Some very bad news today – for Nissan.
Profits are down 99 percent. Not a typo. A near-total wipeout – which triggered the wiping out of 12,500 jobs, the immediate suspension of manufacturing in Indonesia and Spain and an announcement that Japan’s second-largest car company will reduce its model lineup by at least 10 percent by 2022.
Nissan’s U.S. market share is down to 7.9 percent; it was 8.1 percent a year ago.
It is quite possible there won’t be a Nissan by 2022.
So, what’s gone awry?
One thing – a thing which is going awry generally – is the money being wasted on electric cars for which there is no market. Or rather, which there’s no money to be made from making.
Nissan’s Leaf – the company’s first electric car – cost Nissan almost as much money to develop as it continues to lose “selling” it. And when the federal subsidy for electric car “purchases” goes away, it will cost Nissan – and everyone else “selling” electric cars – even more as people decline to “buy” them at all.
Which will happen, because the ending of the subsidies amounts to a $7,500 effective increase in the cost to the buyer – the price of “green,” as it were.
Nissan, et al, will then have to resort to discounts of their own equivalent to the federal subsidy, just to get the electric turduckens off their lots.
This would be no big deal if it were only a handful of electric Turduckens. But because “climate change,” Nissan and everyone else has been forced to commit billions to development of hundreds of thousands of electric cars they won’t be able to sell – unless the ability of people to buy them somehow increases by 30-50 percent or more, this being the rough difference (all else being equal) between an electric car and an otherwise equivalent non-electric car.
Who’s going to ante up?
The going-away subsidy all by itself is equivalent in value to 3,125 gallons of regular unleaded at current prices (about $2.40 per gallon). That fills up a 12 gallon gas tank about 260 times – enough to take you 93,000 and change miles at 30 MPG.
However much people may believe the sky is about to fall because “climate change,” most aren’t going to walk away from what amounts to free fuel for nearly 100,000 miles of driving – by not driving an electric car.
The 12,500 jobs that just went up in smoke – along with Nissan’s profits and possibly Nissan itself – are just the beginning.
A real scheisse show is percolating.
But there is a silk living to this sow’s ear – for the moment.
It is that you stand to score a deal on any Nissan (excepting the Leaf). The news about Nissan’s precarious finances is already spreading like an oil slick on the ocean and dealers will be increasingly desperate to offload what they can while they can.
And here’s the crazy thing: 
Much of what Nissan sells is actually good stuff. In part, because it hasn’t got much of the new stuff – things like turbo fours in big trucks and direct injection and ASS in everything. Nissan is also the only car company whose new cars let you drive without “bucking up for saaaaaaaaaaaafety.”
Well, without badgering you like an annoying mother-in-law via a buzzer that won’t shut up until you do.
All the more reason to shop now.
While you still can.
…
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The problem with Nissan is that it is now a Renault. Nothing more.
Its junk with a Japanese name.
Yep! Just like Chrysler products are now Fiats- But the sad thing is, Nissan was good before they became Renault; Chrysler already sucked when they were bought by Fiat…now they just suck even more. I was selling an old Jeep Grand Cherokee a couple’a years ago. This guy pulls up in a brand new Jeep Renegade (Read: A Fiat with a Jeep nameplate on it)….what a useless, honking pile of feces it was! No wonder he was looking at near 20 year-old GC’s! (Not that they’re any bargains either!)
Holy crap…the herd is getting thin!
I do not know what you are talking about Nunzio. I have a 2014 Ram 1500 Hemi and it is the best truck I have ever owned. Blows the Ford F150 away, better build quality, better interior, better specs, better ride and one a single issue. I refuse to even look at government motors trucks
Guess that’s why Ram split off from Dodge/Chrysler…..
What do you use the truck for though? Low miles, just plain driving…I guess it can survive 5 years- but use the darn thing, and it’ll fall apart.
I should hope even a Chevy could survive 5 years though…..
I hope ya beat the odds…(And I hope ya have a stick…) -but time will tell.
Their downfall started when they spent more on lawyers to try and extract the nissan.com domain name from my ISP than it would have cost to just buy nissanusa.com
I’m wondering how Nissan Motor Acceptance Corp. is doing. I suspect that they aren’t in as bad a situation as Mitsubishi was, back when they were making inappropriate auto loans. But I’ve heard that if you can fog a mirror, you can get a Sentra or Altima. Lots of those buyers aren’t what you’d call “loaded”.
Thanks for the link.
If electrics are a big money loser for a car company like Nissan, how will Tesla ever make a profit making only electrics?
That’s why Tesla hasn’t made a profit- and loses millions…despite getting BILLIONS in tax-payer subsidies and carbon credits from profitable companies…..
I swear, this crap is like they’re following the plan of The Looters from Ayn Rand’s novel Atlas Shrugged!
Hi Meremortal,
Tesla has never made a profit selling its cars; it has survived on subsidies and wealth transfer programs (e.g., the “carbon credit” scam). It has lost money overall for almost all of the 15 years it has been in existence. The purpose of Tesla is not to make money – or even to take it.
It is to sex up electric cars – to be the leading edge of a public relations juggernaut designed to make electric cars seem “cool” in the public mind, in order to lay the groundwork for the pending (and forced) transition to electric cars.
Help me! My (ex) wife left with an “bad boy” with a criminal record about two years ago. I had a Nissan Murano and LOVED it. Unfortunately, some old fogie totalled it. It really was his fault, even the insurance company admitted it and I had not insurance increases because of it. So, I bought a VW Jetta because I KNEW that if I didn’t have a car payment (which I had before the adulteress left) they would just ask for MORE money. (No fault divorce means women don’t keep their promises and men pay. Don’t get me started …)
Anyway, now that things are settled as to what I am going to have to pay. I’d really like to get rid of the VW, i.e. the car payment and higher insurance premiums. I have been driving old cars all my life with only liability insurance and keeping them running. It’s only when I (unsuccessfully) tried to appear a woman that I “needed” a new car. She is gone. My kids are with 50% of the time. I’m not getting married again for their sakes. I just want to be a safe place for my kids and am not at all interested in a woman complicating my children’s lives.
