This one had me stumped for, a while. I just didn’t remember this car being sold in the US; I thought the Pulsar moniker was used strictly for the coupe, like this one. I recognized it from its European use, where it was the basis of the ill-fated Arna, a joint venture with Alfa Romeo to combine the drive train and other parts of the Alfa Sud with this body. And I do remember well this car’s predecessor, the Datsun 310, which it very much resembles:
That’s the 310 on top (Nissan N10/Pulsar/Cherry); they were not that uncommon. But this Pulsar is of the next generation, the N12. Wikipedia mentions it being sold also as the Holden Astra in Australia and the Nissan Cherry in Europe. But no references to the US. All their pictures of it have foreign plates.
My very less than satisfactory Standard Catalog of Imported Cars makes no reference to it whatsoever, but then it doesn’t even acknowledge the Pulsar NX coupe’s existence either, so that’s useless. But…there is another section in wiki on the N12 under “Nissan Cherry”, which is what the Pulsar essentially was too. Finally, an answer: “In America only the notchback coupe (“Pulsar NX”) was offered for most of the N12′s run although the 3- and 5-doors were sold in 1983 only.” That explains it. It had pretty much fallen into the recycle bin of my memory banks, but I remember it now! Sure…
What I do know is that this was a pretty challenging and confusing era for Nissan, coming right in the midst of their transition from Datsun to Nissan. And like many of the cars of that era, it carries both Datsun and Nissan names. And the brand new FWD Sentra arrived in 1983.
So selling two FWD small cars with different names was…pretty much par for the course during Nissan’s difficult era, when they pissed away their once very powerful position in the US and watched it dribble away to Honda and Toyota.
I’d never known they sold these here, either. Most of what I heard of ARNA came from one or more CAR featurettes — either the worst cars of all time or the worst Alfas; perhaps both. Inevitably, they gave the cars both barrels.
Thanks, Paul! I’ve always wondered about this. I was born in the Midwest in ’80s, at a time when most Japanese cars were toast after about 5-7 years of heavy snows and salted roads. My folks’ ’80 Corona had terminal cancer by ’85, and it was rare to see anything built prior to ’83 or so when my automotive cognizance/obsession really began to take hold in the early ’90s. I’m positive I never saw one of these Pulsars on the road, but this is such a genericar that I could have easily overlooked it. The coupes were a relatively common site for a long time; it’s hard to imagine that Nissan actually made an even homlier-looking version of the Pulsar NX.
I feel your pain on the shortcomings of The Standard Catalog of Imported Cars. Been there done that. Malaise Japanese Econoboxes are pretty poorly documented, even in the information age. Until now, Wikipedia was my guess at whether this car was even sold here, but I couldn’t believe it until I saw it. And here we are, a one year wonder.
Also, could Nissans product line and marketing have been any more muddled in the ’80s. Ditching the Datsun badge for “The Name Is Nissan” did them no favors, and renaming all the car lines only confused matters even more. Nissan’s early ’80s models were boxy even by ’80s Japanese standards. The first Stanza and FWD Maxima were dorky, stubby-looking cars, and the Sentra was penalty box. Now, over 25 years later, after being a trailblazer in the U.S. market, Nissan is still a fairly distant third to Honda and Toyota.
still prefer the sportbak pulsars!
I remember reading that Nissan engineers referred to these as the ‘Smurf Hearse’. I’d love to read a head-to-head review with the Geo Storm Wagonback!
Was also rebadged by GM Holden Astra this little heap really got around. I remember these where my father worked they sold GM but had recently taken on a Datsun range real odd to see the two cars in the showroom.
I seem to remember, and don’t feel up to researching, that the Pulsar was a two seater; not unlike the MR2.
It was around this time I became a Nissan fan. In the late ’80′s a friend had a circa ’82 Maxima with the infamous female voice, “door is ajar”. But a sweet V6 that got me hooked. I had subsequently purchased 2 Max’s as a result and currently driving an Xterra.
(The Xterra has got to go though…way too rigid and I’m too old. I’ve got my eye on the new M37.)
Wow – I don’t think I’ve ever seen one of those before. Its possible it wasn’t sold in Canada (our market information is really poor as its over shadowed by US info). Manages to be pretty homely for all angles.
What this is, is proof that Nissan went too far when they cleaned house after the F10 reached production. Whoever was left had just enough talent to fold a cardboard box and spraypaint it white.
I just had a look on Nissan’s USA parts cattalogue, and it looks to me like the hatch-back was produced at least through part of 1984.
Oh man, I remember these things. There were a few sitting on the lot when my father traded in his POS ’79 Mustang for an ’84 Sentra with every option box checked but the automatic transmission. You could see these around that Northern California college town for years. Same with the weird notchback Pulsar sport coupes. Talk about a trip down memory lane.
