It looked the part but Nissan’s thirsty, big-budget R89C, which was campaigned in the World Sportscar Championship and Le Mans in 1989 and ’90, was dogged by technical problems. Doug Nye dissects Japan’s powerful Group C contender to find out why it was no match for the Sauber-Mercedes and Porsches

Nissan R89C No23 at the Nürburgring in 1989; Nissan often race with this number – ni in Japanese is two, san is three

NISSAN ARCHIVE

AT THE END OF A YEAR IN WHICH Honda of Japan have shone so brightly in Formula 1, let’s spool back some 30 years to the Group C World Sportscar Championship contender fielded then by rival major Japanese manufacturer, Nissan.

The name Nissan is derived from Nihon Sangyo, meaning somewhat disappointingly just ‘Japan industry’. Before World War 2 the Nissan Group absorbed DAT, making motor cars under the Datsun brand. The wider Group’s wartime activities in support of the Japanese military left it with a tainted image, and so its cars were marketed under the Datsun brand name until a rather more forward-thinking management decreed resurrection of the Nissan title across global export markets from 1981.

That growth in Japanese industrial confidence and ambition into the 1980s helped the nation’s three major motor manufacturers, Mazda, Toyota and Nissan, follow Honda’s lead in recognising the promotional possibilities attached to toplevel racing. The industry had become world leaders in producing reliable, dependable passenger cars for mass sale – but most were, in essence, pretty grey porridge.

A huge company with big racing ambitions, Nissan failed where Ford once succeeded, but in period their 1989 Nissan R89C was a spectacular new Group C challenger to Sauber- Mercedes, Jaguar and Porsche…

BODYWORK

Vacuum and heat-formed carbon/kevlar composite body designed by Lola/ Nissan and developed in Cranfield Institute 1:3- scale wind tunnel testing

WHEELS & TYRES

Speedline 13.5x18in front wheels with Dunlop 18/320/6.50 tyres (front), 15x19in rear wheels with Dunlop 19/350/750 tyres. Initially cross-ply tyres all round, later cross-ply fronts/ radial rears – then radials all round. Precise details varied from venue to venue

WINDSCREEN

One of the longest lead-time items on Group C closed-coupé cars – as on such classics as the Porsche 917 and Ferrari 512 of the 1970s – was always the windscreen moulding. Those used on the Nissan R89C reportedly proved problematic as body movement popped them from their seals