|
The Nissan Leopard is a line of luxury sports cars built by Japanese carmaker Nissan. The Leopard began life in 1980 and was discontinued in 1999. Leopards were initially based on the Japanese market Nissan Skyline and Nissan Laurel and the American Datsun 910/Nissan Maxima, then later based on the chassis of their Nissan Cedric and Nissan Gloria contemporaries and were rear wheel drive. Final versions were the contributing factors to Nissan's Infiniti M and J products. The Leopard sedan was sold exclusively in Japan at ''Nissan Bluebird Store'' locations as a companion to the Fairlady Z, allowing Nissan to sell a badge engineered version of the Skyline and Laurel, while the coupe was exclusive to ''Nissan Motor Store'' locations. The Leopard was cancelled as a result of Nissan Revival Plan as a casualty of overproduction. ==First generation: F30 (1980-1986)== The first Leopard (also known as Leopard TR-X) was introduced in September 1980 as a contender in the upper medium class of cars, including its primary Toyota contender, the Toyota Chaser. The angular body, available as a two-door hardtop coupé "personal luxury car", and a four-door hardtop sedan, which featured very slim C- and D-pillars and large glass surfaces. The angular appearance was shared with the Fairlady Z, but the coupe was exclusive to ''Nissan Motor Store'' locations, while the sedan was exclusive to ''Nissan Bluebird Store'' Japanese Nissan dealerships. The wind resistance coefficient of the two-door version is 0.37. At the time of introduction, the two body styles both carried the same price tags.〔 The Leopard featured some industry firsts, for instance a fuel consumption gauge in the dashboard. Originally the Leopard was available with naturally aspirated inline four- and six-cylinder engines of 1,800, 2,000, and 2,800 cc displacement; the largest engine received an electronic engine management system developed together with Hitachi, and was called NAPS-Z.〔 The 1.8 liter fours were also originally available with a four-speed manual transmission, all others received five-speeds as standard (or an optional three-speed automatic).〔 In July 1981 a two-liter turbocharged engine was added.〔 Available as a GX, SGX, and ZGX, it had the same maximum output (145 PS) as did the more expensive and heavier 2.8. In September 1982, the Leopard received a mild facelift and with it, the under-performing 2.8 was dropped from the lineup. In June 1984 a limited Turbo Grand Edition with the 300ZX's 3 litre turbo engine joined the line-up.〔 The car shared many components with the six-cylinder version of the Datsun Bluebird 910, sold in North America as the Datsun 810 (and later renamed the Nissan Maxima), but used a platform based on the Nissan Skyline R30.〔Yamaguchi, p. 64〕 The Japanese version had side view mirrors mounted on the front fenders and (uniquely) had small wipers attached to the top of the mirrors to remove accumulated rain and dirt from the surface of the mirrors.〔 The vehicle's styling seemed to be influenced by its more successful main competitor, the Toyota Soarer. However, when the Leopard was introduced, the styling was already a little dated and the coupé-only Soarer did significantly better in the market.〔 A list of the various trim levels and engines that the Leopard was available with at its introduction:〔 After a mild styling update, the car was offered in the following variations: 180X GX, SGX 200X SGX, ZGX 200 Turbo SGX, ZGX, ZGX Super Edition 300 Turbo Grand Edition Images of this generation can be found at a Nissan Heritage website 〔http://www.nissan-global.com/EN/HERITAGE/leopard_hardtop.html here.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Nissan Leopard」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|