So, the VW has lots of mileage because I live on an acreage. I can’t really sell it for what is owing on it. I’ve thought of trading in on a a new vehicle, but not driving the new vehicle. I’d just park it in the shop, run it once a month and sell it two years. POOF. No more car payment. Back to buying $2000 cars and keeping them running. Buy three and fix them as they break down so at least two are always in top running condition. It’s actually cheaper than a new vehicle I think.
Question, is now a great time to buy a Nissan then? Don’t drive it and sell it in a year or two years? Or will the price of Nissan’s go down and I won’t be able to sell one in a year anyway?
Jasom, DON’T buy a new Nissan- ‘specially if you drive a lot of miles. Their quality is NOT what it used to be. For the same money, you can get something more reliable and durable….like a Toyota, Honda, some Ford products still (But even with those brands, it’s getting to the point where you have to be picky- there’s good and bad)- and they hold their value better too.
These modern cars are starting to depreciate faster and faster, ‘causde they’re so expensive to fix once out of warranty, and the technology/user interface BS gets stale quick, and everyone wants the ‘latest and greatest”.
I’m with you- I drive c.20 year-old vehicles…get reliable well-built ones; always keep two on hand- but since I’m pretty good at picking ’em, and wait for the right ones, I rarely have anything break, and usually only have to do routine maintenance and a few very minor repairs from time to time. Cheap transportation…cheap insurance, never a car payment….and I get to drive vehicles I really love- like my Excursion- that I could never dream of affording new. The little extra gas they suck is nothing in comparison to what I save on everything else!
But yeah….since Nissan merged with Renault, it’s just bringing them down.
Nun, I don’t think I’d buy a Honda either. Their quality has been going down and most of it boils down to using the same brand transmission Nissan does. No go is a no no. So it’s under warranty when it quits? Unless you have two cars you’re still afoot since hardly any dealers supply you with a vehicle to drive while your warranty work is being done.
True, 8. Some of the Hondas with a stick (pick and choose) may be O-K…but yeah…not what they used to be (Were never my cup-O-tea anyway- but my BIL’s been buying ’em for a few decades and loves ’em).
Even the Toy[ota]s aren’t what they used to be….
I swear, it’s almost as if it’s part of the conspiracy to deprive of us of good ICE cars, so they’ll be nothing left but expensive, gimped, late-model electrics…..
Nun, at work we have a Chevy and a Turd, esc. me, a TRD. The Chevy and the Toy are supposed to be same, 1/2 ton 4WD crewcabs.
Last week me and the boss had to boost off a tractor. The gas cylinders on the Toy are DOA. Get the cables hooked up and either stand there and hold the hood or let it shut. We let it shut. That Chevy hood will still be standing on its on from now on. Just cheap little shit like that all over that Toy. When it gets to down and dirty the Chevy out 4WD’s the Toy by a lot. Of course it’s heavier so it had a big toolbox, an 80 gallon nurse tank and a portable air compressor while the Toy has a small toolbox and a lift endgate just like the Chevy.
I never get used to the Toy either. I start it, grab the shifter…..and turn on the wipers. Yep, that “shifter” sized thing sticking out from the steering column is a glorified cruise control and windshield wiper. The damn shifter is down there taking up space where the Chevy has a center seat if you want to flip the back up. It has more room.
Guess which one gets used and abused more.
A friend’s wife bought a new crewcab 4WD loaded out Toy in 17. It has gotten a steady 13 mpg from day one. Good news is, it hasn’t gone down. I cussed my Z71 because it gets 14-15.5, depending on your speed. It’s crazy too because 80 is where it gets 15.5 and 60 is where it gets 14 or less. Makes no sense, some bs with electronics I can guarantee.
Well, a buddy found a 98 X cab long bed 4WE 6.5 Turbo Diesel 2500. I’ll probably buy and drive it a while and then put the body onto my 3500 4WD Turbo Diesel when the weather is cooler. That 93 one ton has a lot more room inside and better seats and the engine is mechanical injection, plus it has the New Venture Gear 4500 HD 3 speed with under-drive and over-drive transmission instead of the lesser 5 speed OD in the 98.
8, That’s a given. The Japs can’t make trucks; not real ones. They may be O-K as suburban grocery-getters and such…but yeah…there’s no comparison to ‘Mercan trucks.
I remember when Toyota first came out with what they were trying to pass-off as a ‘real full sized half ton’. I went to a local hardware store (c. 1990) and the owner- this skiinny Greek dude whom I’d always converse with, asked if i had seen his new truck- “It’s a Toyota, but it’s a real half-ton!”. I go and take a look at it on the way out….-Yeah, it was a little bigger and beefier looking than those little squishy things they had been making in the 70’s and 80’s…but still- a Buick could flatten it- never even mind my ’81 F250….. That F250 is likely still on the road if subsequent owners didn’t drive it off a cliff; but that Toy is probably residing in someone’s fridge right now, and is now red instead of black; and says “Coca Cola” on it instead of Toyota.
Up until a bit over a year ago I was down every road in every county in west Texas and east NM regardless of dirt, chert, caliche or state or US highways.
I knew the places I’d see a plethora of dead Dodge’s with a few running, a few GM’s with a pecking order but almost all running, the place with Fords and the requisite 90-97 HD that had weeds growing up around them, mostly engine failures. There would be places you’d see Toys but only one, very new most likely and a Ford, Chevy or Dodge, most likely running and not growing weeds, the HD models. You never saw multiple Toys and almost never a Nissan.
When you came up on a gooseneck, you didn’t have to worry about it being a Jap pickup pulling it.
A couple years ago I saw a nice new Chevy pickup, a 3500 with a long bed. Of course it was a farmer who “ordered” it. You can barely find a pickup with a real bed these days. My Z71 is the worst pickup I have ever owned. Never hada 6.5′ bed, only 8 footers and occasionally a “camper special” that GM made with an extra long bed so you could shut the endgate with a slide-in camper on it. I wouldn’t mind having one myself. We don’t need much room to go to the lake, but then again, we no longer go to the lake since the wife can’t walk well and the boat is hanging out in need of a few thousand dollars in repair.
I have located a 6.5 Turbo Diesel 2500 and it may get an engine run generator for welding on it. Beats hell out of dragging a trailer around if you have room for a torch setup in the bed.
