Nissan GT-R: Points Victory For Godzilla

2023 Author: Eric Donovan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-27 05:39

The Nissan GT-R made the roads unsafe for ten years. The super sports car, affectionately known as "Godzilla", has come closer and closer to the German sports car icon over the past decade.

Anyone who wants to live with a Nissan GT-R every day should either have a bulging wallet or an extremely high pain threshold in terms of fuel costs. Why? Well, the 3.8-liter turbocharged V6 likes to indulge in a deep sip from the 74-liter tank. It should be clear that 419 kW / 570 PS does not exist without the generous combustion of the finest super plus, but the speed at which the fuel gauge moves towards "empty" is still astonishing with every attempt.

Nissan indicates the average consumption with 11.8 liters. A value that cannot be achieved even in “Save” mode (that's the name of the eco mode in the GT-R) and on long stretches of motorway. Admittedly, with 12.5 liters we were very close, but the GT-ROf course, turning off the fuel tap is no fun. It only starts when you set the three rocker arms for the drive train, the chassis and the ESP to “Race”, switch the transmission to manual mode and load properly.

Nissan GT-R to 100 in 2.8 seconds

Then it turns out that "Godzilla" has remained a damn tough dog even with the recently implemented facelift towards comfort - even ten years after its market launch. Thanks to Launch Control, it goes from standstill to 100 km / h in 2.8 seconds. The jump from zero to 50 km / h takes place so quickly that you tend to forget to pull the right rocker switch on the first attempt and the GT R mercilessly slams into the limiter. If you adjust the right moment to upshift, however, one of the sports cars will reward one of the sports cars with a nasty blow in the neck and then dash on unimpressed towards the 100 km / h mark. Hardly any vehicle - especially not for a base price of less than 100,000 euros - pushes so energetically at 220 km / h as the GT-R.

The engine sound cannot drown out the V10 sawing of an Audi R8 or the V8 screeching of a Ferrari 488, but the noises that the Nissan makes have their very own charm. It starts with the mechanical tones of the gearbox, clutch and differential, which always sound a bit broken but at the same time wonderfully racing car-like. If you then step on the accelerator, the sucking revving up of the turbo from 3000 revs is replaced by a huge roar of the torque wave, on which you can ride up to the performance peak at 6800 revs. Shortly before the limiter, the new titanium exhaust system appears, giving the concert a worthy conclusion in terms of motorsport atmosphere.

Comfortable entry into the Nissan GT-R

But the GT-R can not only go straight. Although the steering initially confused with an unusually strong addiction to ruts for a 1,813-kilogram monster, the all-wheel-drive monster can also be tamed on curved mountain roads with a consistently strong hand. With all the important parameters in race mode, the Nissan shoots its way from corner to corner, like the cannonball once quoted by rally legend Walter Röhrl. The combination of power, traction, slight drifts and fast gear can make even seasoned professionals a little dizzy with several successive hairpin turns.

Speaking of dizziness: Anyone from a Porsche 911or Lamborghini Huracán gets into the GT-R runs the risk of suffering a slight fever on the bucket seats mounted very high up. This makes getting in and out of the car a little easier in everyday life, but the seating position should be significantly lower for a sports car. And while we're at the highs and lows, we can also talk about the loading sill and the infotainment system. The former is so difficult to overcome that a cable winch on the trunk lid would be useful for transporting crates of drinks and the latter is so old-fashioned and fiddly that we are glad, anyway, prefer the V6 in the front to the music or the lady with the navigation device discusses listening. On the other hand, the negative properties of the GT-R (consumption, seating position, trunk, navigation system) can be counted on one hand,which makes the sports car do damn well in this test.