list. These days cars have ugly little electronic handbrakes with a LED on it, what a load of shite.
- usrusr 2y agoAh, that joy. Had it crossing the Atlas mountain in Morocco, in a 35 HP FWD car. Low weight and simplicity, that's the key. Yeah, that won't return any time soon. At the border crossing, we shared the queue with two of the five teams (according to Wikipedia) participating in the first ever 4L Trophy. When I'm gone (well, when we're gone, me and my peers at the time), those memories will be gone, it's how it is.
- hilsdev 2y agoI prefer NA but I can have a lot of joy with a proper turbo or two, or a supercharger. There’s a big difference between a turbo used to pass emissions standards and one installed for fun
- throw8394949888 2y ago[flagged]
- spike021 2y agowhile i agree the only thing i’ll note here is the aforementioned GTR (R35) never came in manual. It’s definitely quite a bit lighter than the Tesla at least.
- throw8394949888 2y agoI love cycling way more, but then every random dog is trying to eat me. So ICE rules!
- whatever1 2y agoI totally agree. But why? The Evs have brutal acceleration and reach higher average speeds. We should feel some excitement, yet I don’t even bother to have a spirited drive in an EV. The super fast ones just make you feel nauseous.
- Szpadel 2y agoretro computers are also obsolete but they still have considerable amount of supporters.
- dinkblam 2y agoif you hate the process of driving then you are correct
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- tashoecraft 2y agoIn the enthusiast market we're seeing the opposite. Evs have made speed routine, but dull the driving experience part. 90's and 2000's sports cars with manuals are worth sometimes 100ks more than those with paddels, even though they are slower. The gtr has been essentially the same platform since its release, when the competition has gotten extremely tight. Then there's nissan's issues, ceo getting arrested, money troubles, uninspiring lineup that mostly sells to fleets/rentals, thus leading to inability to invest in halo vehicles. If the plaid was making cars like this obsolete why are we seeing insane demand for the 911?
- numpad0 2y agoSounds like pure cope, considering Tesla obsolescence of late + this being literally 2007 car
- BoostandEthanol 2y agoThat’s if you view cars as boxes that go from A to B judged exclusively by their spec sheet. But if you viewed them as such, why would you have a Plaid instead of a basic long range S? Maybe if the driver cares about performance, but is only capable of using their right foot. The only enthusiasm is being pushed into the seat at the peak of the traction of the tyres, for all of a moment before the speed limit restricts them again. All without any other theatre. I can see the appeal of being able to have that performance without drawing attention to yourself, but then you specifically clarify your statement by excluding tracks or technical (fun) roads. …Strangely, I thought I liked the Plaid until writing this. I’m enthusiastic for what Tesla has done to the EV market, and the Model S appears to generally be a good car (all my experience is in the Model 3 my Dad has. I’d assume the experience is similar) but I can’t help but feel like they’ve made something so utterly uninteresting as their top of the line halo model. What could’ve been the GT-R of this era seems to have barely grazed the automotive community.
- Tade0 2y agoI don't think it could have been the GT-R of this era, because there is not going to be a GT-R of this era once R35 is gone. To paraphrase one of my favourite motoring journalists (translated): "Will EVs kill motoring? No, but only because it's already dead - tuning died several years earlier. EVs are only a transition technology. In 30 years driving will be this lame thing that only old people do." I find it hard to seriously disagree with him on that.
- lenerdenator 2y agoDepends on where you're at. My girlfriend's car is currently awaiting a new engine at the dealership. It'd take about 30 years to build up the infrastructure in my city (a major one in the Lower Midwest) to get to where it would need to be for her to not need anything other than public transit, and that's assuming nothing else changes (like even further urban sprawl) and that we had the political will to start today - we don't. Maybe in Europe, Asia, and a select few North American cities it'll be dead, but there will still be plenty of places where it's necessary.
- Aurornis 2y agoIf your entire concept of a fast car is one that accelerates really really fast from a stoplight every once in a while, Plaid is your ticket. It does not replace cars like the R35 for people who like to drive, track, or modify cars though.
- FireBeyond 2y agoAbsolutely. My brother in law has had a Model S then an R1T, and now a Cybertruck (that he plans to sell). The acceleration is fun as hell, when you do it. 100%. Any of those three, thinking about cornering, handling, really driving, I have an RS 5, and that thing handles like it is on rails. Taking a corner too hard in his Model S and I was hanging on for dear life as I felt the control sliding away.
