This may be old news to some of you guys, but I found it interesting nontheless. It's an article describing what Nissan has in store for the 2009 350Z.



http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/news/57...s_on_zcar.html

"But it's the latter news which will really excite enthusiasts. The
new car will take the current 350Z and add a more involving chassis and punchier engine. Olivier Paturet, chief product specialist at Nissan, told Auto Express he wanted the next Z to be a more hardcore machine, targeted squarely at Porsche buyers. "

"We've seen what Porsche is doing with the Cayman, and I would like our new car to have more power, less weight and be more driver-focused," he said. "There's certainly a market in Europe for such a machine - it's simply a matter of convincing our US and Japanese divisions that this is the way forward."

 

After reading that, it seems nissan wants to take the z upmarket. Meaning higher price tag. That would be a mistake imo since the z has always been more of a no compromise sporting car for the masses.

I think if Nissan wants to go after Porsche...do it with the Infiniti brand.

See to me Porsche has always had fine performing cars with a few that are just incredible performers. But overall they are usually pretty low on the performance to dollar ratio. Just the opposite of the Z. A base z has an incredible performance to dollar ratio that few cars can match.

 

Nissan would never do anything to canniblize sales of the new GT-R, which, with its $70k+ price tag, is a true Porsche fighter. Plus with the new Supra coming out next Spring aimed squarely at the Z, RX-8, TT, and S2000 crowd, Nissan will continue to fight in this price range; it is simply too lucrative to just give up.

What can happen, though, is that with a V8-based 400Z (as the grapevine is abuzz), Nissan will try to steal some of the Boxter crowd, albeit that would be very tough in the uber image-conscious US market.

 

I agree with your first statement regarding nissan not wanting to turn the Z into a competitor for their upcoming GTR, however I'd like to know what sources you are using when you refer to a new Supra coming out in the Spring. I hope your not basing your statement on car magazine heresay because I have heard nothing subtantiated regarding the release of a new Supra.

 

Well when can we get some freakin pics of a 2009 Z?

 

Funny, because in reading the Porsche magazines, the Cayman S was designed to steal away potential Z and S2000 buyers.

 

IMO it's Porsche that is trying to play in other markets and trying to steal a few sales from Nissan, Honda, and Mazda. I mean the Boxster and the new Cayman are definitely more "down market" offerings as Porsches go.

As far as the gt-r goes...if it retails for the estimated 70k(likely will sell for more like z06 vettes)...then yes that would be a direct threat to the upper-mid-line Porsches like the Carrera etc.

That still leaves a big 40k gap between the z and the gt-r for nissan to improve the z and go more up market. Which I hope they continue improving the z but at the same time not forgeting the market the car was originally ment to target. Hey nissan...keep the z's price reasonable.

 

All the Japanese companies have tread this "upmarket" path before in the late 80s and early 90s. They took the 300ZX TT, the VR4, The Rx7 and the Supra TT and put them out of reach of the common man. Sure they had performance to match the exotics of the time and nearly unmatched sophistication but most of them suffered from serious reliablity problems and were ultra expensive to maintain and repair. That move nearly took the Japanese sports cars to the edge of extinction in the U.S. market. Lets hope that they have learned a hard lessen from this and keep the cars priced within reach of their faithful buyers. Porsche is drooling over the sales of the 350Z. That is why they have built the Cayman. They figure a potential Z buyer may be willing to shell out 7-10K more to get the Porsche nameplate. I am sure they are right in some cases but the Z tradition is all about making an affordable, high performance sports car that can hang with cars that cost 20k more. Are you listening Nissan?

 

Short of Mr. Hideaki Otaka (Toyota CEO) appearing on CNN to say,"I promise you, the world will see the new Supra in 2006" nothing could be considered truly substantial.

That said, I tend to put more weight in the big 3 auto publications than I do on forum entries and consider it neither gospel nor heresy. R&T's Speed publication ran a blurb on '06 Supra a few months ago. Everywhere you look, there is buzz that Toyota will reveal the car at the Tokyo Motor Show next month (10/22-11/06). I am holding my breath. If it turns out to be as great as I think it will, I might get that instead of the Z next Jan.

 

this is what I dont understand.

Germany:

"lets build a $50-60k sports car to "steal" buyers away from the $25-35k Japanese cars"...(and our cars arent even that fast, or good.....cept maybe for Cayman). most ppl who are buying a Z arent REALLY looking for a $60k alternative with costly repairs and sketchy reliability......pfft

Japan:

"lets build a smash-hit, great sub-$30k sports car, sell 100k of 'em, and then jack the price $15k when no-one's looking and say "oh we're traying to edge ____insert german automaker here____ out of the market" and single-handedly alienate 90% of our market who wont pay the extra $

WTF?

it happened in the mid 90s!

 

Not anytime soon. I mean, there will be concepts and all, but you won't get the real deal til' later haha.

 

The affordability of the Z is what still stands today. Hope it will stand for all times.

 

Nissan's making a big mistake if they're considering bringing the Z upmarket again...the last time they did that, it damn near killed the Z-car for good. The Z has always been about having high-end sports car performance at a common-man price...and that's the way it should stay.

 

agreed. i have always viewed the Z as a pure sports car without compromise. it does not
pretend to be a luxary car. it does not pretend to be an exotic car.

no frills all performance...

 

Exactly !!!!!

 

2006 Supra

2007 Supra

2007 Supra

Never know.

 

i don't know how old this pic is, either way, i found it on streetfire.

 

The runup of prices of Japanese cars in the mid 90's was mostly a function of a strong dollar and a weak Yen. All the Japanese imports became more expensive as a result. In response, Japanese mfrs. started building more cars here. Unfortunately, lots of people traded their sports cars for SUV's and poor sales killed-off several models (Z, RX-7, Supra).

 

+1, and add 3000GT to the list.

 

Maybe Nissan will make the Track model higher end and leave the other models for us poor folk to buy. I don't think the track model has enough extra stuff to make it worth much more. Rims and brakes that you would replace anyway if you tracked it regularly don't add up to an extra $5000 imo. If they made the track model a punchier upscale car, it would give the other models more mystique by being associated with a hardcore driver's car with 350-400hp and a great suspension and chassis. As long as the Track model didn't stray to far lookswise from the rest of the models anyway.