Thanks for posting this. I was feeling nostalgic… the 1983 Nissan Pulsar Datsun was my very first car and I don’t have any pictures of it. It was a horrid goldish-tannish color, and I loved that car. It ran like a champ, heater blew hot, got incredible gas mileage, hauled all of my friends and hauled all of my junk. It belonged to my oldest sister, then my mother, then my other sister, then she sold it to me for $1 when she moved out. It’s where I learned to drive a stick shift, and subsequently where I taught all my friends to drive a stick. I was told that only a few hundred of these were ever made. My sister purchased the car from a dealer in California. I received it (and sold it for $375 at an Auto Auction) in Washington State in 1997.
I haven’t seen one of these in about 20 years.
Folks bought a light blue one for my mom in 83 in metro Detroit. Sister got it in 89 and I got it in 93. Drove it through the latter part of high school and through 3 years of college. I remember it had 60 hp but it could haul since it was so light. In fact for fun I would park the front end into a street parking space and then get out of the car, lift the back end and swing it to the curb. After spinning out on the freeway with a light snow on the ground for a third time while a door was tied shut I ended up donating it and upgrading to an Escort.
I loved that car, but it was dangerously light. Also the locks seemed to freeze easily but maybe there was a quick fix for that. Still it worked like a charm under the hood. And in Detroit with plenty of snow and weather as well as salt. And it was rare but I do remember seeing a few now and then through the 80s. In the 90s less so and none at the end. I did see one about 10 years ago and got nostalgic…
What are those stubby little levers in the console, between the seat belt buckles?
I have to wonder why Nissan decided not to sell the 3 & 5-door in the US. It seems like it would have stood a good change at luring some buyers away from the Rabbit/Golf, Omni, Civic hatch, GLC/323 and Escort. Not to mention, I think it looks rather sharp for 1983, with its origami creases, where the Sentra was utilitarian to a fault.
But the fact that Nissan decided against doing so and put zero effort into adding greater feature content to either the Pulsar coupe or the Sentra, or imparting the models with any sportiness beyond some cynical styling efforts for the rest of the decade is telling. The Stanza similarly suffered from a lack of US market development. These cars may have been competitive, even ahead of the game, in the early ’80s, but by the 1987/1988, Honda’s wedge-shaped and technologically progressive cars, and Toyota’s more polished, feature-laden offerings drove the mainstream market away from Nissan.
The very late ’80s and early ’90s saw this change, with the company betting the farm on some very sleek, powerful and high quality cars, but it was too late by that point. Furthermore, they spent the rest of the decade largely re-skinning and ignoring those models.
It’s a real shame, though, as Nissan’s pre-Ghosn cars were always of superb quality in my experience and the company did deserve more attention than it got in the ’90s. But boxy, stripped-down and slow Stanzas and Sentras during the mid ’80s really screwed the company for a long time, with customers dismissing the brand as generic.
I had a 310 hatchback, which was sold as a Pulsar in Canada. It was an ’81 that my mom bought used and gave to me in 1985. I kept it for 3 years. I took it in for a safety check in 1988 and the mechanic told me to get rid of it because it was rotting out underneath. At the time it had nearly 200,000 km and still ran pretty well, although in the last winter the carb iced up on me a few times. I bought an ’84 Cavalier which was in many ways a better car (more room, more power, quieter) and left the Datsun at my parents house. Within a year the mechanic’s words came true. I charged the battery and it fired right up, but a drive around the block told me all I needed to know about the car. My dad gave it to a friend as a parts car, and I’m sure the engine lived on far beyond the rest of the car.
Hi Paul, this vehicle sure is a classic.
I had the opportunity to live in Melbourne, Australia from 2008 – 2010 courtesy of my wife securing a scholarship to study in Australia.
During this time we were looking for a vehicle so asked a couple of people that we knew to assist us. We lived in Maidstone which is in West Melbourne and our neighbor one day informed us that an elderly lady from St. Albans wanted to sell her vehicle. He said he would set up a meeting with a relative of hers who would drive the vehicle to our place for an inspection. On the day they brought the vehicle I was surprised at how old the vehicle was. The relative advised that it was a 1983 Nissan Pulsan 5 door hatch. I have never seen one before and did not think vehicles this old were still allowed on the road. After testing the vehicle my wife and I decided to purchase it.
This vehicle was amazing. It was in very good condition despite its age, it could speed on the Melbourne freeways, and was very economical. In fact, workmates of mine at Rod Laver Arena would leave their vehicles at home and hitch rides with me because of their fuel issues (probable caused by the GFC).
When we left Melbourne in January 2010 we had many requests from close friends and other interested buyers to purchase the vehicle but we decided to keep it and bring it back with us to Papua New Guinea. My wife eventually learned to drive using the Pulsar which was a big blessing and up until today it is still running perfectly.
Virgil Hani
Port Moresby City
Papua New Guinea