Last time I got really broke I sold my red face Lincoln and it broke my heart. That was a great welder and you can’t even get a copper wound welder now. If you find an old Lincoln or Miller, both great welders, suck it up and hang onto it. Whatever you give for it, it will only increase in price regardless of the age(if it’s old to begin with).
Yeah, 8, the only Jap trucks you see around here out in the country, are second vehicles- used as cars by people when they don’t need to drive their real pick-up.
My neighbor had such a second or was it a third or fourth vehicle? I can’t remember. He broke down a bout two miles down the road once…and his wife went to get him…drove him home, and he got in his real truck and went back to where the Jap was and got it going….but then had a dilemma because both trucks were stick…and his wife couldn’t drive a stick…so he calls me to drive the Jap truck home (His wife drove my then van)- and I’ll tell ya, just driving that Jap truck (It was an old flimsy one- c.85) those 2 miles was enough to make me sick of it! -Despite enjoying the stick.
The second gen Tundra’s are superior to the half tons of the big three in virtually every way.
I’ve got all of them. My business has several 3500 Duramax’s from 02-2019. A 2017 F350 powerstroke–pile of shit.
I pull 12,000 lb mini excavators and 8,000 lb skid steers often with my Tundra. I added helper springs and it handles a load as well as any 3/4 Ton Chevy or Ford, minus the squeaks and rattles.
I used to talk shit on Jap pickups, until I owned several.
I spent about 4 months looking for an 01′ Suburban 2500 with the 8.1 motor and finally found one in near mint condition with only 94K on it (this was back in 2017). It was being sold by a doctors widow up in Idaho and I flew up from FL and drove it home. Mileage is about 10 per gallon average but I don’t care…it’s reliable, built like a tank, and will go anywhere. As a bonus it was et up for armor at the factory – shows it on the build sheet. This is my second Suburban in that configuration and in my opinion, the only way to go.
It doesn’t matter how well Toyota and Nissan make their full-sized pick (the T100, which for Toytoa was a flop, would nowadays be considered a ‘midsized’, and their lack of a V8 doomed them from the start), American pickup buyers want ‘Murican full-sized trucks.
They made great small pickups and should have contented themselves with that market, conversely, the Chevy S10 was always a POS and the Ford Ranger took time to become decent (but never great). It was Dodge when they came out with the Dakota that figured that Americans don’t really want TOO SMALL a “small” pickup, unless it’s some kid’s pizza delivery vehicle.
What’s a wonder is why Toyota could make a decent off-road vehicle like the Landcruiser (descended from WWII trucks, they didn’t have many but theirs were tough, Kim Il Sung’s DPRK Army couldn’t have likely stormed across the border w/o some 1,200 Japanese trucks left over from the captured stocks of the Kwantung Army that the Soviets absolutely crushed in ten days in August 1945.
The neighbor has an old T100 (“Squeaky”). I suppose that it is plenty reliable but by his own account gets worse gas mileage than my old full size Chevy while only able to haul 1/4 the load. He got stuck in his driveway a bunch of times last winter but that could be due to his tires; we’ll see if it gets around any better this next winter with new tires.
PS. Jason, why would you buy any vehicle and not drive it and sell it in a year or two? The money you’ll lose on depreciation- even with ZERO miles, will be astounding! And if you finance it, even worse- interest, and you’ll still have to keep it ensured- You’ll lose probably 50% of what ya paid for it, when all is considered.
There are better ways to lose money and keep the bitch from getting it. Maybe buy a classic car for the same money, if that’s your thing- and keep it for a long long time- it may even appreciate….. or move to another country where “they” can’t get ya!
Say hey Jason.
That’s a sad story but I have a happier one.
Back when Nissan was called Datsun I had a Datsun 1600 the year after the “Fair Lady” and before the 2000 giraffe transporter.
It was an absolute pleasure in the days of the dopey musclecars. Scrubbing the lousy bias ply tires was a laugh and the few chicks that I knew really liked it. It wouldn’t get the ton except on slightly downhills but it was an MGB killer, or wounder.
My pile of junk MGB was my dear departed Setter’s favorite car. It wasn’t actually a POS as I had redone the engine and drivetrain but sprayed it flat black to temporarily stop the rusting.
I am thinking of going out to the Mazda lot to find a Miata. I worked in Mazda (Toyo Kogyo) when they were mostly rotary engines.
I would never buy an auto trans car again even if the auto is better than manual for performance. At least it isn’t ASS which I truly am.
May God bless going around corners really fast and leaving the headlights from the 396 dopes way behind.
If you have gold coin it only costs about 80 British pounds to buy a new Miata. That is a heck of a lot less than it cost for a new Triumph Bonneville in 1966.
The damned taxes jack the price of anything.
Although I’ve always preferred American iron I picked up a Datsun 510 way back when to get through the gunvermin-manufactured “gas crises” of the 1970s. I must admit to not expecting much except for something a bit more modern and tolerable than a VW Bug (which I’d owned in the past) but I was pleasantly surprised. That little Jap car was much better than one would expect of any economy car of the period. Just shy of 100hp in a light car with OHC engine, 4-on-the-floor, and independent rear suspension. Pretty sweet for what it was.
Unfortunately our Oriental friends at that time had not really mastered the art of rustproofing so by the time the second “crisis” was over it had practically turned back into iron oxide. Those old Datsuns have been long gone in the salt belt but I still see pics and stories about them out on the Left coast, with most having been hopped up into racers.
Those 510s had performance potential way back “in the day”. Yep, still had a ways to go on durability, but they were easy to fix and cheap to run.
Nissan had it right with the 810 if you got it with the 2.8 liter, twin-carbed six (same as in the Z car). Big, but not too big, and plenty of ‘giddyap’!
Even the “Honeybee” fastback 210s were fairly zippy with some fairly inexpensive performance mods. That generation were the first that were styled in the USA, but still built back in Japan. Ever since they got rid of the “Datsun” brand (why?) and started making them in Tennessee (and now MS), it just hasn’t been the same. A few ‘winners’, but a lot of “Hum drum”.
