Are you a big fan of Nissan and Datsun models from the past and present? Do you have about an hour to spare on Youtube? If you said yes to both, then you're in for a treat. That's because Hoonigan Auto Focus recently paid a visit to a 'secret' museum of Nissan USA. From the company's humble beginnings as Datsun, to fire-spitting IMSA racers, this facility has it all.
Hoonigan Auto Focus' Tyler Kapper and Larry Chen show us what Nissan stored in their special facility. Not only that, we also get to see some Steve Millen Z-cars, classics, and even press cars from the not so distant past. Nissan even kept some forbidden fruit cars for the US in this special place, along with concept cars, race cars, and even the pioneering models from the Infiniti brand.
But the video isn't just a showcase of Nissans and Datsuns from the past couple of decades. There is a very good reason why the video is this long. Chen takes one of the cars in storage out for a test drive, and, of course, he takes a few snaps of a certain classic Nissan. That opportunity alone would make any fan of the brand jealous. Then again, being the official press photographer for the all-new Z has its perks.
Aside from the classics, the video tour (and test drive) also features several interesting back stories for select cars. We won't mention all of it since it's the meat of the video, but we'll share one of the many mentioned here.
If you recall the Z Concept from the 1999, Nissan kept it in their vehicular archive. One of the facility's curators, Jonathan Buhler, has a pretty amusing story about that car. Believe it or not, it's a running car, but its underpinnings are interesting. It may not look like it, but the Z Concept is actually an S14 240SX (or Silvia) under the metallic orange skin. It's even powered by the same 2.4-liter KA24 engine that's related to the one found in the first-generation Frontier and Xterra. It's stories like that (and more) that make the video worth watching from start to end.
So where is this storage facility/museum, you ask? It's located at Nissan USA's headquarters in Tennessee. As for access, you'll have to ask Nissan USA if you can see their valuable collection in person.
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