Remembering Japanese cars from the past

Tag: nissan gazelle (Page 1 of 2)

JDM Trivia #6: 1981 Nissan Drive Guide System

JDM Trivia #6: 1981 Nissan Drive Guide System

This weeks trivia is all about the 1981 Nissan Drive Guide system which was basically a crude navigation system for the Nissan Skyline DR30 and the Nissan Gazelle and Silvia S12. Nobody took a wild guess at the teaser from last week, but I’ll get to the purpose of the antenna in this episode!
JDM Trivia #6: Nissan Drive Guide System
In the 1970s the most advanced navigational system in your car was…a road atlas and a compass! Of course the US military was solving that problem by shooting up GPS satellites from 1973 onwards but the automotive industry also made attempts. In the 1980s in Germany and the US companies used antennas to send signals via various radio frequencies but this was very costly. Meanwhile in Japan Toyota, Honda and Nissan made their own attempts to solve the car navigation question.

1980s Japanese Navigational systems

In 1981 Honda implemented a system called Electro Gyrocator and this system breathed tech savvy Hondaness as the system used an Helium gas gyroscope to detect both rotation and movement. The complex system required printed plastic maps and if you are interested in more photos and background information, Japanese Nostalgic Car blog wrote an article about it. In the same year Toyota implemented a system on their Celica XX but I was not able to find any information about how that system worked.

Continue reading

JDM Trivia: Mitsubishi Galant Σ and Nissan Gazelle crossover?

While browsing for photos of a non-disclosed car model (coming up) I stumbled upon a photo of a Mitsubishi Galant Σ (sigma) on Minkara that looked a bit odd:
Mitsubishi Galant double square headlights
The shape was right, but those headlights and grille really look the same as the Nissan Gazelle S110 units!

So I double checked with a Gazelle S110 I featured a long time ago:

The corner lights are different, but this is a kouki (late) model and the zenki (early) model did feature full orange corner lights. Apart from that it does look very similar!

And this is the common Mitsubishi Galant Σ we all are familiar with: Continue reading

WTF: Tomica Nissan Gazelle S12 Super Silhouette replica

After yesterdays TOMs Corolla Group 5 I was searching for Group 5 cars and found this Tomica Gazelle.
Wait a minute! Isn’t that supposed to read Tomica Skyline Super Silhouette replica?
No, it isn’t! This is all about the Tomica Nissan Gazelle S12 Super Silhouette replica:
Tomica Nissan Gazelle S12 Super Silhouette
Yes, someone made a replica of the Tomica Skyline Super Silhouette racer in the early 90s but used a Nissan Gazelle S12 body for that. He even included all correct livery… WTF?!

You can watch the video below: Continue reading

The other Nissan Silvia Super Silhouette racer

There is so much footage of the Hoshino Impul Nissan Silvia KS110 Super Silhouette race car that we tend to forget there was actually another car on the gird that resembled it: the Nissan Gazelle KS110 driven by Haruhito Yanagida!
Nissan Silvia KS110 Super Silhouette
In the season 1981 Yanagida’s car resembled Hoshino’s car with its bodyshape, but Yanagida’s car wasn’t a Silvia: it was a Gazelle. So you see the difference? 😉
I guess most of the audience also had difficulties and therefore Yanagida changed the bodyshape to the Nissan Bluebird 910 from the 1982 season onwards.

Photo found at: Minkara

Family Album Treasures: Hoshino’s Gazelle

Back in the early 80s when the Japanese Super Silhouette series were at its alltime high in popularity Kazuyoshi Hoshino drove his iconic Nissan Silvia S110 silhouette racer to many victories.
Nissan Gazelle S110 with Hoshino Impul rims
Kazuyoshi Hoshino was a smart man: apart from founding the Hoshino Racing he also founded the Hoshino Impul company which produced the Impul D-01 wheels as their first product. By mounting these wheels on his silhouette racer he had the best advertising possible and many of these wheels were sold to his (young) followers.

Also this guy fell for them and mounted them on his Nissan Gazelle S110, just like his hero Hoshino. Definitely a keepsake for the family album!

Found at: Minkara

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