Do you have sources for those numbers and this infor.ation by chance? Please:)
Thanks
Nissan’s longtime and very “respected” CEO Ghosen was arrested last year and jailed in Japan for personal income tax evasion, paying himself too much (evidently) and other financial shenanigans. He only recently was released on bail and faces years in tough Japanese prisons. No telling what kind of accounting games he may have played, which might now be coming home to roost. Just a theory.
But Nissan is “too big to fail.” Failure will only happen when large banks pull loans, regardless of accounting profits. The Japanese (and probably French) governments won’t let that occur. Large companies with these kinds of problems, including malinvestment in bad ideas, often decide to write off asset values in one huge lump, take the profit hit (now a big loss) and get that over with. It doesn’t necessarily track with cash flow, which is what banks are concerned with. As Eric has discussed, EV mania hasn’t yet paid off for any major car manufacturer. Even mandatory EV quotas may not help.
The banks in Japan will foist Nissan upon some other company should the time come. Maybe a car company maybe some other big corporation. But it will be a Japanese one, not a French one. Ghosen’s financial misdeeds if any were probably on the order of ‘everyone at his level does it’ but were selectively enforced because he was attempting to merge Nissan into Reault.
What’s often forgotten is the ‘Mega” (or should that be ‘Mecha’) nature of Japanese conglomerates…Nissan is mainly known in the USA as an auto manufacturer, but the main money makes of the Nissan Group were real estate and insurance. Japanese Real Estate has been in a twenty-five year funk, and with it’s population receding and AGAIN, the outlook ain’t looking great for their real estate market to come back. The Nissan Group is carrying billions upon billions (in US dollars, in Yen it’s into the trillions) of debt that it has no hope of repaying, but to undergo bankruptcy would devastate the already shaky Japanese banking system, and could even collapse the Bank of Japan (their equivalent of the US Federal Reserve). It’s worse than “too big to fail”, the failure is inevitable and will likely cause a huge depression in Japan when the house of cards collapses.
So what you’re saying is, Japan could collapse back into feudal warlordism soon and all because of central banking.
Yeah, that sounds about par for the course.
I’m still enjoying my 2013 Infiniti G37s coupe although it isn’t a practical every day car. It’s a hoot to drive, it is very fast handles well, and it is comfortable with great brakes. There is something to be said about some of it’s older technologies such as port fuel injection, rather than direct injection, and the lack of turbocharging, and hard drive based navigation. I would consider it a sporty car, and it puts a smile on my face every time I drive it. I have seen 28Mpg on the highway, but my happy right foot makes for lower mileage on average. I just installed Eibach sway bars, Koni sport shocks, a strut brace, and an IPL true dual exhaust and the sport accessory muffler. Having fun now,,,
I have a 2009 370Z (Consumer Reports test car!), that I got for $28k in 2010. Had 8000 on it, only has 88k on it now. I’ll drive it until the wheels fall off. I used to restore vintage Z’s, but when I got this one, at a much older age, I figured I’d just keep the thing up, and we’d become “classics” together. So far, so good…
Dammit Blank, good for you. I hoped me and my rare El Camino would be two of a kind till the end. The only good thing is I still have it and almost all new parts for it including chrome, a grill sourced through a Chevy parts dealer from Canada, the only new one left to be found for an SS, new rear lights and many other parts such as springs and steering parts. I should just double down and replace the floor pans where they’re bad and not worry about making it look factory.
A newly rebuilt SBC(old style, don’t care for the variable everything of the LS engines)or a 6.5 Turbo Diesel I saw in an older Elco would be fine with and OD transmission. An Auto for the wife and a 6X5 Eaton for me with double sticks. I drove every vehicle we had like it was a truck anyway.
I’d start pulling down on a hill and if it had a shifter in the console I’d be reaching out and trying to grab it sorta in a trance. My wife would slap my hand and say. It’s not a goddamn truck so quit reaching.
Oh well, it’s hard to break old habits and beyond eating and drinking that’s probably my oldest habit. You have to admit it’s not every day you see and El Camino with a diesel and a Spicer 5X6. Ok, I could live with a 4X5.
…electric Turduckens…hilarious. No one is telling me if I’ll be able to charge my EV with solar panels, in the winter in the Midwest, where skies are cloudy most days. Since coal, gas and oil will be banned from usage, as dictated by “The Squid”…er, I mean, Squad, what do I do? Call Tuber? The real sad part is that whenever government mandates something, the opposite is always the best choice. But, it’s gonna be fun as insane environmentalists buck up against those who actually still believe in rationality and not Marxism. Sorry to see Nissan go, but heck, Amazon put Kmart and Sears under, so change is inevitable. Really though, it should be GM and Tesla on the death bed.
Great article Eric.
The entire industry is in trouble – they just haven’t figured that out yet. GM just delayed its “autonomous” target date significantly. Ford has laid off masses. etc etc.
You have people with impressive sounding credentials who should know better buying into all this “100% electric by 2030” BS. That’s going to blow up in all their faces. The longer it takes them to realize that, the worse the final collapse will be.
The amount of mind-blowingingly unproductive meetings that this industry pays highly paid people to attend is eclipsed only by the ludicrous amount of R&D money squandered satisfying NHTSA, the EPA, IIHS, and international “pollution” police (IMDS etc.).
Who do sub-subcompact cars (that’s 2 subs – no typo) tip the scales at over 3,000 lbs now? See above. Why are “accidents” increasing. See above. Add in OEMs who are soy boys, engineering departments Cuckled by design departments, and “woke” HR departments providing “inherent bias” training and you’ve got yourself the slow, agonizing death of a once fine industry.
I’ve been doing this (mechanical engineering – now program management) for over 27 years. I’m 50 now. I can’t even recognize this industry anymore. My colleagues mostly don’t see the big deal. They make a lot more money than the median household income. They drive new cars for the most part. I argue that I can’t even afford a new car today, so how do “median” Americans afford one?
Answer: They don’t.
I’m glad my house is paid off, I’m low maintenance, and have been saving 85% of my take home pay for the past decade. I don’t think this party is going to last much longer and being a “silver aged” employee, I’m at the top of the list for any “cost cutting” exercise. I would welcome it now actually. You would not believe what they pay me to do things even an unsophisticated computer program could 30 years ago – for free.
