NOT bought for its LOOKS or SPEED! (Nissan Micra (1983-92))

Member Name: ia_young

Product:	Nissan Micra (1983-92)
Date:	12/06/01 (657 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: economical, reliable, cheap to run

Disadvantages: strabge colour, old shape

I have been meaning to write an opinion on the car, which I drive for quite a while now but until now haven’t really got around to it. Finally I decided to do it, so here we go, this is my opinion on the Nissan Micra. Okay when you hear Nissan Micra you conjure up the image of a car which quite a lot of elderly people drive, but then you ask yourself why? There must be something about the car, which is drawing people to buy the car. I will try to explain my view…

** Looks **
My Micra, which is an H reg was not bought for looks. This model is the model, which is quite square not the new updated bubble version, which I can’t stand. The colour I can’t quite work out, to me it looks Gold and to everyone else that looks at it they see Gold. But the logbook that I have says it is beige! Either the car is a re-spray, the log book is wrong or the translation from the Japanese name for the colour is wrong? Either way it doesn’t really matter, it is a pretty unique sight!

Inside the car isn’t much better than the outside, the designers either didn’t know what colour they were using or there was a surplus of brown upholstery and brown plastic! I won’t moan about the colour too much, hopefully, as it is very comfortable to drive and be a passenger in.

** Performance **
Being a 1.2 you would expect this car to have a little go? Considering that it is quite a small and light car, but that is where you would be wrong. This car has less go than my previous car, which was a 1.0 VW Polo. However where the car lacks is speed performance the car gains in how economical it is to run. When I first got it, it was unleaded, which then meant cheaper petrol than 4 star (not any more thanks to the Government!). The car does around 41 miles to the gallon (about 320 miles per fill up), which is quite good and for the amount of miles that I do means that the petrol is quite cheap. To get the most ou
t of the petrol the optimal conditions are for a long journey averaging around 60 Mph. If you go around town a lot the miles that you get will go down, as with most cars.

** What Does It Have **
Well in terms of extras, not a lot, but the model that I have, GSX, does has a tilt sun roof, a working heater, a boot opener by the drivers seat and a buzzer to say if your lights are on. Believe me this is luxury compared to my last car!

** Cost **
As I said the car is cheap to run in terms of petrol, but parts could be a problem. In general most of the parts are very cheap, but some could lead to very expensive (say if the part had to be ordered in from Japan!).

** Condition **
Well considering that this car is around 11 years old and has done a fair few miles (above 130,000) this car is in very good condition. It is probably not as good as it could be, but then it probably wouldn’t have been driven much and this is a car to be driven (as it does not have the looks). It has a few patches of rust, but not much and recently the radiator blew, but considering the miles it has done quite well.

Summary: