Forget the silly name - the Nissan Qashqai is a deserving cash cow

THE Nissan Qashqai is a bit like the geeky kid everyone seems to have gone to school with. Studious and destined to go on to greater things, but entirely fair game for the playground bullies because some cruel parents have given it a stupid name.

I’ve just spent a couple of days in the company of the latest 1.5 DCI model and almost felt compelled to leap to its defence because people couldn’t resist calling it names. Sticks and stones – apt, given its off-roader pretensions – may break its parts but words will never hurt it.

“Ahhh, so you’ve got a Nissan Squashed Quiche! Any good?” a mate of mine immediately asked when he found I’d got the nation’s fifth best-selling new car as a temporary companion.

I replied by telling him that yes, I can understand entirely why so many of you are buying them. It’s roomy, easy to manoeuvre for something of its off-roader stature, and it’s well equipped. In fact, easily my favourite thing about the latest model is the optional Blind Spot Warning system, which flickers a tiny little orange lightbulb next to your door mirror every time an errant Transit thunders past. It’s got the potential to save your life on a congested motorway, but it doesn’t beep intrusively every ten seconds. Just that little orange flicker to remind you. Why can’t all cars have one?

Another pal wasn’t surprised when I told him. “They’re great, those Cash Cows. Loads of people I know have got ‘em”.

Agreed. Not only is usefully more practical than Nissan’s family hatch for the same sort of money, the Pulsar, it’s got a chunky, rugged look to it the more conventional Golf rival doesn’t. Like the first generation Cash ‘n’ Carry – sorry, Qashqai – it’s also built in Britain so you can justifiably buy one as a patriotic purchase, and unlike the first generation model it doesn’t suffer from having slightly cheap-feeling plastics throughout its interior.

It was my dad, however, who posed the big question. “It looks like a good car, the Mushy Peas,” he said. “But would you buy one?”

Personally, I wouldn’t – but that’s because the Skoda Yeti I tried a few weeks ago could endure trickier terrain and carry bigger bookcases than the Crash Bandicoot can, and I know the Nissan makes up for it with better looks and a nicer drive.

The great thing with this bit of the market is that everyone makes a small, off-roader-esque car these days – but the Nissan’s one of the best because it’s such a good all-rounder. That’s why it’s such a big seller – and why it really is a Cash Cow.

The inconvenient truth about electric car sales

HERE’S some shocking news you probably weren’t expecting – sales of electric cars have gone through the roof!

That’s the message from the Department for Transport, which is proudly trumpeting the fact that sales of what it calls Ultra Low Emissions Vehicles are up 366 per cent from this time last year. That’s plain English for not only the likes of Nissan’s LEAF, which run on electricity alone, but plug-in hybrids like Toyota’s Prius, which lace the eco-friendly cocktail with a spot of petrol power to spice longer journeys up a bit. It’s a huge rise, which is why the Government’s just committed to chucking half a billion quid at boosting ULEV sales.

But – surprise, surprise – there’s a catch. Dig a little harder into the figures Whitehall would rather you didn’t read and it turns out it’s not quite the miracle you’d think.

Yes, sales of the sort of eco-friendly offerings that get Whitehall’s official stamp of approval – and for that, you need fewer than 75g of carbon dioxide to escape from your tailpipe, or preferably none at all – are three times what they were a year ago. In the first four months of this year, Britain took 9,046 of them to its bosom. To put that into context, the total for all vehicles – cars, vans, buses, bikes, the lot – was 872,000. In other words, even with the huge surge in popularity the eco-friendly ones the Government’s so keen to push make up barely one per cent of the total.

It’d be tempted to sign off in the same way my Maths teacher used to when I tried to pull a statistical fast one – a terse ‘must try harder’ – but that’d be skipping an even more inconvenient truth. You shouldn’t dismiss the eco-friendly offerings as sales also-rans, because they’re getting ever better.

The prototype electric MINI I remember driving five years ago – which had batteries so enormous they took up the back seat area and made the whole car feel weirdly leaden – has evolved into the brilliant BMW i3 and its i8 supercar sibling, the latter of which surely qualifies as the first truly cool plug-in hybrid. The Nissan LEAF might not be my cup of tea but you can’t fault its ability to do humdrum hatchback things on volts alone. Best of all, the pub argument credentials for my favourite electric car – the mildly wacky Renault Twizy – has been strengthened by the fact Sir Stirling Moss has recently bought one. Oh, and it’s mid-engined, rear-wheel-drive and tuned by the same people who do the Renaultsport Clio.

If you’re seriously thinking of getting a ULEV, don’t do it because it ticks the bureaucratic boxes. Do it because – once you get past the environmental flim-flam – some of them are actually really good. That’s the real shock behind the sales figures.

The Nissan GYM joke raises a serious point about overweight motorists

NISSAN – via the best April Fool’s gag I’ve fallen for in ages – have raised a serious point about the threat today’s pose to your health and wellbeing. The X-Trail and Qashqai have declared war on your waistline!

In the best motoring joke since BMW announced it was making an M3 pick-up truck a couple of years ago, the manufacturer announced its own automotive battle of the bulge. It’s a shame its new system will never be a reality, because it promises to burn off 1,415 calories on your next commute. Press a button on the dashboard marked ‘GYM’ and you’ll get thinner, pretty girls will flock to you and Jamie Oliver will hail you as some sort of 21st century saint. Brilliant!

It’s a shame it’s only an April Fool’s joke, because if it weren’t I’d have to applaud Nissan for recognising the nation’s motorists are an increasingly bloated bunch and that something had to be done, presumably before the entire road network started to groan beneath their collective weight and slowly sink further into the ground.

In essence, what the fictional GYM button would’ve done was take all the driver aids you’ve paid through the nose for – and then switches them off altogether. In other words, transform your brand new Nissan X-Trail into a bottom-of-the-range 1985 Ford Orion in an instant.

Yet the joke does raise a serious point. As someone who grew up driving Minis and still regularly drives a 43-year-old MGB, I look at all of Nissan’s driver assistance gizmos and conclude they – ironically – do little other than add weight. Yes, the car of 2015 is unbelievably easy to drive, but are the gadgets actually being counter-productive for our waistlines?

The new Ford Galaxy, for instance, can be ordered with a device that does your parallel parking for you. Why? Anyone on a British road should have mastered the manoeuvre by now, so I can only assume anyone who uses it is too fat and lazy to do it themselves.

It’s the same with power steering. Parking a MG or a Morris Minor that’s a bit heavy at 3mph is not the workout you might expect – it’s the entirely normal driving that your granddad would have just got on with, rather than moaning about how difficult it is. Safety devices like ABS are worth every penny, but things like power steering or parking assist are just encouraging us to take the easy option.

It’s nice that Nissan has taken the first step in giving us the option to switch these things off, but really it – and indeed, every car maker – should be selling us cars light and efficient enough not to need them in the first place.

The Lotus Elise – the antithesis of everything the GYM button stands for - doesn’t have any of these devices and it’s all the better for it. Really, it should be prescribed through the NHS to anyone struggling with obesity. It’s the healthiest new car you can buy today, and that’s no joke.

At no point did David Simister fall for Nissan's brilliantly worded April Fool press release during the making of this column. Honest...

Nissan LEAF leads electric car sales charge

SALES of electric cars more than doubled in 2014 compared to the previous year, new figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders reveal.

Among the biggest sellers are Nissan’s LEAF and Vauxhall’s Ampera, but even at current rates the electric vehicles still only account for one in every 220 new cars sold in the UK.

THIS is the new Nissan Pulsar. Will it succeed?

SADLY Nissan's official pictures of its new Pulsar weren't released in time for this week's Champion column, but here is the company's new hatchback hopeful in all its glory.

What can you expect? Well, it's an all-new hatchback using an entirely turbocharged range of engines - a 1.2 litre petrol lump, good for 115bhp, a 1.5 litre turbodiesel which thumps out 110bhp, and - most excitingly of all - a 190bhp 1.6 litre which lands beneath the Pulsar's bonnet early next year.

There's no word yet on prices, but Nissan reckon they can conquer what your fleet manager unceremoniously calls ‘the C-Segment’ - as in the hotly-contested territory currently fought over by the likes of the Focus, Golf and Astra - by blending gadgets on the inside with nifty design detailing on the outside. In the company's own words, Nissan is taking over where the Almera left off six years ago by "using the same design approach and original thinking that produced the Qashqai, X-Trail and Note".

  
Will it work, or will the Pulsar end up stealing sales from Nissan's own Juke and Qashqai models? Only time will tell, but I'm looking forward to getting behind the wheel of the firm's family-friendly contender.

Nissan spices up the Micra with new limited edition

NISSAN is now offering the Micra with a choice of two-tone paintjobs in order to give the supermini a more youthful vibe.

The limited edition Micra, imaginatively called the Micra Limited Edition, costs £12,300 and is available with three different colour combinations – white and red, blue and white, and red and black.

Based on the existing Acenta trim level, which comes mid-way through the Micra in terms of gadgets and equipment, the Limited Edition follows a number of its supermini rivals in offering contrasting roof and mirror colours, notably the MINI One, Vauxhall Adam and Citroen DS3.

The new model, which comes with 15-inch alloy wheels, air-conditioning, cruise control, and a roof spoiler among other niceties, is available to order now.  

Nissan LEAF now easier than ever to own

NISSAN is aiming to make ownership of its electric cars a little less shocking with a series of new incentives.

Anyone looking to buy its zero-emissions LEAF hatchback can now recharge their car for free at any of its dealerships, borrow a petrol or diesel car for up to a fortnight if they need one, and get free a European breakdown and recovery package if they get into trouble.

Jim Wright,  Nissan Motor GB's managing director, said: "By making firm promises across five key areas we are tackling head on some of the questions we hear from potential customers when considering electric cars for the first time. These commitments deliver unprecedented levels of support to customers and make the LEAF a practical, desirable and affordable reality for many more motorists.

"The pledge to offer LEAF owners a free diesel or petrol Nissan for up to 14 days a year is particularly revolutionary. It means LEAF drivers can enjoy the many benefits of LEAF ownership, such as running costs of just two pence per mile, on their normal daily commute and then, when they’re going on holiday or have a longer trip to make, borrow a car that’s more appropriate to their journey."

The scheme, called the Nissan CARE-EV Leaf Customer Commitment Scheme, is aimed at helping eco-conscious motorists overcome the uncertainties they face when buying an electric car for the first time.

Nissan has sold the LEAF here since 2011, and earlier this year started building the zero-emissions hatchback at its UK plant in Sunderland.

 

The offer is available at all 205 of Nissan’s dealerships across the UK.

The new Nissan Qashqai

A NEW version of one of Nissan’s biggest sellers will go on sale across the UK in February, it has been announced.

The second generation Qashqai looks similar to the outgoing model but is longer, lower and wider, and will come with a choice of either two-wheel-drive or four-wheel-drive.

UK prices and specifications for the Qashqai will be announced closer to its launch on February 1.

Find out more about the latest Qashqai at Nissan's UK website.

The Nissan Juke is the modifier's car of the moment

IT WAS as tall as a wardrobe and some might argue about as pretty, but by gum it was quick. In the right hands, the Nissan Juke R could give most supercars a run for their money.

I'm not one of the journalists lucky enough to be given a go in the GTR-engined Ferrari basher but the first time I came across it I heard it before I saw it, an almighty, industrial roar, following seconds later by an unlikely black blur rocketing past on a private test track. Offering the sort of pace Porsche customers are more familiar with in a high-riding hatchback off-roader thing is, you've got to admit, an incredible engineering achievement.

But the Juke R's real success - and I know Nissan's marketing men are probably nodding smugly at this - is that the Juke seems to have become, out of nowhere, the modifier's car of the moment. On increasingly frequent occasions, pimped-out Jukes have become visitors at car shows. The quirkily-styled SUV from Sunderland is treading the same territory the Ford Capri, the Vauxhall Nova and the Citroen Saxo used to call their own.

This is unfortunate, because not only am I yet to drive a Juke (although I've got a little experience of the bigger, duller and even more ubiquitous Qashqai), but, two years on, I'm still struggling to form an opinion on it. One moment I hate its gawky face and faux Paris-Dakar wheelarches, but then the next I'm quietly admiring the direction the stylists took, because while you'll either love it or hate it, you'll have an opinion of some sort on it. Try saying that about the Volkswagen Touran.

But - and I think it's one of the few cars I can say this about - the Juke does seem to take the Pimp My Ride stuff in its stride. Those wheelarches, for instance, are so enormous they make the standard model look a bit underwheeled, but I've seen a couple with enormous alloys and whitewall tyres that look the business. It also, because it looks like a bit bonkers to begin with, seems to suit silly spoilers and tinted windows. I've no idea why, but it's increasingly becoming one of those cult cars that encourages all sorts of automotive creativity.

