The Nissan Primera was ahead of its time (P10)

Aug 3, 2023

The Nissan Primera was ahead of its time (P10)

Sold from 1990 - 1996, the first generation Nissan Primera was a modern and sophisticated car.

Full Review of a 1990 Nissan Primera P10 2.0 GS.

#nissanprimera #nissan

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Content

2.32 -> The Nissan Primera is a mid-sized family/ business rep-mobile car built by Nissan from 1990.

10.24 -> The P10 - which is the first generation of the Primera - was a super modern car for its day. Back

16.16 -> in 1990 it had all of the very latest tech and what you'd expect on a car, such as a 16-valve

22.48 -> fuel-injected engines and a very fancy front multi-link suspension. Like the Nissan Bluebird

28.24 -> before it, it was built up in the north east of England in Sunderland, in the Nissan factory where

33.12 -> they really had gone to show that it is possible to build a high quality car in Great Britain.

41.36 -> It just feels like a Bluebird++ - they could have called it

45.2 -> the Bluebird but I guess they were trying to get rid of that name, and

47.84 -> they called it the Primera which is basically Spanish for 'first' or 'one'. They were like 'yeah Primera

53.52 -> is the best, forget about the old Bluebird that was for granddads'. The Primera was available

58.16 -> as this four-door saloon but you could also get it as a five-door hatchback which

62.24 -> gave you a bit more practicality at the back, where you could get more stuff in the boot.

65.28 -> But to be fair, the boot on this is massive. You could also get it as an estate car but the estate car

71.04 -> wasn't really a Primera, it was based on something called an Avenir and it was built in Japan so although

75.6 -> it looked a bit Primera-y it wasn't the same car. This car is a four-speed automatic, so it's

81.44 -> very smooth and easy to drive. It's just - go pedal, stop pedal. The steering's

86.8 -> light, you've got great visibility. There was also a five-speed manual. It has got power steering, but

92.64 -> at lower speeds it feels weighty, but then as you speed up - even now at 20 miles an hour - it's

98.32 -> much lighter. You can feel there's a lot of play in it - it's not sharp steering - the ride

103.2 -> quality is pretty nice on this car, it goes over speed bumps pretty well - it's not a modern

107.52 -> car with thin tyres or anything. These seats are quite comfortable as well, they're actually

111.28 -> more comfortable than the seats in the Nissan Juke that I was driving recently. And I'm

115.44 -> sat on this beaded seat cover, which was just all the rage in the early 90's

121.52 -> it's doing its job in that it's really quite warm in here and it's keeping my back sweat free.

130.88 -> So to put it into context, it was going up against cars like the Ford Sierra and the

134.24 -> Vauxhall Cavalier, and those cars at that time were a bit dated - obviously later on you had the

139.2 -> Mondeo and the Vectra but when this Primera came out it was super fancy and and modern. So this

145.36 -> car is on the mid to high spec level, it's a two litre GS - they had all sorts of different

152.24 -> letters and and things back in the 90's didn't they - the L, the LS, the LX, GS, GT and so on. So you've

158.8 -> got four electric windows - the way it's set up with this little switch here, I can put my hand on the

163.2 -> door handle and then my thumb can control the electric window switch. Weirdly you've also got

168.08 -> the window switches down here in the center as well, but that's for the other doors.

172.8 -> One touch on the driver's side, so it's going down like that. Wind-y manual sunroof which is a nice

179.92 -> touch, you've got the electric aerial that comes on when you put the the stereo on which is just a

185.44 -> very cool 80's and 90's thing. It doesn't have air con which is a bit of a shame on on a day like

191.44 -> today, but electrically adjustable wing mirrors which are these quite neat small

195.84 -> modern looking wing mirrors. There's only two blanks that I can find, and I assume they would

200.72 -> be for heated seats. I like the interior, it's very black and 90's and it's not actually

206.32 -> that interesting to look at but you've got this quirky looking steering

210.16 -> wheel - three-pointer - in front of you with a huge space for for all the dials and so on. There's no

214.88 -> trip computer or anything, you've got this tiny little LCD clock in front of you - now that

219.68 -> that would only have been in some pretty high spec Mercs and stuff back then, but what you do get is a very

224.88 -> nicely laid out dash with lots of information and you've got a check engine light but it's a Nissan

229.44 -> so that that probably doesn't even have a bulb in it. I was just looking at this - I've got a great big

233.92 -> sun-visor here that blocks the entire view of the road. There aren't any cup holders in here

238.48 -> but there are lots of little cubby holes - there's one here in front of the centre console,

243.28 -> you've got spaces for your cassettes in the dashboard, and a little cubby hole - very small

249.44 -> one - in the center console here. You've got a pretty reasonable glovebox and then Mr Furious

256.64 -> driving would love this Tea Shelf here - in the old days instead of an airbag and safety during

262.48 -> a crash, you could just have a cup of tea on the on the dashboard instead - it meant that you could have

267.28 -> a little sip as you went along and then if you did have a crash, you'd get boiling tea in your face.

