I love this car

It’s like a trueno hatch with taillights from a coupe

A few people called them the japanese twins

Corolla Sport Coupe?

It does though.

I have 2, an 87/88 and people always ask me is that a Toyota?

Yeah I got the RCR reference!

I love pop up headlights....

Very beautiful and great car this Nissan 200 SX 87, I love this car

Exactly, I mean seriously, a 17.5 quarter mile? My 93 Probe GT had about the same power and weight, yet get 15.5 in the quarter.

Years ago I took my 1984 ford telstar 2.0 carb in quartermile was a fast car at the time had extractors and exhaust recon motor but did 16.1 quartermile lol 😆 at 140kph

The Turbo 2.0 200sx 0 to 60 is around 7.5 seconds. Not sure how they got 10 seconds.

I’m thinking maybe there was something wrong with their test car or perhaps the driver didn’t know how to launch it 🤷🏻‍♂️ those numbers to a car that size with that much power don’t really add up to me

Yeah there had to be something wrong with this car or their tests. I remember when this car came out and it was faster to sixty than the 300zx na. It wasn’t by much, but it weighed less than the 300 so it made since.

me too

Yup the era of big engines with no power lol...funny that midsize family sedans nowadays beat those figures with 4 bangers under the bonnet lol

PremierAutoMan86 Oh retrospect!!!

GT6SuzukaTimeTrials And abysmal acceleration numbers. For a car that weighed about 2500 lbs, 160HP should make that thing scoot, but it hardly can get out of its own way.

HINDSIGHTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT if only you culda invented a better engine..then go BACK IN TIME TO MAKE IT WORK!!!! IF ONLY!!! llololololoolololol

joh n actually , the car's weight come in at 2975lbs based off everything that can be found online for the v6 version. motorweek must have mistakenly referenced the 4 banger car's weight.

Wouldn't pass smog here like the sr20det

The V6 is better And 250 hp was eazy got get out of it

It wouldnt be 190hp tho, it only is so because japanese always use appropriate high octane fuel. It would have to be detuned for shitty 87 octane fuel as people only ever want cheapest pump gas. It would be probably around 150 maybe 160-ish at best. It shows with how toyota gave up on trying with 3sge just 2 years later and just slapped lazy 5sfe from camry into both Celica and MR2 except for turbo version.

I think that building a sick VG based from a 3.3 block would suit it better, or perhaps a VQ swap. IMO do the sr into a base model or a 1986-back turbo s12. These were pretty unique in thier class and it would be a shame to remove what made it special. Im surprised at the z28 comparison, nah in my mind this was Nissans take on a Foxbody Mustang 5.0 It even looks like a cross between an AE86 and a Mustang, particularly the Interior! And to end, that crazy Japanese fabric design is one of the things about 80s Nissans that I love!

Too bad Nissan is not like that anymore

Underpantsniper And actually VG30E. Too bad they didn't use VG30ET, that has torque.

When did the vq series start?

@@maxwelsh6121 I think it was in 99 or 2000 in the Maxima.

Yeah, but it felt like a fast car though with its free revving engine. It was pretty easy to break those rear tires loose too.

Craig Wildfeuer actually believe it or not the first vq engine was in 1994 with the vq20de wasn’t a well known engine at the time though

same here

Kevin Moondust that’s so true we always get the shit. GTI? Naww more like rabbit take the L It’s a pain in the ass also fuck the 25yr old car import rule.

@@tony_5156 and let's not forget those shady jdm importers

@@tony_5156 It's true in Canada too, the Japanese and Europeans always got the best cars. Our import wait time is only 15 years.

Get a base model to swap, they already had a CA20 in them and that way you can preserve the uniqueness of the V6 model (only made for 2 years!) I dont think it was very common, I've only seen 2 or 3 SEv6 models my whole life (but seen lots of 4cyl ones) If i find one that is actually intact ill probably build a mean VG33 based lump for it.

At least the s12 came with a higher performance version in the us which we should've gotten in the S 13 but then again Nissan was starting to lose its way by the time the S 13 came out. And now absolutely cannot disagree with you more. The styling of the S12 is unequivocably 1980s and I love it for that. I am sure you meant the handling of the S 13 made the S 12 HANDLE like a 1970s car but absolutely no way an S 12 ever look it came from the 1970s. If anything pretty much a third GEN Camaro is what set the styling trend for the 1980s which the 200sx, ae86 , and even Mustang all followed suit. in fact, I would dare to say that the Mustang might've actually started the said styling trim trend being that it came out in 1979

me too

Yeah, that was just a 2 door Sentra in 1996 and unless you got the SE your 200sx was only packing a 1.6 Its really a shame how Nissan totaly lost thier way in the mid 1990s, it really is sad. Nissan used to be the performance and sport oriented japanese company, hard to believe looking at Todays Nissan, basically became Yesterdays Toyota but without the quality

KA24 was a great motor. Timing chain, stout bottom end.. took well to turbos.