Shareholders should be outraged. Instead they celebrate.
Multiply what they pay me by all the other overpaid but underutilized professional class who are sucking oxygen in meeting rooms and you have decent cars that cost a full year’s pay (for many people) and go obsolete in 3-5 years.
Talk about “sustainability.”
I describe a typical day as chaotically boring while simultaneously infuriating. I’ve worked with OEMs and several large multinational suppliers. I hate my current job. Despise it. I’d look for another, but I’m convinced it will be the same BS with different faces. Despised my last job too. Best case scenario is I’m blissfully ignorant about how inefficient the new company is for maybe 3 months.
All large multinational corporations start to look, and act, like government agencies after a tipping point. Rules are dumbed down to satisfy the dumbest person in the corporation. There is zero accountability for serious mistakes. Failure often results in promotion and larger budgets.
Scott Adams (of “Dilbert” fame) had it nailed.
I welcome the inevitable. Bring it on. I once loved cars. Not a fan nowadays. I’ll never buy another new car (I’ve only bought 2 my entire life though). Too fat. Too complicated. Far too expensive.
‘I welcome the inevitable. Bring it on. I once loved cars. Not a fan nowadays. I’ll never buy another new car (I’ve only bought 2 my entire life though). Too fat. Too complicated. Far too expensive.’
The same.
Well said
Hi Bostwick,
I rolled my ancient orange Barchetta out yesterday – because this EV stuff is getting me down. I needed a reminder… of what cars used to be like… and may be like again, after all of this has passed.
We are in the eye of the hurricane now…
In honor of all automotive innovation that has been abandoned I wanted you to see this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTGayn3Y800
As Jay Leno puts it, “SAFE at any Speed!”
And from all of us who know how to drive, F. U. Ralph Nader you non-driving prick!
gtc, they made a few 67’s and one was a performance job. I forget it’s moniker but it was a real looker and had a lot of power. The local dealer had one and brought it to my father’s house in early 69 giving him a great deal on it. It had a few miles from being a demonstrator but was a full warrantied car. I was cool and tried not to show how much I wanted it and my dad wanted it too. I thought it would make a cool look between my screaming Malibu and that car(it was red also).
I loved the look and it was a really nice car with a lot of power. Go back a few years and a friend had one of the turbo models. It was anything but a slouch and handled high speed curves like crazy even though the guy didn’t know how to drive.
We lived outside a small town on the SW side and the place I worked was on the NE side but everybody there knew when I cranked up my Malibu in the morning and listened to me come to work. They gave me a lot of hell because I was so young but there were a lot of gearheads there who had some, what would become, rare cars.
If you weren’t awake when I tore off to my road construction job, you would be soon. That was with full exhaust. I didn’t dare leave with the dumps opened since I knew some morning the DPS would be waiting for me.
The main DPS guy lived a half block off highway 180 and 2 blocks from the only traffic light in town, at the corner of the bank and courthouse. A good friend lives a quarter mile from me and had a badass 427 67 SS. We wait till the wee hours, generally on a Friday or Sat. nite and open our dumps and race going west through where most of the town was located.
Racing like that brought everyone awake to their feet. We’d being doing well over 100 mph by the time we went past the Mobil Truck Stop and everybody would be outside, standing in a line watching us go by including the sheriff. He loved it too and never said word one to either of us. That would be our last run and we’d both practically coast home with open dumps having to pass by the truck stop again and turn onto a farm to market road we lived down. It was all in good fun and entertainment and nobody accused us(those that were out there looking)of being bad guys or anything else. We didn’t have a quarter mile dragstrip and that was a new highway through town with what was then the new style of asphalt, hot mix. It had great traction and was very smooth. The only fly in the ointment were the dips at some intersections with the last one being right beside the truck stop. By then hitting those dips that most people didn’t even notice became a challenge at well over 100 mph. We’d race to a couple miles out of town and have to shut them down since the front tires just barely contacted the pavement. We’d drive beside the other, 327 to 427 on the way home and whoop and holler……and everyone at the truck stop would still be standing there waiting for our return. The sheriff was a good family friend and he’d be there with a big smile. Those dang boys, I wish I was that young again look on his face.
Compare that to today. Well, you can’t. We’d be the most wanted outlaws in the land and they’d have everything in place including a tank to stop you. We turned at the truck stop 2 blocks further west one night and took a back street to our road to home. Everyone watching complained and everyone living down that road complained so we only did that once. Gotta keep your supporters happy.
Late 80s early 90s nissans were nice cars. the 240z later the 280Z and the 300Z of course. the Nissan sentta SE-R was bargain smoothness. A car and Driver top 10 for many years. i owned an NX-2000 based on the same chassis for many years. The Nissam maxima was cool. Oh the heck well
Aside from the electric car nonsense, Nissan’s downfall is/was inevitable. Whereas Nissan used to make highly reliable and durable cars which exemplified Jap manufacturing techniques, these days, they make not-so-durable vehicles with junk transmissions; and their partnership with Renault (The French word for “Fiat” apparently 🙂 ) and Mitsubishit only dragged them further down, like Fiat dragged Chrysler further down (if that’s even possible, ’cause Chrysler was pretty low already).
Add to that the wasted effort/money/energy of the electro-enviro BS, and really, what’s left?
The decisions being made by most corporations these days are just LUDICROUS. Seems they’re all committing mass suicide. When they go under, it’s not even a surprise, or a mystery as to why- as it might have been years ago when a big corp failed for no obvious reason; instead, today, one wonders how they stayed afloat as long as they did.
(Now I must go and wait for a large-chested woman to appear at my house, so I can fondle her breasts)
partnership with Renault (The French word for “Fiat”
With Nissan dragging it down, Renault predicts a worsening year
https://www.autoblog.com/2019/07/26/renault-earnings-nissan/
Renault–Nissan–Mitsubishi Alliance
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault%E2%80%93Nissan%E2%80%93Mitsubishi_Alliance
Contagion effect:
Definition: In economics and finance, a contagion can be explained as a situation where a shock in a particular economy or region spreads out and affects others by way of, say, price movements.
