MISSED THE MARK?

COULD NISSAN HAVE DONE MORE WITH THE D23 NAVARA IN REGARD TO ITS OFF-ROAD POTENTIAL?

THE current D23 Nissan Navara arrived in mid 2015 and replaced both the well-regarded D40 and the older and underwhelming D22 in lower-spec models. It was initially marketed as the NP300 but that tag was dropped at the first remake, of which there have been three, a little over 12 months later. The keynote feature of the D23 dual cab was the use of coil rather than leaf springs at the rear of all but the basespec work-grade model powered by the less powerful (singleturbo) 2.3-litre diesel engine. Mid- and top-spec models received a more powerful 2.3-litre bi-turbo diesel engine, both engines being sourced from Nissan’s major alliance partner Renault.

The coil springs, rather than leaf springs for the rear live axle, could have delivered excellent wheel travel, but they didn’t. Engineering-wise this should have been the relatively easy part, but it seems that off-road ability was never a high priority for Nissan’s engineers when they designed the D23. Given dual-cab utes fulfil many and diverse roles, hence their global popularity, Nissan put it’s priorities elsewhere (in contrast, Toyota’s engineers placed off-road ability high in the priority list for the current generation Hilux).

Up-spec D23s did, however, come with a driver-switched rear locker, and engaging the rear locker did keep the on-road-tuned ETC active on the front wheels, so a tick there. But none of this was sufficient to effectively overcome the inherently poor wheel travel. The Navara’s ground clearance – on standard suspension and wheel/tyre package – is also the poorest of its peers, and while you can improve this with suspension and wheel/tyre changes, you’re still starting from the backmarker position.

Mercedes-benz, a minor-alliance partner of Nissan, used the D23 as the starting point for its X-class ute (released in 2018) so as to get on to the fast-growing global ute market bandwagon more quickly, but despite throwing a lot of chassis engineering at the D23 (and a Benz V6 diesel powertrain in the high-end model to boot), X-class production tellingly only lasted a mere two and a half years.

While Nissan has carried out several updates to the Navara D23 since its launch, with much retuning of the suspension which has improved the general driving and load carrying to a point, only the locally developed (by Premcar) N-trek Warrior (2019) moved the off-road game on significantly. While Premcar’s primary focus was making the Warrior better off-road, it was also much improved on road and a much more impressive chassis makeover of the D23 than that achieved by Mercedes-benz. The recently updated Navara range now includes the PRO-4X and PRO-4X Warrior, which is again a Premcar development.