New Skyline GTR, a failure in the makeing?

The sad thing is I have driven one (Grey Import R32 GTR), while I have neither the experience nor the time, it did step out as described. I gave Julian Edgars article as a example, another local Journo Martin Donnan said the same thing....

Besides that it was fine, sadly I only had 5 mins behind the wheel :( While it was not the fastest car I have ever driven, it was quite nice and felt very competent. I was not impressed by the motor that sounded like a overdriven vacume cleaner and tromp it in a higher gear and "wait a few moments" engine response. And yes I do know you need a few revs :lol:


The thing is, I'm worried that if anybody says anything that is negative about a Nissan GTR, they are subject to character assasination and abuse. Can anybody really give a subjective review of a car under these conditions? It probably takes a brave person to do so.....


I was a little upset because I sorta idolised the car as a young lad.....I guess its a example of "never meet your heros"? I'm not the worlds best driver, I don't have the skill to really test it.

I'll say again as I did at the start of the thread I'm not against the new GTR, I'm just really worried about it

Yes and I do hate badge abuse too Blaro, are you impressed with a Alfa Romeo owner saying this?
 
thedguy said:
and a bit OT: When did a 2800lb car become "light weight"? I'm not attacking Kaboomn but seriously, anymore I hear people say "oh the s2000 kicks but because it's light weight" it's an over weight pig. A miata/mx-5 are both fucking overweight after the 1st gen. And even the 1st gen is pushing the limits of being called lightweight.
Notice how I put quotation marks around light? Its all good man :) It was ment in a sarcastic tone, bit of a mis-understanding there!

No way that around 1400kg is light, but still the old ST185 Celica GT4 was around 1390Kg (somebody shoot me down if I'm wrong) so yeah....

Normally I think lightweight is from 900-1100, this does not include kit cars or ICV's which don't exactly play by the rules :p
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sorry, my browser seems to have developed a love for making me double post. i'll get to fixing it.
 
kaBOOMn said:
The sad thing is I have driven one (Grey Import R32 GTR), while I have neither the experience nor the time, it did step out as described. I gave Julian Edgars article as a example, another local Journo Martin Donnan said the same thing....
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sure it steps out, the GT-R is designed to exaggerate rear wheel drive handling characteristics, not drive for you. sure it's all wheel drive, but it's a pure driving machine, not some namby-pamby grip machine like an evo, that never lets go.

fair enough it's not the fastest car you've driven, don't forget the standard GT-R left the factory with only (supposed) 280ps. That's the voluntarily mandated power limit. half of what makes it so legendary, is the restrictions imposed on the engine by the factory to keep it down to this limit. If you drove a standard one, sir, that's like drinking Budwieser, watery crap. One with a simple computer mod, that's Stella Artois.
 
flyingfridge said:
kaBOOMn said:
The sad thing is I have driven one (Grey Import R32 GTR), while I have neither the experience nor the time, it did step out as described. I gave Julian Edgars article as a example, another local Journo Martin Donnan said the same thing....
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sure it steps out, the GT-R is designed to exaggerate rear wheel drive handling characteristics, not drive for you. sure it's all wheel drive, but it's a pure driving machine, not some namby-pamby grip machine like an evo, that never lets go.

fair enough it's not the fastest car you've driven, don't forget the standard GT-R left the factory with only (supposed) 280ps. That's the voluntarily mandated power limit. half of what makes it so legendary, is the restrictions imposed on the engine by the factory to keep it down to this limit. If you drove a standard one, sir, that's like drinking Budwieser, watery crap. One with a simple computer mod, that's Stella Artois.
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Fair call, I have a rather highly worked RB30 (24v conversion etc) in my day to day commodore, so I know very well what a RB can do. Still compared to the Alfa Romeo engines in the other cars its a rather souless, poor sounding powerplant....

The 'ol VL was my planned step up to a Skyline, but I was a little shattered when I drove one, and at that stage I'd been working with Alfa Romeo's for around 12months and I kinda fell in love with them.....

But if it is the car that reputation makes it, it Shouldn't step out. I mean you have just missed the point then. Sorry.

The fast car was a turbo lotus 7 replica, which we built at the shop......a SR20DET in a spaceframe car is scarey......:evil: lol, I spoze it doesn't count tho!
 
The impression I'm getting about the skyline GT-R's is that nissan took a complete shit chassis, and instead of tuning it properly to dial out most of the oversteer, they figured they'd put a heavy AWD system in it, that costs lots to manufacture and market it on the tech.

I seriously wonder about how good the R32 chassis is when one with a seam welded chassis, full roll cage, urethane filled "frame", and usual suspension mods can have it's ass handed to it by a front wheel drive Chevy Cobalt with a beam axle rear suspension and mac strut front. *

It seems to me that the Skyline GT-R (R32 anyway) was so dominating for the same reasons Audi kicked so much ass in the early 80's with the quattro...timing. Consider what the competition had in 89-91 and a car with 4wd would dominate, especially when trying to put down 500+hp in race trim.

*Granted the Cobalt had just as many mods to the chassis as the skyline, but it was way underpowered by comparison. 600+hp vs the cobalts 275+100shot nitrous.


edit: Could someone link me some articles on the whole ATCC and GT-R domination, along with the group A domination in Japan? I can only get here-say from people rather than an actual article written by a magazine or someone that has done quality research. I'd like to know the real (full) story rather than just the over hyped stuff that has been getting spread around for the past 2 decades.
 