Description: The contagion effect explains the possibility of spread of economic crisis or boom across countries or regions. This phenomenon may occur both at a domestic level as well as at an international level. The failure of Lehman Brothers in the United States is an example of a domestic contagion.
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/definition/contagion
I wonder if they will be heavily discounting the 370Z. The mechanicals are almost obsolete.(Not necessarily a “bad thing.”) The exterior design remains iconic. Still a lot of fun to drive, too.
Obviously, the new Supra is in a different league. But if one could pick up a 370Z for, say 65% of the price of the Supra……….intriguing.
Or maybe Nissan has been making so few of the 370Zs that they don’t have excessive inventory to liquidate?
Hi Mike,
I agree; I’d be looking into it if I had say $30k to spend on a fun toy! Nissan sells about 175-200 per month (this year so far, see here: http://carsalesbase.com/us-car-sales-data/nissan/nissan-370z/).
My 2 cents: Between the French, Japanese and American governments they won’t let Nissan die. Like GM et al it will be considered “vital” to one or more nations industrial base. Maybe they’ll be taken over and forced to make only electric cars. To say nothing of another company legitimately buying Nissan.
Maybe Deutche Bank is floor planning Nissan dealers and this is the Black Swan event.
Kowtowing to every illegitimate edict coming down the pike leads to this.
I thought so too. Nissan caters to people with bad credit and subprime loans because their cars are somewhat more affordable.
Deutsche Bank is experiencing a bit of a run at the moment- 1-billion Euros per day! They are a zombie bank or about to be one soon enough.
Meanwhile German industrial output continues to collapse (another 7% this 1/4). Daimler has admitted to sales falling and possessing excess inventory. “Investing” billions of what will soon be desperately required capital into battery electric dreams is not going to pan out very well for them one might suggest. They ought to have done what Hungary has done and told the Eu bureaucrats to go pound sand. Too late for them now.
France has its internal divisions and differences and interests pulling ever harder in opposing directions. A civil war is not out of the question. The Yellow Jackets have been protesting EVERY weekend without pause for, what is it now, 34 weeks or more. Certainly there are going to be bigger outbreaks of violence than there have been so far given how brutally the police have been treating the citizenry. And the French economy (in particular the industrials continue to get worse and worse).
Italy is getting ready to spit in the faces of the un-elected bureaucrats in Brussles and, likely as not, head for the exit door, or, perhaps engineer a total restructure of the whole Eu project on a far more representative basis than is presently the case. I’m betting they depart though.
Sweden (possibly Norway as well) is a wrecked nation which does not have a future (not as a place where Swedish identity and culture and traditional blonde blue-eyed Swedes will be at home). Wait for the Swedes to start running from the dump they used to live in. Anybody going to be taking in Swedish refugees? Anybody?
Belgium is an artifice. It’s a goner really.
The Eastern portion of Europe led by Hungary and including Czech Republic, Poland and possibly Austria (a.k.a. the Visigard Group) are already telling the Eu to shove off. Likely as not they are going to forge a path of independence from the Eu and invite Italy to join with them. Likely they align more closely with the Russian Federation and with China.
Poor Greece. What are they going to do? They are totally insolvent. The German and French banks continue to rape them for whatever they can lift.
All goes to show the Eu is toast. It is done, busted and rotting. If the Poms get their stuff together they might be able to exit prior to the whole Eu tomfoolery collapsing. If the Poms are quick enough, they won’t get burned when the Eu edifice collapses. Watching Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees-Mogg in Parliament yesterday suggests that the Poms are going to go for a prompt exit and that the Eu wallahs had better realise there is nothing they can to do hinder or prevent it.
One hopes that the failure of the Eu and the mega-recession which is going to take it there will put an end to all the BS global warming regulation along with the battery electric dreams and the vast burden of regulations pounded into anything that moves in the European economy. They simply will not be able to afford the overhead…
Best expect to see some famous names go belly up- industrials, banks, services, retail etc. etc. etc. The bad news is that many, many, many innocent (and ignorant) people are about to realise they have been well shafted right through the guts. The good news is that the forth reich is done and dusted.
Very astute and accurate observation, Siotu!
You’ve capsulized present-day Europe in a few paragraphs! Well done!
Only one thing I might add- and it is pure speculation of course- but something that is oft repeated throughout history, and seems to be in great favor with the overlords now-a-days especially: Let us not discount the prospect of a huge false-flag “terrorist” attack; a war; or social and economic collapse as a means of “them” regaining the control and power they are losing- In fact, it seems that the Anglo nations are being set up for multiples of those very things. Nothing like some BIG crises to goad the people into submission again.
Think about it: All the dysfunctional policies we have seen over the last few decades…no sane person could expect them to have beneficial results; the pols aren’t stupid. They want us to believe they are, but they do what they do on purpose, and would rather we perceive them as stupid than evil and corrupt. What I’m saying is that things have been purposely set-up to bring us to this point- including the diluting of our cultures with third-world troglodytes.
Sadly a large number of the European peoples have been thoroughly inculcated into the Climate/Safety Cult. Several of the most obnoxious people I’ve dealt with on the internet, including the one who cheered about the guy who got arrested for an 8-month-old middle-of-the-night roundabout drift and the one who thinks I’m a reprobate for accelerating quickly away from stoplights, have been Europeans. There are a few who “get it”, but there are enough cultists among them, likely even in nationalist circles, that even if the EU as an organization ceases to exist, it will still be an uphill slog to achieve freedom in the Old World if it’s even possible. Even then, they’ll still be dealing with the more physical effects from hundreds of years of monarchy, socialism, and other assorted tyranny: overcrowded and polluted cities, heavy concentration of land ownership outside of said cities (assuming that’s pretty much here to stay unless the old money starts selling), economies which have been thoroughly adapted to (and ravaged by) central planning, and other things that would get me mobbed if I brought them up. Simply put, Europe was too thoroughly and densely settled under tyranny, so they are well used to living small and may no longer be able to dream big.
Plus, then you have the great masses of third-world invadigrants, many of whom are too deeply embedded in their new homes to be got rid of “just like that”, and who have proven angrily resistant to fitting in with their hosts.
