A man named Frank, from Thailand, invoked the wrath of the Nissan GT-R fan community by posting a video with an R35 running on a deprecated RB26 inline-six engine from the late 80s, instead of the iconic V6. Why on Earth would you swap one for the other? But hold your horses, the explanation is great.
The way some YouTube and Instagram users saw it, Frank took a high-end sports car and downright ruined it with a pointless engine swap, ending with less power and torque. It doesn’t help that in Thailand, this particular luxury car costs from $400,000 USD. The giant lettering ‘FAKE’ on the sides obviously did not faze the critics. It did not ring any alarm bells, although they those should have been very loud bells, indeed.
The matter is, it is not the engine that is fake – it is literally everything else. The car featured in the video is a 30-something year old Nissan Cefiro sporting a new carbon fiber bodywork done from scratch. Frank sourced the headlamps, front spoiler, hood cover, doors, brake lights and fuel lid from an original Godzilla to make sure his build looked authentic. Think he overdid?
Now, such a conversion would never come cheaply, but the tuner says he managed to keep it under $50,000 USD – an order of magnitude less than the real GT-R R35 costs. And some commenters did not notice the difference. So, who do you think is the smart one here?