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Small-town dealer has immaculate S12 that you NEED to own

6 June, 2017

 

It ain’t every day that you stumble across perhaps one of the best examples of Silvia rarity, and it sure as hell ain’t everyday that it’s located at a Chevy dealership in middle of nowhere USA. But here is that exact gem, a first-year-only colour, super-low kilometre, and triple pedal example of ’80s radness — a left-hook 1984 Datsun 200SX Turbo hatch.

While we know the Silvia range well down under, it’s a somewhat unknown and ‘foreign’ term to most of the American public — bar the hardcore Japanese-tin fans that will know of the  S13, S14, and maybe S15. I mean, its even still badged as a Datsun …

Perhaps that’s why this particular example hasn’t already become a drift missile and still represents the sophisticated sport coupe-era of the ‘80s. It’s powered by a SOHC CA18ET heart, premiering the ultimate in era technological advances like turbos and the magnificences of  multi-port injection.

It has only seen 58,692km of driving duties, which is rather impressive for it’s age, and the seller claims it has been stored indoors for its entire existence. It has also recently undergone a serious amount of maintenance to bring it back to health after sitting for some time. 

If you fancy getting your hands on this near-on museum condition piece of automotive goodness, there is still time on the eBay auction — it will set you back approximately $14,705 NZD for buy cost alone at the moment and no doubt will shoot up in the last minutes (then you need to factor in the rest).

Will we see it on our shores? Probably not, still pretty awesome though.

 

Almost mythical pony

The Shelby came to our shores in 2003. It went from the original New Zealand owner to an owner in Auckland. Malcolm just happened to be in the right place with the right amount of money in 2018 and a deal was done. Since then, plenty of people have tried to buy it off him. The odometer reads 92,300 miles. From the condition of the car that seems to be correct and only the first time around.
Malcolm’s car is an automatic. It has the 1966 dashboard, the back seat, the rear quarter windows and the scoops funnelling air to the rear brakes.
He even has the original bill of sale from October 1965 in California.

Becoming fond of Fords part two – happy times with Escorts

In part one of this Ford-flavoured trip down memory lane I recalled a sad and instructive episode when I learned my shortcomings as a car tuner, something that tainted my appreciation of Mk2 Ford Escort vans in particular. Prior to that I had a couple of other Ford entanglements of slightly more redeeming merit. There were two Mk1 Escorts I had got my hands on: a 1972 1300 XL belonging to my father and a later, end-of-line, English-assembled 1974 1100, which my partner and I bought from Panmure Motors Ford in Auckland in 1980. Both those cars were the high water mark of my relationship with the Ford Motor Co. I liked the Mk1 Escorts. They were nice, nippy, small cars, particularly the 1300, which handled really well, and had a very precise gearbox for the time.
Images of Jim Richards in the Carney Racing Williment-built Twin Cam Escort and Paul Fahey in the Alan Mann–built Escort FVA often loomed in my imagination when I was driving these Mk1 Escorts — not that I was under any illusion of comparable driving skills, but they had to be having just as much fun as I was steering the basic versions of these projectiles.