Maybe I’m wrong, I hope I’m wrong, but somehow I don’t see the nations of Europe ever reaching their full potential again.
I concur, Chuck. Same thing here in the US and all other first-world (and even second-world) countries. The populations have been propagandized and brainwashed to the point that their beliefs in collectivism and government; as well as their values and worldview are such that they no longer appreciate liberty, or even know what it is.
If the current order of things were to cease, they would just erect another, which would be as bad or worse, because of the tendencies of human nature, and the lack of any culture-wide system which would moderate those tendencies, as nominal Christianity once did.
We can see by the example of some of the recent popular movements- e.g. the Yellow Vests; The Occupy Movement; The Tea Party; etc. that even those who appear to oppose the system as it currently is, are not concerned with liberty- but rather just with making the system work for them (e.g. They don’t want to eliminate taxation, but rather reduce the rates that apply to them, while increasing them for others; They don’t want to eliminate Medicare, they just want “Medicare for Americans only”, etc.)
This is also why I think that TPTB have likely engineered this suicide of the West- so that they can replace it with something even worse, and more tyrannical- and the peons will not only help[ destroy the old order, but actually demand and work to establish it’s replacement.
If you keep that scenario in mind as you watch what is unfolding and hear of current events, I think you will see that that is indeed what is going on.
Is the whole Renault company going belly up, or are they just cutting Nissan? The reason I ask is that Renault is still in Formula 1, and they’ll be there for next year too, AFAIK…
Peak F-1 has passed. It only looks passable because of the huge amount of money going in there from governments, manufacturers (like Mercedes) and broadcasters. The fans are departing slowly and steadily.
Frankly the whole show went to the shitter when they allowed the manufacturers to dictate what the engines would be. The new engines sound shit. They cost tens of millions to develop to get the cars from 4mpg to nearly 6mpg. Whoop dee effin dooo!
Meanwhile the racing is poor quality. Great racing outfits like Cosworth, Hart, etc. have departed due to the inane costs. Williams will be gone soon. The cars are sooooo ugly. F-1 these days is a big nothing yuck result for massively inefficient spend. How gauche.
Anyway, Renault will be there until they aren’t. There is no loyalty from these corporate management mobs. Especially when they want the money for something else (like a bonus!).
This. I’ve mentioned before some of the reasons why I’m so emotionally invested in preserving the rowdier aspects of car culture (which, by extension, are reasons I hate a certain other transportation device), but Formula 1 is probably the most perfect example imaginable. In general, it seems that racing, like wrestling, gets less real the closer you get to the top, but F1 takes the cake, with everything else the FIA has ever touched close behind. It’s an irrelevance pie with byzantine finnicky BS filling, topped with politics, seasoned to taste with a pinch of decadence and a dash of greenwash, then garnished with the shredded remains of many, many tax dollars from more countries than I care to remember right off the top of my head. It is nothing short of a let-them-eat-cake greed circus devoid of any redeeming value (yet still somehow more interesting to watch than the top levels of NASCAR).
It’s as I’ve said before – the cars and courses have both become completely divorced from reality, they are becoming more so as time goes on, and they evolved in tandem with each other. The courses, usually overdesigned by the eternally-unimaginative Tilke & co. (and now frequently located on stolen land in third-world dictatorships), are not always that nice to drive in anything short of a top-class racing machine, and the massive, luxurious facilities with miles of tarmac runoff area are overkill for anything less than top-class racing. The cars, meanwhile, have become so finnicky, fragile, and over-specialized that they need these ridiculous courses in order to race well. Of course, it goes without saying that at this level, none of the drivers ever has turned or ever will turn a wrench on “their” car.
And of course, the only way anyone can think of to fix this is even more BS rule patches.
Late stage sanctioned racing, ladies & gentlemen. This is what it looks like.
Eric,
“Climate Change” is old school. Get with the times and use the new PC term “Climate Crisis”. I can imagine the Clovers winding themselves up tizzy, slathering all over themselves as they wave their rainbow flags in alarm, while wearing their “Diversity is Our Strength” T-shirts as they gyrate around their AOC statue screaming “Its a CRISIS! Its a CRISIS! OMG, a CRISIS! Ban all cars, close the airports! We’re going to DIE!”
Hi Rush,
Indeed. I just noticed this the other day. I read a story in the LA Times – a “news” story, mind – and the writer actually used that term. In a got-damned “news” story! As a journalist who once worked for big papers,this floored me. Such egregious editorializing would not have gotten past the copy desk as recently as 1995. But then, that was a quarter-century ago and much has changed in the “news” room…
It’s more like the PROPAGANDA room now!
Bring Carlos Ghosn back for an encore performance…
If it wasn’t for Uncle they’d be able to bring back something light, simple, and economical but still practical and fun to drive like the original Datsun 510. Probably sell boatloads of them.
Hi Jason,
Indeed. The times scream for such cars. A $10,000 new car capable of averaging 50 MPG and good for 15 years of service without major repairs – something that could be offered tomorrow – would cut the average person’s car related expenses by 50 percent, leaving them with savings or disposable income rather than debt.
Which is why it isn’t being offered.
Canary in the coal mine?
I am calling Shrek’s donkey AOC and asking for my free electric car to go with my free college. She seems to have it all figured out.
Going to be a lot of unemployed car salesmen and cheap cars come end of year. Maybe the bubble is finally starting to burst.
Nooo! I need the parts from the Xterra/Frontier body for at least another 6 years!
Nissan went the way of Chrysler during the Daimler era. Renault cheapened the cars (cvt, no more Se-R), had steady price increase, stagnant development (350z, GTR, frontier) and built a reputation of being the fleet rental or bad credit purchasers.
I’m diggin’ this: b/c I might be in the market for a new truck and really like the Titan and Frontier. Both are kinda “old school”: No ASS, no 10-speed transmission, no direct injection, no aluminum body, no driver “assists”….
Hi Tom,
Yup – there is an upside!
The current Titan and Frontier are good trucks; good engines, good transmissions – no four cylinder turbos or direct injection or 10 speed federal fatwa transmissions.
I own an older Frontier and aside from shockingly poor gas mileage, it’s been a damned good truck.
eric, I bought a Nissan pickup for a number of reasons, the main one being fuel mileage(ha ha ha), it’s narrowness and 4WD for hunting and getting through the shinery brush and the shinery sand.