- maximilianburke 2y agoAn added bonus is that money for the GTR doesn’t go to a nazi though.
- ycombinatrix 2y agoThat is not remotely true. Maybe in the specific case you want a drag racing car with minimal effort.
- randerson 2y agoUnless you live near a drag strip I'd argue that the Plaid's one trick is wasted on public roads. 0-60 in 2 seconds is not even enjoyable for most people. But if it was, I'd like that joy to last more than 2 seconds (without losing my license). A sports car is something you wake up early on a Sunday morning to drive to a technical mountain road for no other reason than to derive pleasure from the human-machine interaction. Which you can do at legal speeds. Plenty of sports car owners do also go out of their way to visit the track. How many Plaid owners excitedly set their alarm for 5am so they can enjoy a twisty mountain road a few hours away?
- Aurornis 2y agoSad to see it go, but at the same time it’s been mostly the same car for 15 years. It was a performance bargain at launch, but the rest of the automotive world has been catching up. You can now get nearly the same track performance at almost half the price. The R35 will always retain a special place in the automotive world for being an AWD turbo platform with a lot of modification headroom. I’m not too surprised they’re discontinuing it after 15 years though.
- nxm 2y agoCan you give me an example for the same performance at half price?
- Aurornis 2y agoCamaro ZL1 is close on performance and nearly half the price. Unfortunately also discontinued. Base C8 Corvette models are surprisingly close at a fraction of the price. The top tier C8 models are even faster.
- rascul 2y agoThe Camaro might also be going away (again) soon.
- Moto7451 2y agoIt's already gone. They stopped making them over a year ago and they seem to be finally off the Chevy website. Local dealers in my area still have some new inventory on the lot.
- ur-whale 2y ago> Camaro ZL1 is close on performance Are those 4wd ?
- smolder 2y agoClose on performance in a straight line isn't really close on performance.
- didip 2y agoNissan is dying. It's time to accept it already. The moment they created a plastic oil pan, it's game over. Nobody cares about engineering anymore at Nissan.
- emptybits 2y ago> The moment they created a plastic oil pan, it's game over. Nobody cares about engineering anymore at Nissan. BMW has put plastic oil pans on a variety of their models for over a decade. N20 motors. The G90 M5. Others, maybe. I'm not saying it's a good idea, just a counterpoint that a plastic oil pan design doesn't invalidate other good engineering.
- numpad0 2y agoBMW is considered relatively unreliable, categorized into "hasn't been that much expensive for me so far" tier by Japanese standards. So that's probably not a great counter example.
- j45 2y agoIt also could be engineered maintenance.
- emptybits 2y agoFair comment about BMW. So another data point ... Ford also supplied their F150 trucks with plastic oil pans for a number of years. Not sure if that's still the case. But an F150 material decision is going to factor in hard use and reliability. So it's not like this is an insane design decision. I agree it's suspicious to replace a traditionally metal motor part with plastic, but there's plenty of this history we've gotten past. Consider that people freaked out when intake manifolds started to move to plastic. Now it's quite normal. Even on Japanese motors. The benefits besides cost and weight include the ability to model and mold more complex geometries.
- Grazester 2y agoYou think Nissan is alone in this? You could have mentioned Nissan terrible CVT's or grenade prone variable compression engine but you stated something that in widely done in the auto industry now as being their issue when it the grand scheme of things doesnt even register.
- jdietrich 2y agoThe R35 started development in 2000 and was launched in 2007. It has had a number of updates along the way, but you can only push an old platform so far. The R35 has already been discontinued in most markets because it can't comply with new regulations. It's sad to say goodbye to an icon, but the R35 has remained in production for far longer than anyone would reasonably have expected. It probably doesn't help that the car is so closely associated with Carlos Ghosn.
- ur-whale 2y ago> The R35 has already been discontinued in most markets because it can't comply with new regulations. Another thing to add to the list of things to love about the R35.
- Rebelgecko 2y agoWhy is that something to love? Making it more exclusive to other markets?
- outer_web 2y agoI interpreted it a "regulations bad".
