One-Off Nissan Z Gets Downsized Grille At Toyko Auto Salon

Although it isn’t anything like as divisive as some big grille designs out there from other manufacturers (cough BMW! cough), not everyone is a fan of the new Nissan Z‘s big, rectangular gob. There is one particular version of the car that has a very different front-end treatment, however, revealed at the recent Tokyo Auto Salon.

It’s dubbed the Fairlady Z Customized Proto, and it has a unique front bumper involving two smaller, separate grille sections. The new look brings the sports car more in line with Z cars of the past.

That’s far from the only retro touch, though - much of the cars mods seem to provide a tip of the hat to the 432R, a JDM homologation special version of the original Fairly Z that shares an engine with the first Skyline GT-R. It’s finished in a similar shade of orange enhanced by numerous black decals, while at the back, there’s a new spoiler and some cool semi-circular exhaust tips.

Compared to the production car, the Customized Proto gets a deeper dished, larger diameter set of multispoke wheels. They’re wrapped in aggressive semi-slick tyres with Nissan Z lettering on the sidewalls, much as we saw with the original Z Proto show car.

Nissan hasn’t said a whole lot about the car - at the time of writing, we weren’t able to track down a press release for it. The company’s North American communications boss Dan Passe did however shed a little more light on the car on the Nissan Z Club forum. He described the car as “exclusively a study vehicle equipped with concept accessory parts to gauge customer and fan interest for potential future accessory offerings”. Hopefully, then, you’ll be able to buy some of this stuff in the future.

See also: Nissan Z Prototype Has Impromptu ‘Race’ With Subaru WRX STI

Displayed alongside this showcase was the Proto Spec Z, the 6,966,300 yen (~$61,000) launch edition of the sports car in Japan. US pricing isn’t available just yet, but the expectation is for the range to start at a little over $40,000. In case you need reminding, we in Europe won’t be able to buy one in an official capacity, with Nissan declining to bring the car to the continent. Boo and indeed hiss.