Good thing I bought that $500(in 1984 dollars)unlimited 5 year warranty. It got 18 mpg with the little metric wheels and tires, the windshield wipers wouldn’t touch the windshield at 55mph going into the wind, something not rarely done in west Texas.
Well, it was an overheating little sumbitch and the sheetmetal was pitiful. I was going to put fender flares on it after going to a 15X30.5 tires and wider wheels but it was too thin to mount anything to and it got 16 and less with those larger wheels. OTOH, my 6.5 Turbo Diesel xcab, long bed, 4WD got 18.6mpg and would have pulled that Nissan out of a hole upside down or on it’s side. That Nissan never offered a limited slip(I expect 4WD and not goddamn 2 axle drive)and no aftermarket did too while a friend with a Toyota could get practically anything he desired for it.
It had shitty seats and only 2 since they stuck the transfer case lever between the seats….smart eh? Well, color me stupid too for buying it. The best thing about it was the pale blue color and the fact when I was running well over the 55 mandated speed limit(it would be huffing at the current speed limit)I could slam on my brakes since those were the haydays of the Escort and Passport, and somebody else would get the ticket, no doubt complaining fiercely they hadn’t been speeding.
Right off instead of waiting for the dealer to do anything I had to remove the transmission and replace the input shaft ball bearing. Use a bushing or roller bearing or anything else at that place but not a tiny ball bearing.
I never got over the lack of fuel mileage and back in the 80’s we definitely had global warming and global cooling. Our record temp here for 2 days in a row was 122 with a Fisher scientific thermometer hanging in the shade. The coldest and longest cold spell on history in this part of the country had a range of 5 to -10 for over a month with no break and a record besting for all times, -17. That was too cold for it and once started(I installed block heaters on everything we had back then, Impala, El Camino, 2 Silverados, the Nissan and tractor). The Nissan was fine upon starting, hell it was inside and plugged in, but out in that brutal cold something went agly with its computer controlled carburetor and it would only operated at WOT. The ultimate insult was when I had to stop and borrow my dad’s S 10 on the way to the pharmacy. That was the year my parents kept on at us to get a flu shot….and it was free…..whoopee. We both damn near died that year from the worst flu you can imagine that turned into pneumonia and we were both down and out for 2 months. Sick or not, we had to go to the tank and chop out holes in the ice. At least we weren’t too worried about falling through.
My eyes are so sensitive to cold wind I had to buy some ski goggles just to feed the cows and do other chores outside. The Nissan bucked and shuddered all winter. It gave up every pulley and alternator and a/c compressor like they were candy. It also had the u joints go out faster than anything I’d ever seen. Some of this was covered under the warranty(ujoints)but I couldn’t wait for days so I just bought them and installed them.
Almost immediately, the passenger side axle boot went along with the CV joint, replaced under warranty….if you can get it 60 miles to the shop.
But those days with north wind howling and snowing and freezing rain going north and the windshield wipers flailing around and inch from the windshield produces some pretty hairy moments in pitch black storms. I finally found some 3 wing aero thingies for the wipers that held them down and didn’t dare let one go if they broke.
I just never had another vehicle that had so many failings due to heat and cold and wind. I even threw a belt one day trying to get out of mud……with pure mud tires. It would sure have helped if it had had a locker or LSD either or both ends. It stayed in the barn with the Chevy’s took the big hail and only showed clean spots.
The first time a friend saw it he called it “Baby” pickup. It stuck so that’s what everybody called it and it lived up to its name. Help, I’ve fallen over, I’m iced up, I’m overheated, I’m stuck in the mud….with mud tires, I can’t clear the windshield. Yep, Nissan really did their homework on it…..meanwhile my buddy with the Toy just kept on going. I guess avoiding tickets in the crowd gives it some distinction but had it been red or black or some other bright color(come to think of it, I don’t recall a bright color that year model)I could likely have been nailed on one of those freebies when speeding. Anything that had to be replaced, like the endgate handle assembly, was uber expensive and so was the engine when it had to be rebuilt at 140,000 miles. I could have dropped a new Chevy (from Chevrolet)crate engine with warranty into it for less money had I been able to figure how to cut enough metal from the front to get a decent sized cooler in it. I even went so far as to consider and a Corvette radiator on the roof but that would have been the only one around and I didn’t have the balls of the Man in Black.
Cars were so bland back then the El Camino that was red with black SS stripes and a black tarp on the bed stuck out like a sore thumb. Then a friend bought a Nissan car and the too narrow seats, lack of power and not particularly good fuel mileage were enough to keep me out of it. I have a wide chest and don’t fit well into most Jap cars anyway. The wife rented an Altima and I drove it across town just to see what it was like. 20 blocks and I was dying from the seats. I never drove or rode in it again. She rented a Chevy and a Ford at different times when I might be along. They were both ok and the Ford seats were actually pretty comfortable and the Chevy’s weren’t bad either though not as good as the Ford. All the other imports had those tiny seats.
I just don’t believe everyone in Germany is so small they don’t have problems with their seats too. After the wife’s Blazer was destroyed(wish they’d totaled it since their repair sucked)by a garbage truck, she(me once, for 600 miles)had to ride in a Versa. Now that really was a POS and buzzed and felt like we were in a kiddy car.
3 years ago when I saw a pic of 12,000 new Altima’s stashed at an airport while the new models were being rolled out I got the idea Nissan was pushing for another collapse and that collapse he then riding on their tang on a one-by. They have misjudged the American market more times than I care to consider. I do recall when the Altima(sans the seats)were nice cars.
Then they went to the worst automatic transmission maker in the world along with Honda and VW to some extent, and that hurt all of them. Rant over although I could go on.
Breaks my cold dead heart, Nissan made awesome cars, from the Z’s, Skylines, Silvia’s, etc.
Hopefully they can be brought back in the future
I’m going to say it’s because of Climate Change. Temperatures the last 2 days here in VA have not been in the upper 90’s, so it’s definitely Climate Change that’s killing Nissan. They should have made a TransGender Car by now; too, serves them right for not being “Diverse”.