This morning I accompanied a driving buddy down to Orange County (about 40-50 mile drive) to help him look over a Pantera he wants to buy. Since I have had one for years, which he's driven, he valued my opinion and questions for the seller. This friend picked me up in his late model Nissan GTR. OMG, while it looks nice (he just spent a couple of thousand dollars on an amazing detail/paint correction), what a horrible car to ride in! First of all the transmission is very clunky, secondly the road noise is nearly unbearable, tire noise, drone, buzzing, probably as bad as any car I have ever ridden in. Terrible!!! I was thinking the whole way there and back about how refined, quiet, composed and comfortable my 2010 XKR with over 175,000 miles on it, felt in comparison with this low mile GTR. It was simply awful, and even with its speed potential after riding in it, I would NEVER consider owning one after this ride. My 50 year old Pantera as crude and ancient as it is, is a way more enjoyable and tolerable ride. I honestly can't believe how badly executed Nissan made this car.

It sure makes you appreciate the sophistication and quality of our cars!

 

Thanks, suspicions confirmed, I was considering one in 2018 when I bought my R

Looks like I made the right choice.

 

Was his stock?
The GTR is incredibly complicated compared to the brute in a suite that the XKR is.
Drift shaft running to a gearbox in the rear, then another driveshaft running to a differential in the front.
I will give it a uniqueness in exterior styling.

Did you also drive it?
Experience riding as a passenger can be different than from behind the wheel were you are more connected to what is happening.

 

Did you tell him to forget about the Pantera and to start looking at XKR's or F-Types?

 

JagRag,
He already has a supercharged Acura NSX (1996) that is beautiful and a pleasure to drive. He was looking for a Pantera last year and contacted me through the Pantera forum and it turned out we live less than 5 minutes from each other. I had just gotten mine back from its restoration and modification, and I let him take it out for a nice ride. He was smitten. And yes, we actually talked about F-types today, and how he's looked at them occasionally. And as crude and ancient as the Pantera is, and at only 43" off the ground, its ride is still way better, more solid, dare I say even more refined than that of his GTR. I'd have to think that there is something wrong with this car, it was so bad. If my Pantera was as bad as this I would have sold it 18 years ago, I wouldn't have kept it a week as beautiful as it is.



Tervuren,
As far as I know it is a completely stock GTR. And yes, when you drive a car it is a different experience, but the choppiness of the ride, the extreme noise infiltration, and the very, very clunky transmission shifts would be the same in either seat. My friend told me that he is going to Dynamat the whole car to try and help with the noise. Honestly, it was one of the worst driving experiences I have ever had, this car is just terrible.

MartyUK,
If you drove the XKR and the GTR back to back on a freeway or highway, my prediction would be that you wouldn't be able to stand the GTR for more than a moment or two after driving the XKR. It's shockingly bad. Now maybe this is just a very loosey goosey example but you couldn't get me in that car even as a passenger again. Marty you made an excellent choice!.

 

There is really no comparison here. The GTR was designed to be a track monster with as much as triple the power the XKR can offer, it was never intended to be a smooth cruising GT car.

 

jahummer,
Not comparing a track car to a fine GT, but he uses the GTR as a daily driver; it's not liveable as a daily driver. He just emailed me that he wants to go look at a Pantera in Arizona, and I wrote him back saying "I'd love to go with him, but not if we're in the GTR. We can take my XKR." And I told him he could drive because I think he'd want to sell the GTR rather than the NSX to finance his Pantera purchase. The GTR was really that awful.

 

The gtr is what it is and can be pushed to its limit no problems try doing that to a xkr and you'd end up in a ditch .

At certain times I do wish I was behind the wheel of a gtr , however most times I'm behind a wheel I'm glad it's the jaguar .

 

I agree, as I said before the GTR is a poor choice for a DD if you want comfort. Bit as far as performance as Steve said, it blows the XKR out of the water.

your friend should not sell the NSX, that too is a classic.

 

I never argued that the XKR could perform at GTR levels but given the choice between the high level of performance we can extract from our XKRs that comes with a civilized level of comfort and composure as opposed to the uncivil package the GTR offers just to get to that extra performance is not really a choice for me. Since the GTR never really appealed to me, I never paid much attention to it, but yesterday, I went online to read some of the car magazine reviews of it just to see if what I experienced was common or peculiar to this car In a very positive review from Car and Driver on a long term test car, they raved about the performance, the upgraded level of the interior from the original model, but the main complaint was the terrible noise level in the car, the awful clunkiness of the drive train and transmission, which means these cars were built knowing these deficiencies existed. Frankly, it's inexcusable for a modern day car that is priced at about the $100,000 mark to be this bad. WOW!!

 

Yesterday, I had to drive up to the central Valley of California from Los Angeles to take care of a problem at a property I own in Delano, CA. It's about a 300 mile round trip. With little traffic I cruised up there at speeds between 80-110mph effortlessly, relaxed, and comfortably in a serene surrounding. I was still thinking about how bad the GTR was and how I would never be able to take it on a ride of this length without suffering greatly. My car has over 175,000 miles on it and over 10 years old and is still a wonderful place to sit on a trip and certainly gobs better than the Nissan. Honestly, it's shocking how bad it is in comparison. And by the way, I averaged about 22mpg even at those speeds.