- TheJoeMan 2y agoUnfortunately, in the USA, the regulations essentially just force manufacturers to put the engine into a huge body just so they fall under different (less-strict) emissions regulations. So banning small vehicles like this with okay gas-mileage (which I would consider "ok" to be in the 20's range), but we aren't improving the environment, since consumers are now just pushed to huge vehicles with gas mileage in the high teens.
- Zak 2y agoI wonder if a fuel economy standard that ignores vehicle size would be viable. That would advantage the lightest, most aerodynamic cars and make big vehicles expensive. Some people need big vehicles, but increasing costs for those people might be an acceptable tradeoff for making the average car smaller with the inherent benefits to fuel economy and reduced danger to other road users.
- okdood64 2y agoNissan's Skyline/R35 lines were largely wildly expensive projects that Nissan had no business doing, at the expense of their company's future. They were a form of a charity (bless them) to the automotive world. But then they had to pivot hard (see Carlos Ghosn) to be try to be profitable and killed their brand. (There were of course other issues than just these projects, though.) RIP Nissan.
- j45 2y agoMost makes have a leading model that exemplifies a lot of the qualities that the other vehicles are inspired by. Doesn't have to be high volume to be successful.
- rconti 2y agoI've never driven the R35 -- it never particularly interested me, largely due to the dual clutch transmission but also because of the size. But I was in Japan in December and took the opportunity to rent an R34 GT-R which was just such a treat. I get the irony -- the R34 was a huge car for its time as well, especially in Japan. These cars always did punch above their weight, though. As much as I have little interest in the R35 due to its transmission, I still think it was the correct choice- the GT-R was always the tech-forward, throw-the-kitchen-sink-at-it, performance-first car, it was never meant to be the lightweight purist choice.
- 4gotunameagain 2y agoWhy does the dual clutch transmission repel you ? I am aware that a stick shift has better "feel", but if that is the comparison (as I am assuming due to you mentioning the R34) a dual clutch is superior in every other way except weight. Sure, feel is very important, but refusing to even drive one ? Not judging, genuinely curious.
- roflchoppa 2y agoYeah I was curious about this as well. I really like the DSG gearboxes that are used in the Golf, maybe the tech is/was older?
- Aurornis 2y agoSome people just like shifting manually. It's a preference thing. I agree that DCTs are great. Modern DCTs are amazing. I don't personally feel that DCTs take away from the driving experience at all. It does get tiresome when people become snobby about driving stickshift, though.
- j45 2y agoThe DCT on the GT-R definitely wasn't as rough around the edges as I anticipated it might be.
- numpad0 2y ago
- Kapura 2y agoNissan had a huge amount of credibility in enthusiast car communities, not just with the GT-R but also the Nissan Z cars. Unfortunately, they chose not to continue in investing in those spaces, so they have slowly seen what was once a strength evaporate. It's like watching a body builder lose discipline and get fat but still hang out at the beach thinking he looks like he does 10 years ago. Sad!
- Aurornis 2y ago> Unfortunately, they chose not to continue in investing in those spaces Unfortunately, car enthusiasts chose not to continue investing in buying those cars Annual GT-R sales were in the hundreds: https://www.thedrive.com/news/nissan-sold-just-one-gt-r-a-day-last-quarter https://www.thedrive.com/news/nissan-sold-just-one-gt-r-a-da... The entire mid-range sports car industry had a big problem for a while where enthusiasts didn't buy many new cars. Everyone was waiting for someone else to buy new so they could buy used at a discount.
- Neywiny 2y agoIt's like the death of the manual. Enthusiasts are up in arms when only an automatic comes out. But do they buy the manual? No. Did they ever intend to? Who knows. Why design a car for no sales.
- kllrnohj 2y ago> Toyota introduced the manual-transmission GR Supra partway through 2023, finally putting a clutch pedal in its flagship sports car. It proved relatively popular, accounting for 43% of Supras sold in the US in 2023. For 2024, the manual take rate went up by quite a bit—Toyota tells us 65% of Supras sold here in 2024 were manuals. https://www.motor1.com/news/746173/toyota-supra-manual-take-rate-2024/ https://www.motor1.com/news/746173/toyota-supra-manual-take-...
