A FORGOTTEN 1990s hot hatchback could have become one of the great rally icons of its era – if not for a fatal engineering flaw.
Earlier this week, we spoke to Car S.O.S stars Fuzz Townshend and Tim Shaw ahead of the first episode of Season 14 of their hit show.
While episode one sees them restore an iconic Austin-Healey Frogeye Sprite, our attention was piqued by a later episode featuring a 1990 Nissan Pulsar GTI-R.
Its owner, Raymond – a devoted dad and lifelong petrolhead – had suffered three bouts of cancer and had become too weak to finish it, leaving just a rotting shell and boxes of parts including an engine and a missing turbo.
The boys set out to complete his dream motor, dubbed the “baby Godzilla”, from the ground up and eventually, at Silverstone, an emotional Raymond is reunited with the car he never thought he would see restored.
But while Fuzz says the Nissan Pulsar GTI-R, which even competed in the World Rally Championship under Group A regulations in 1991 and 1992, had “everything” needed to rival rally legends like Subaru and Lancia, a cooling problem ultimately held it back.
Tim said: “It had everything – turbo, four-wheel drive, 16 valves.”
“It was like a pizza with all the toppings,” added Fuzz.
“Try a pizza with all the toppings though – it isn’t always very good. You want the right toppings, not all of them.”
The Pulsar GTI-R is considered a cult icon today and was built as a homologation special so Nissan could compete in the World Rally Championship’s Group A category.
Remembered for its all-wheel-drive turbocharged performance, the car echoed Nissan’s legendary Skyline – Godzilla, if you will.
It boasted a mighty 2.0-litre engine producing around 227bhp and a sophisticated all-wheel-drive system, earning it the nickname ‘baby Godzilla’.
“You’d see one on the road back in the day and you were terrified,” Fuzz added.
“It had everything it needed to be scared of it.”
There was, however, a problem that stopped it becoming a petrolhead favourite in the same way as the Subaru Impreza or Lancia Delta Integrale of the era.
Tim said: “They had a problem with overheating.
“You’d get something called cavitation in the water system in the water pump.
“You’d end up with an airlock and the engine would overheat.”
The duo were able to fix the problem on Raymond’s GTI-R, but it did make them wonder whether the notorious issue held the car back from true greatness.
“If it hadn’t had the overheating problem, that car could have been a world rally championship contender,” said Tim.
“It could have been up there with the Integrales and Audis and Subarus, all those famous rally cars.”
Tim even got behind the wheel of the little beast and was impressed by how it drove.
“When I got into the car it drives like a modern Fiesta in the sense that, for a car of its age, it was phenomenal.
“It wasn’t as quick as I’d hoped, but it did drive very well.
“The technology was great for its time.”
In the early 1990s, the model might’ve set you back around £
Today, the Pulsar GTI-R remains one of the most intriguing what-if stories of the 1990s performance car era and is considered a rare find – with some fetching as high as £55,000 at specialist auctions.
Car S.O.S Season 14 airs exclusively on National Geographic every Thursday at 8pm.