273.68 -> It is now time to ask Backseat JJ what he thinks of the back of the P10 Nissan Prim-

279.2 -> What are you doing?!

281.656 -> Yeah I'll be at the meeting as soon

283.2 -> as possible, as soon as I can get this pleb to drive me there.

287.04 -> Okay then, yes, see you in Zurich. What this? It's just the award

293.76 -> that this car won - the Festival Of The Unexceptional 2022, 'Rep Mobile of the year'

299.805 -> "congratulations to Chris James!" *applause*

302.72 -> Oh you want to know about the back! Okay yeah, no problem. So head and leg room - it's designed clearly

308.48 -> just to fit two six-footers, one behind the other. Can feel my hair touching the roof and my legs

312.64 -> are just touching the back of the seat. It's got some very nice comfy cloth type seats, there isn't

317.44 -> that much back here, but there is of course an ash tray because that was all important back in the

322.56 -> day when everybody smoked, including your kids in the back. There's no door pockets on the sides and

326.88 -> there's no pockets on the back of the seats but there is this very nice armrest here, which

331.52 -> folds down and you can sit in comfort. And what is nice is that they've got a slot here for the

336.64 -> seat belt anchors, which means that they don't start crushing all the upholstery and everything

340.8 -> when you flatten the seats. And that's about it back here.

344.039 -> Okay cheers mate, thank you for that.

350.24 -> So you couldn't really get a slow Primera - this is the automatic so it's a little bit

353.84 -> hampered in performance but they were all 1.6 and above, and there was a

359.84 -> carburetor version but almost all of them were a fuel injection 16-valve all very modern - I think

365.84 -> it would probably feel a lot quicker with the manual. The 0-60 mph is around 10 or

370 -> 11 seconds, so that's perfectly fine isn't it. There was a diesel version available but that was

375.2 -> very slow, I think it was non-turbo - you'd get very good mpg and you could do infinity miles

380.56 -> in it before it blew up. And if you did want a performance Primera they did something

385.6 -> called the eZX which later became the eGT - that had 150 horsepower, now that would have felt

392 -> pretty quick because obviously like I said it's a light car and i think that would have been a

395.68 -> pretty nice nice car. Primera history - it goes P10 like this one, then they face lifted it, then

400.48 -> they did the P11 and then they facelifted that, up until like late 90's early 2000's and then they made

405.76 -> the P12 which was the great big crazy looking car that had the spaceship dashboard.

410.24 -> In the 80's and 90's Nissan were absolutely at their peak of designing reliable

415.84 -> well-built cars. Nowadays Nissans are not quite so robust. The RAC recognised this car as being

422.32 -> just utterly reliable. So I'm cruising along at 50 miles an hour now and it's actually

426.48 -> pretty quiet in here. Now i'm getting to 60 miles an hour there's quite a bit of wind noise but

430.64 -> it's still cruising along with just two and a half thousand RPM. In 1993 they facelifted the Primera

437.6 -> - they called it the Series-II and it had a slightly different grille and some other little

441.04 -> changes - they did make it safer, they put the side impact bars and the airbags in and ABS as

446.64 -> standard as well which was a big deal back then, to the point where Nissan made a funny little

450.8 -> advert about it. I wish they made car adverts like they used to, there's a lost art I think and they

455.52 -> didn't seem to take themselves quite so seriously back then either. The Ford Mondeo which didn't come

460 -> out until something like 1993, they benchmarked this Nissan Primera in order to design the Mondeo

466.96 -> to try and get it up to the standards of the Primera so it was praise indeed for Nissan that

472.32 -> Ford had used this car as their watermark. So in order to meet the exacting European

478.48 -> standards of what people expect over this side of the world, Nissan designed the Primera to be fun to

484.32 -> drive - and it is. It has a multi-link suspension up front which was unheard of for Nissan at least.

490.72 -> It was all designed by the guy who did the R35 GTR - he knows what he's doing. Although

497.44 -> I was saying the steering's light - you can do this - when you're going straight ahead but

501.2 -> once the steering does bite, so to speak, you can have fun with this car. Back

507.04 -> in the 1990's any self-respecting car company that built a car like this entered it into the

512.24 -> British Touring Car Championship, and Nissan were no different. They had the Primera in from

517.36 -> 1991. It did have some some success in its early early days, it never really won the championship up

523.2 -> until it's later guise as the P11. It did have Tiff Needell driving it, so it had the man, the

528.16 -> myth, the legend himself Tiff Needell behind the wheel. So that's the Nissan Primera - it's

532.72 -> it's a car that, the original one is all but forgotten now, you don't see them anywhere

537.04 -> and most people don't really remember them but they were a very competent car for the time

540.88 -> and better than a lot of the competition that was around. So if you can get your hands on one please

545.44 -> do and just keep it in good condition keep hold of it and uh and just keep them for the future

550.88 -> generations to come. Big thank you to Chris for bringing this car to the channel - if you want to

554.88 -> see a video about a 1980's Nissan 300ZX then click up here, and I'll see you in the next video

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zT6PBPgjCNM