Which is a good thing. Let me know if you think yours is a bit of a blank canvas...

A Datsun revival could actually work with Nissan's eco know-how

GREAT news! Datsun - a brand you thought had died back in the days of Spandau Ballet and bad leggings - is back.

I am, unfortunately, a bit too young to remember a time when you stroll into a car showroom and drive out in a gleaming new Cherry or Bluebird, but as evocative automotive names go it's not exactly one I've brought up to recall fondly. Google the Datsun Sunny and it'll become immediately obvious why I'd go for a Golf instead.

True, I'll admit the original 240Z sports coupe is deservedly called a classic car, but it on its own can't save Datsun's reputation for being a maker of crushingly dull motors.

So you're probably expecting me to head into town, get my shoes polished and prepare to give plans to revive the name a right old kicking.

But I reckon the Nissan Renault partnership, a sort of Franco-Japanese alliance aiming for automotive world domination, is on the ball and could actually pull off reviving a rubbish brand best known for building boring hatchbacks to boringly high standards.

Take, for instance, Nissan itself, which realised a couple of years ago nobody was buying saloons anymore. It pulled both the Primera and the QX out of the showrooms and instead brought you the Qashqai, a sort of off-roader meets hatchback thingymebob whose name nobody can spell or pronounce properly. A car which you, the great British public, responded to buying them in their thousands. The Nissan Qashqai is absolutely everywhere because you love it.

Nissan then decided, using all the money they'd made from Qashqai sales, to fit wheels to an SR-71 spyplane and go racing at Le Mans. While the car they've created, the Deltawing, looks like something Darth Vader would drive it shows they've got the finger on the pulse, because they're using it to prove small, lightweight cars are better than big, heavy ones. It might only have a 1.6 litre engine but - because it's only got half the drag of a normal racer - that's all it needs.

Admittedly, we're not all Stars Wars villains so you probably won't see the Deltawing for sale any time soon, but what Nissan might be offering you instead by reviving Datsun is the sort of reliability and ruggedness Qashqai buyers love, but with added eco-friendliness and a lower price.

A Deltawing-inspired Datsun with racing-inspired aerodynamics, eco-friendly yet unexpectedly exciting engines, low weight and - crucially - an even lower price? That's a Sunny successor even I'd go for...

If Darth Vader drove a car...

THE same people who brought you the Micra and the Almera have just fitted wheels to an SR-71 spyplane.

This, believe it or not, is not the next Batmobile, but a racing car which Nissan is going to campaign at this year's Le Mans 24 Hours. The DeltaWing, the company reckons, will weigh half as much as a normal racer and have half the drag. And, presumably, twice the wow factor.

Andy Palmer, executive vice president of Nissan, said:

“As motor racing rulebooks have become tighter over time, racing cars look more and more similar and the technology used has had less and less relevance to road car development. Nissan DeltaWing aims to change that and we were an obvious choice to become part of the project.

“But this is just the start of our involvement. Nissan DeltaWing embodies a vast number of highly-innovative ideas that we can learn from. At the same time, our engineering resources and commitment to fuel efficiency leadership via our PureDrive strategy will help develop DeltaWing into a testbed of innovation for Nissan.”


Admittedly, it's not a classified entrant - so technically, it can't win the race anyway - and it's only got a 1.6 litre engine, but because they've bolted an enormous turbocharger it still manages to pump out an impressive 300bhp. Not that any of that matters, because while it's purportedly acting as a technological testbed the thing absolutely everyone will be talking about is that body.

As a sort of cross between an SR-71 spyplane, a Le Mans racer and something out of the Star Wars films I think it looks fabulous.

You probably disagree. Let me know...

Fire up the... Nissan LEAF

THIS is, depending on how you look it, a multiple award-winner that'll start a revolution in motoring or a flop in the making.

It's not unfair to say that Nissan's LEAF, winner of both the European and World car of the year awards this year, is the first electric car to get taken seriously by the motoring press. It's also got the Government's blessing, because they'll give you a whopping £5,000 off as part of efforts to wean you away from petrol and diesel. Getting this car right isn't just good for Nissan, then. It's good for saving the ice caps and mending the ozone layer too.

It's just a shame then that this all-important car isn't going to woo with its looks, which is important because a lots of people do buy cars on style alone. I admire Nissan for avoiding the electric car cliches and going for the classic five door hatchback look, but to my mind at least the fresh-looking front end is ruined by a rear that's strangely proportioned and hard to get used to.