@@muhdewd9727 not true... there bottom end needs to be upgraded to be reliably over 300whp. SR’s bottoms can handle more than 500whp and they’re timing chain as well (without the notorious rattle that the KA is known for)

+Doobie1975 The number of people here expecting 5 second 0-60 times here is hilarious. The most POWERFUL of Ferrari's back then did that. So 10 seconds was fast at the time. You're normal road car did much closer to 20.

I was expecting it to be in the low to mid 8's in the 0-60 run

+Doobie1975 LOL, that's probably what more expensive performance cars did at the time. Even recently 0-60 runs were quite high. When the GTR came out, it was the only production car that was able to do a sub 3s 0-60 run. Most supercars were doing 3 or 4 seconds at that time.

1) The s12 V6 was not a "lightweight sports car" , at 2956lb it was more like a Japanese Foxbody Mustang 2) Car and Driver's published road test pegged 0-60 in 8.6s which was decent for its day, MT must've gotten a Friday car 3) most cars werent much faster than that in 1987, notable exceptions are the Buick GNX (4.7s 0-60) and Porsche 959 (3.9s 0-60) but for comparison that aforementioned 5.0 stang did 0-60 in 6.3s so 8.6s for a v6 of 160hp in a car not much lighter was decent.

Andrew Walters Tire technology, drag strip grippyness (vs. the regular asphalt it looks like they tested the s12 on), better gearing in the Honda, and you're probably a better driver lol

Detuned. They didn't want it to be able to compete with the 300ZX.

The 300zx was actually heavier and obviously the performance was too similar Because otherwise the V6 option would've never materialized you would've thought that Nissan would've just continued the turbo four trend right into the S 13 because the V6 was only available in the US market . As far as I know all non-US market, got some version of the CA 18 What would've been a really cool and very collectible would've been if Nissan would've done a one year only 1989 S 12 with the SR 20 DET, with the S 13 model lineup coming in 1990. It is such a shame that Nissan would not sell the SR 20 DET in the US because they didn't want to compete with the much more expensive z car Makes no sense, considering that why would it matter as long as customers bought a Nissan why would it matter which Nissan they bought? Corporate logic really stinks. Perhaps some alternative reality where Nissan didn't end up completely losing themselves it actually happened.

Nissan put the VG engine in almost everything they could fit it into back then, kind of like what Nissan did with the VQ from 1995-2015 One interesting tidbit about the Quest/Villager VG30 was it was the only iteration of the VG that was non-interference (by Fords directive) So no wonder the quests were so slow, the cams had to be super mild to allow for an non-interference design!

I had an '88 Blue/Blue. I actually liked it more than the '85 Supra, never should have sold either one. I never liked V6's 'til I had a VG30. Had an '88 Maxima SE too. Still got 3 VG's sitting in the shop, one's a VG30ET.

They did have small fuel tanks. I drove both an 87 auto and an 88 5 sp SE from Chicago to CA (at different times) and I averaged 30 mpg in the 88 and 29.5 in the 87. I had the cruise control set at 85 mph most of the way. I think the best distance I managed was 375 miles before I stopped for fuel.

Randy Behrmann what kind of rpms was it at going 85mph

I drove 1 back while I was in college. The shifter was crap. Bulky, notchy, and it would often 'get lost' between gears on a quick upshift. A better shifter and linkage was needed to make that a great lil car!

The thing with that car is that one would have to get use to driving it along with the shifter. Yes, it was one of the worse ever with very long throws but once you get use to it, it's fine just like every other car.

Jason M yea. Mid 7 sec is what it felt like. Definitely not 10sec

Cole Moore Check out testdrivejunkie dot com

Nobody needs that.

Considering that the original car had a 1.8l engine, I assume that the number doesn't represent the displacement.

+chipchip That's what my S12 has swapped into it. Makes a huge difference in the performance department. Especially with a bigger turbo and intercooler.

The turbo here in the US was the CA18ET. While it wasn't the best engine, it became the CA18DET, and its cast iron block had two cylinders added with a larger bore to become the famous RB26 used in the Skylines. It also was influential in the development of the SR20 series.

CA18et is so rare in the states now

+Christopher Walker Back then, your sentra would have done 18 seconds. Times change.

Wouldn't fit. The 300 ZX Turbo had one manifold wrap around the rear of the engine, no way it would fit that way. I had an '88 SE, it was a stuff job.

This was the late 80's. The Nissan 300ZX turbo at 205 bhp was the most powerful engine out of Japan. Technology.

Only the Turbo and SE-V6 did.

lol

No wonder people forgot about this car.

silkhead44 I think MW tends to not abuse their test cars with full on dumping of the clutch at raised rpm's when making acceleration tests. Off idle starts and full throttle lift shifting is why the numbers are slower than other publications. I think C/D and MT got this car into the mid/high 8s to 60 and mid/high 16s in the 1/4mile.

05gtdriver those magazines use unrealistic launch methods. Motorweek is known for "real world" launches, where they aren't dumping the clutch at high rpms, like other car reviewers do to get the maximum time.

It was the 80s lol

joseph orozco Yeah, I suppose so..