- Kapura 2y agoPorsche just had the best year for the 911 ever. I think the low-end sportscar market probably isn't highly profitable, but I think that if nissan had pursued a strategy other than "these sports car platforms were good once, let's never update them more than absolutely necessary" they would have the credibility to justify continuing to innovate closer to the top end of the market. I think there's also intangible benefits related to brand image. Toyota doesn't sell millions of Supras or 86, but it's enough to break out of the "prius and rav4" mentality of the brand.
- Strongbad536 2y agoGuess I’ll get a Supra instead if my paper money ever pans out
- ben7799 2y agoMy brother worked at Nissan back when the R35 was new and exciting. It sounded like the ownership experience (at least in the US) was not good. Reliability and maintenance were bad. Word got out that it wasn't a fun car to own and then they got very hard to sell so the salesforce didn't even like them. Dealers didn't want to put them on the lot, etc.. And then it did the standard Japanese sports car thing where it languished without updates and got old and outdated compared to other brands' sports cars.
- j45 2y agoIt was always a stiff ride, but maybe the Fast & Furious generation only saw the cars and didn't drive the R-34 and R-33. All good though, GT-R deserves the love for the fun it has, like the time it was banned from a racing series for winning too much https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_Australian_Touring_Car_season https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_Australian_Touring_Car_se...
- yardie 2y agoWell I feel like Mazda is the last true hope for performance production cars.
- Izikiel43 2y agoThe mx5 is beautiful
- 0x457 2y agoMy favorite car to drive. Exceptional driving experience and cheap. Trunk is alright for groceries (for one or two people).
- artificialprint 2y agoNot true! Look at toyota, yaris, corolla! Even rumors of celica and mr2 making a come back
- rozap 2y agoEven lotus is getting enshittified :(
- randerson 2y agoI wouldn't call the MX-5 a performance car, but it is certainly one of the purest sports cars on the market.
- berbec 2y agoDid I miss Mazda releasing the FF model? I didn't know they had a performance car on the market currently.
- jmb99 2y agoUmm, there are quite a few performance production cars? Mustang (ecoboost or gt), corvette, ct4/5-v blackwing, Nissan’s own Z, golf gti/r, to name a few. Does Mazda even make a “performance” car? The mx-5 is an enthusiast car, definitely not a performance car by pretty much any metric
- insane_dreamer 2y ago
- outer_web 2y agoSurely this means we will see a 2027 R390.
- AcerbicZero 2y agoTruly one of the greatest cars of its time, a snarling, cybernetic banshee that bent physics to its will; Now, just a fading watermark on the walls of history—a reminder of how high the tide once surged, before receding for good. We've lost a lot of ground since the glory days of the mid 90's.
- Klonoar 2y agoI mean, this is really about the model from 2007+. That model in particular was incredible at the time and the fact that it held on so long is remarkable.
- berbec 2y ago> high the tide once surged, before receding for good r/unexpectedhuntersthompson
- AcerbicZero 2y agoLegit what i was aiming for :)
- mberning 2y agoI bought one of the first 2012’s available in the US. Flew out to St. Louis to pick it up. It was a very cool car. Drew way too much attention for my taste. And it was very unrefined in many ways that I didn’t expect. It was a special car, but I ended up not liking it that much. I sold it after about 6 months. Maybe once a year I have a very vivid dream about it. Kind of sad to hear this is the end of the line for it.
- SideburnsOfDoom 2y ago> After nearly two decades of embarrassing supercars, Nissan has is this intended to mean "After nearly two decades of making embarrassing supercars, Nissan has" or "After nearly two decades of embarrassing the supercars, Nissan has" ?
- nkotov 2y agoDriven the R35 in 2020. A lot of fun but definitely felt outdated by then. It's a shame that Nissan somehow had all the cards right (a working man's super car under $100k) and fumbled so much by just not innovating in the 2010s. Their luxury brand Infiniti suffered as much as well. I don't know what they were doing.
- chasd00 2y agoA joke i have on tap is when i see a GTR i say it has the second hottest rear end i've ever seen. When I'm get the inevitable follow up question i say "i married the first!". heh it still makes me chuckle.
- wjgilmore 2y agoOne of the most fun experiences I have ever had in a car was traveling from Tokyo to the Friday night Daikoku car meetup in a GT-R Skyline. It was legit like being in a scene from Fast and the Furious, multiple GT-Rs cruising through traffic, girlfriends hanging out the windows filming with phones. Fire shooting out of exhaust pipes, it was unforgettable.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]