NISSAN 370Z: THE END OF THE ROAD
THE 370Z IS NO MORE. SURPRISED? NO, I THOUGHT NOT. My guess is you’d already consigned it to that same great car park in the sky where the GT86 is about to pull into a space, and possibly about five years ago at that. As far back as 2015, David Vivian penned a group test in these pages for the arrival of the Mk3 Audi TT and introduced the gravel-voiced Nissan with the phrase ‘long in the tooth’. Yet the 370Z soldiered on, an anachronism in many ways, a big, honest, thirsty coupe of the old school, and one we’ve always had a soft spot for here at evo.
At times it felt like that love wasn’t shared by those at Nissan UK, where in later years it seemed like an embarrassment for a company that had abandoned traditional vehicles – bar the GT-R – for SUVS and crossovers. The perception was of precious little support for and promotion of the car: often the press fleet was devoid of a Z, so it rarely appeared in the pages of this or any other magazine. A self-fulfilling prophecy at work, the car’s sales were miniscule and it shrank further from view.
What many seemed to forget was that here was a low-slung two-seat coupe, with 323bhp, rear-wheel drive and a manual ’box, all for an absolute steal at under 30 grand. Its emissions and fuel consumption made it hopeless as a company car, and its residuals were never going to do it any favours on a monthly lease, but as a cash-sale bargain it was almost unmatched.
The 370Z’s quest wasn’t helped by the lack of a truly convincing halo model. Nissan tried Nismo variants, but somehow they never quite hit the spot, failing to convince potential purchasers that they were a viable Porsche alternative. Indeed, in the same issue as the group test mentioned above, Dickie Meaden tested the revised Nismo version and concluded that, despite possessing some appeal, its engine and chassis dynamics weren’t special enough to distinguish it as its price approached Cayman territory.
The fact that the other cars in that test had four-cylinder engines, some with displacements as low as 1.6 litres, shows how even then the Nissan was on borrowed time. Today there’s no place for a big, naturally aspirated coupe in a mainstream range: the nearest you’ll find is Porsche’s Cayman and Boxster 4-litre GTS models, at a very different price point, and even their arrival has been greeted with incredulity in some quarters.
It’s nearly 20 years since the 370’s predecessor, the 350Z, made its debut. The 350’s unique lines and oversteer-on-demand chassis instantly made rival coupes look effete. Somehow, the 370 never quite recaptured those glory years, both through circumstance and because, despite appearance on paper, the 370 just wasn’t as likeable as the car it replaced. It was faster, with a more competent chassis, but the 350’s more transparent, entertaining character was sacrificed in the name of that greater performance.
However, what really hurts about losing the 370Z is that the minuscule niche for enthusiast cars with a naturally aspirated engine and manual gearbox has just got even smaller, and moreover, that the Z’s successor, the manual-equipped 400Z, isn’t coming to the UK, or to Europe. To quote Nissan: ‘A shrinking European sports car market and specific regulations on emissions mean that Nissan was unable to build a viable business case for the introduction of the production version of the next-generation Z-car in Europe.’ Given what Toyota has achieved with the GR Yaris, this is a perfect example of why we’ve championed the little superhatch’s arrival. It seems where there’s a will to find the necessary corporate coinage down the back of the sofa for a business plan, there’s a way. Clearly Nissan just isn’t that interested as, in its own words, it focuses on electric cars and crossovers.
The Nissan 370Z was a good car, if not an inspired one, but with its demise we move inevitably one step closer, for better or for worse, towards a norm where a driver’s car is a very different beast to the traditional notion of one.