Rusty But Trusty

Back in the late 1980s, Nissan’s Maxima moved from being a mushy competitor to the “best” GM had to offer, to a car they promoted as the 4DSC or four-door sports car. Gone were the first and second-generation cars’ Toyota Cressida-mimicking styling and talking-car phonograph system, replaced by sportier contemporary styling and an optional 190hp VG30 V6 engine starting in 1991. While the lower-spec (non-SE) cars retained some of the plushness of their predecessors, there was nothing like the tufted pillow-top seats available on earlier cars. With that stunning introduction, let’s take a look at this 1989 Nissan Maxima RHD for sale for $2900 in Broward County, FL.

Wait, is that picture backwards? As it happens, it isn’t – this is a right-hand-drive version of the Maxima. Squinting at the low-resolution pictures leads to a questionable conclusion that it has a metric speedometer, meaning it’s likely to be a Japanese import. How did it get here? Perhaps a member of our military brought it back as personal property. Since it’s basically the same as a US-market car with the steering wheel on the wrong side, you may even be able to get away with registering it here, especially if you live in Florida, where, according to the internet, a blind monkey could register a pony and cart as a GAZ Chaika and nobody would bat an eye.

Notice the Japanese market details, including headlight wipers, rest-of-world-style Nissan grill, and fender-mounted indicators. The rest of the car is standard bland light blue metallic Maxima. The car is said to have been sitting for a while, so the engine needs work. Two power windows are said to need new tracks, while the interior and body are said to be clean, and the headlight wipers are said to work. As the seller says, when’s the last time you saw a right hand drive Maxima?

Of course, the counterpoint is, does having the wheel on the wrong side make it interesting enough for you to care? Unfortunately, internet-tracking paranoia has led the seller to cover up the plate with an old t-shirt, so you won’t know if and how this car was ever registered here. From most angles, it looks like any other Maxima, but if you want to have the only one of something at a car show, this could be the ticket!

Tags: Feature, japanese, maxima, nissan, rhd, sedan

This entry was posted on March 26, 2016 at 5:00 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.