Yeah I'll post them up, the GTR's had aweome launches off the line which was a HUUUUUUUGE advantage.

If you want another example of 4wd in touring car raceing, try the 2.5 litre Alfa Romeo 155 v6 Ti in the DTM....first year, 4wd, thankyou for the win :D

The other thing is by that time, all the other group A cars where getting really outdated, the Sierra was around 5 years old.

**Its not the full article, the original has much more, on into 1992**

http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache...n+skaife+sandbagging&hl=en&gl=au&ct=clnk&cd=2

The other thing is there are some things you would like to know. Cams put the idea of air restictors on the table, and while most teams agreed with it, Nissan where up in arms. Boost limitation is no good, since you can be sneaky and do stuff and then claim the boost is the same!

....Air restictors could have solved the whole problem.....I'd love to see a mixed serries here, but it isn't going to happen :cry: the JGTC runs air restrictors before you flame me....

I know in Europe GTR's with air-restirctors where not a compeditive machine. The Gibson team where noted for not playing exactly by the rules, for example engine swaps in the Group C days and submiting homologation papers 5 mins before the race in Japanese so nobody could double check what they had under the car.....

The other thing you have to understand is the amount of raceing teams going under at that stage was just stupid. Nobody here could afford to run a Group A car anymore. The other problem is that (with a few exceptions) all the old Group A cars at that stage where really outdated, the only Commodore that won a race against the GTR was 6 years old and the Ford RS500 was 7 years old. I work in a small race shop, so I get to talk to quite a few interesting poeple that come through (and at events).....

I'm not saying its a bad car, but you kinda have to look through the mud.....
 
well looks like there won't be a manual option

Read about it HERE on jalopnik

on one hand i am sure the DSG box it will have will be GREAT on the other i do enjoy the old H-Gate
 
I think the biggest problem with the GT-R is that its really only impressive on a technical level. If you look at it as a piece of art it makes the 911 Turbo look like the most beautiful car in the world.

I think the real test of a car is being able to leave a life changing impression, despite whether its technically shitty or not. On this test alone i think the GT-R would probably score about as low as a Hyundia Elantra. The fact that i still have never heard a skyline that even sounds remotely good is scary enough, but by no means is it as horrifying as the interior. And i don't expect it to be much better at all this time around, because the cars the GT-R is related to (what is it, the G37 or something?) Are still desperately bad on the inside, the 350z is marginal. I need to feel welcomed when i sit in a car, not like I'm trapped in a hellhole. And to be honest if i had to own a skyline or anything similar to it i would probably rip out the interior, because theirs no point in that much extra weight if its going to be ugly. I understand style can be subjective, but i think a complete lack of style is a entirely different issue.
 
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as i understand it it is not based on any of the current line up of nissan cars. The chassis designation is R35.
 
The_Finn said:
as i understand it it is not based on any of the current line up of nissan cars. The chassis designation is R35.
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Thats nice, but i still see no reason why Nissan would care to make it seem at all special in a emotive way.
 
Weirdly enough, what I'm really looking forward to in the Nissan Fuga X or Infiniti M45X:

Same attesa-ets 4WD system as the GT-R but with two extra seats and a V8 rumble.

Though it's a mere 325hp, it should still be as reliable as a bullit and quick like the old Skyline.
 
Ottobon said:
I think the real test of a car is being able to leave a life changing impression, despite whether its technically shitty or not. On this test alone i think the GT-R would probably score about as low as a Hyundia Elantra. The fact that i still have never heard a skyline that even sounds remotely good is scary enough, but by no means is it as horrifying as the interior. And i don't expect it to be much better at all this time around, because the cars the GT-R is related to (what is it, the G37 or something?) Are still desperately bad on the inside, the 350z is marginal. I need to feel welcomed when i sit in a car, not like I'm trapped in a hellhole. And to be honest if i had to own a skyline or anything similar to it i would probably rip out the interior, because theirs no point in that much extra weight if its going to be ugly. I understand style can be subjective, but i think a complete lack of style is a entirely different issue.
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So the Skyline is therefore a shitty car because YOU'VE never experienced one, the interior is ugly, and it shares its chassis with some other cars whose interiors are also ugly?

...right. Duly noted. Boy, aren't we clutching at straws here?
 
The new GTR will probably be a dissapointment in terms of tunability, but out of the box it should be one of the best GTR from Nissan (probably still behind the R34 Z-Tune though). What you guys are discribing are the R32, the AWD system is already greatly improved in the R34, so I would guess the upcoming GTR (V35?) would have a even better AWD system. And the new car is based on the FM (G35, 350Z chassis) which got really good reviews. So handling wise it should live up to the hype. But I guess we won't be seeing 600-700whp GTR on stock blocks, cuz the engine is just a VQ35 bore and stroked to 3.8L, and the VQ series is open deck, so it won't take much more power than the (rumored) 450hp without rebuilding and sleeving.
 
If it's seriously just coming with an auto then I'll only take the engine, thank you. Save a couple grand while I'm at it, and stick it in anything from a 240SX to a Triumph Spitfire (because V8 911s aren't blasphemous enough...).

nissan_gtr_preorder.jpg


It's ugly too.
 
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