GT-R50 expected to go into limited production
Italdesign keen as mustard to build up to 50 examples of the car it expects to charge as much as £800k for...
By just the third comment last week, a PHer had asked the question Nissan and Italdesign were apparently waiting to hear: "are they building some?" Hats off then to MDMetal - yes, they are. Probably. Maybe. Or they will if they get more people asking the same question at Goodwood and other car shows this summer. Ideally the sort of people who have pockets deep enough to meet what will likely be a €900,000 asking price.
Naturally that huge figure is just an estimate, too. But one flung out quickly enough that you'd have to assume Italdesign had already given it some serious thought. Thus it will use the Festival of Speed - just a few days away now, in case you'd forgotten - as a sounding board for the idea of a limited production run; limited to the tune of 50 examples, obviously.
Italdesign would be responsible for building (or, more specifically, coachbuilding) the cars in question, a profitable thought which has made its CEO extremely bullish. "At Italdesign, we have a long history of making our customers' dreams come true. By joining forces now with our partners at Nissan, we brought a true GT-R fantasy to life."
He continued: "Together, we have the target that soon this 'monster' of a vehicle will change the lives of 50 very select enthusiasts. Their wait will soon be over." That sounds like a fairly confident prediction to us, and frankly, it's hard to see why they wouldn't put their 'samurari blade' outlets where their mouths are given that it's easy-peasy to sell 50 versions of virtually any fast car globally - let alone one with the cult hero status of the GT-R.
Granted, €900,000 is a good deal more than the £151,995 it'll cost to secure the brand-new, unregistered Nismo that currently appears in the classifieds - but absurd exclusivity and a prettier shape always come at a cost in the car industry. And these are wild times. Don't underestimate the appeal of buying the car built to simultaneously mark the 50th anniversary of both the GT-R and Italdesign, either.
Moreover, there's the thought of that 720hp output to factor in, too - 120hp more than the 'standard' NISMO, thanks to experience gleaned from GT3 racing - and a revised chassis to go with it. Plus did we mention it's got Energetic Sigma Gold accents to go with the Liquid Kinetic Gray paint? We're betting the 'sold-out' sign gets wheeled out almost immediately after the 'for sale' one goes up.
It'll never be a real thing, even the money is just theoretical nonsense.
I'm actually shocked at how much airtime it's getting.
The reason it would cost so much, FYI, is that if it's to be small volume, the tooling required to build it would be massive if they use the unit price to recoup it.
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