The Silvia S13 Is One of Nissan’s Most Legendary Cars
The Nissan S13 was an icon for young drivers in its day, and its accomplishments still hold up today. Read on to learn more about the car that popularized drifting.
is full of rivalries. It puts country against country, and car companies within the same country against each other. Such is the case with the Nissan Silvia in trying to compete with other sports cars such as Toyota's MR2.
This is the story of the often-overlooked Silvia S13.
History of Nissan's Silvia
The Nissan Silvia has been around for some time. It first debuted in 1965 under the name of Datsun. It was designed by Albrecht Graf von Goertz, a former consultant to BMW. The first production run of the Datsun 1600 ran for only three years and only about 554 were actually manufactured. It was more so a car of luxury rather than of a mass-produced "everyman's car."
That would change with the next generation, known as the Silvia S10. The S10 kept the sporty platform and its compact size with rear-wheel drive. Unlike its predecessor, the S10 was mass-produced.
The Silvia would continue to innovate in each subsequent generation, but it wouldn't reach legendary status until the S13 was produced.
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The S13 first debuted in Japan in 1988. It was an instant hit, and had the tagline of "Art Force Silvia." It won the Good Design Award from the Ministry of International Trade as well as the Car of the Year Japan award as reported by the
The S13 did have an aggressively sporty stance, somewhat comparable to Toyota's MR2. Nissan's sporty coupe was wildly popular with younger drivers. While it did carry a decent 1.8-liter DOHC engine, young drivers loved the car for something other than speed: drifting.
If not for the S13, drifting might never have caught on. Its low and wide base made it ideal for the new style of performance driving. Granted, the subsequent S14 would be known as the drifting king, but the foundations were laid with the S13.
Can you buy a Silvia S13 in the US?
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Nissan's Silvia was groundbreaking in many notable ways. It was also groundbreaking in some less desirable ways: international bureaucracy. While getting any generation of the Silvia would be easy to get in Japan, it would be a little more difficult in international markets.
Fortunately, the S13 did become available in the good ol’ US of A., albeit under a different name. In the US, the S13 was sold as the 240SX. Sure, it wasn't an exact copy of the S13 due to differing car regulations, but it was pretty darn close. The US version also had pop-up headlights, unlike its Japanese counterpart.
The 240SX was available in two distinct versions: hatchback or coupe. Both versions had the sporty advantage of having standard rear-wheel drive and were built on the same chassis as the S13. A convertible option would be added in 1992.
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