The inside's far better, thanks to a great use of colour coordination, a suitably futuristic dashboard and a feeling of general solidity and safety boosted by its 5-star Euro NCAP safety rating. Roomy, robust and a nice place to be, it's somewhere you'd happily stay even after the battery's run out.

Obviously you don't get your characteristic petrol throb or diesel rattle when you start it up, but the great thing about the noise the Leaf makes is that there isn't any. All you can hear is the roar of the tyres, which you won't notice because you'll be busy wondering why you can't feel the weight of the batteries in the steering or handling. Make no mistake, this is one cleverly-engineered car.

Sure, there's the issue of range - 100 miles, if you're asking - but if you only ever do short trips, like lots of people I know, then it's unlikely you'll notice.

It's tricky to say how much it costs to fill up - it depends on whether you have Economy 7 or not - but the smart money says it'll cost you about 2p a mile in fuel, compared to around 15p for a small petrol car.

But as always there's a price to pay for being ahead of the pack - which is the price. At £23,990, the LEAF isn't rubbing shoulders with Focuses and Astras, but 3 Series BMWs and Golf GTis, and that's after the Government discount.


It's an impressive car but to buy it you'd have to be someone who either has a second car for longer journeys, or just really, really want one.

Video: Life On Cars visits the SMMT Test Day

Champion motoring correspondent David Simister gives his verdict on some of 2011's most important new cars at the Millbrook Proving Ground in Bedfordshire:

Full road tests of all the cars in this video will appear in the Fire Up The... section in the next few weeks.

Why I'm still not charged up by electric cars

IF you make it as far as the motors section in tomorrow's Champion, you'll probably be bored with all the stories about the Coalition Government cutting things. But what if they gave you £5,000 off your next new car?

That's right; David Cuts Cameron and his Lib Dem sidekick, Nasty Nick Clegg, actually announced yesterday that they're going to give you a whopping £5,000 off the price of your next car. Naturally, there's a slight snag to this nugget of good news - it has to run on electricity.

When the scheme starts in January, there will be just three cars on sale in British showrooms which run solely on electricity, which admittedly is three more than this time last year. The Mitsubishi iMiev, the the Smart Fortwo electric drive and the Peugeot iOn. Yet as much as I'd like to save the Earth, I'm yet to be convinced electric cars actually work properly yet.

I base this on my limited experience of driving just one electric car, the zero-emissions MINI E which BMW trialled in the South East earlier this year. I've driven and enjoyed the petrol-powered Cooper on a couple of occasions, but the MINI of the volt-powered variety was - and I choose my words carefully - one of the worst cars I've driven this year.

Sure, with all the power available at precisely no revs at all it got off the line like a greyhound, but the engine braking in particular was appalling; one on occasion, I pulled up safely at a roundabout without touching the brakes. It also had no back seats and a range of less than 150 miles and as much as BMW stressed it was an experiment and not a finished product, I really couldn't recommend it.

I've every hope that the similarly electric Nissan Leaf, which has just been voted European Car of the Year, and Citroen's C-Zero, which has just achieved the not-at-all-impressive feat of being the first car to successfully use the Eurotunnel, prove better buys. But there's still one real price you'll have to pay, and that's the price itself.

With the iMiev - a tiny city car - on sale at £24,000 and the Leaf due to cost about the same when it eventually goes on sale, I just can't see why you'd pay the price of a 3 Series or Golf GTi for a tiny and not terribly inspiring hatchback just because it runs on electricity.

I can't wait to be proven wrong, of course, but at the end of 2010 and even with the temptation of a tasty £5,000 discount, I just can't get charged up about electric cars yet.

Fire up the... Nissan Cube

GET a six-year-old child to scribble a picture of a car for you and chances are their creation would look like something like this.

Nissan's Cube is cute and curious in equal measure, with its deliberately, defiantly boxy stance being the first thing that hits you when you come across it. Paint one red and you're letting yourself in for Postman Pat jokes, but get the colours, wheels and spec right on what's a very Oriental automobile and you'll have an intruigingly different bit of motoring on your hands.

There's no getting around the decidedly high-rise styling - you either love it or hate it, and given that the entire car's named in its honour, it's not going to be changing any time soon. It's particularly sensitive to colours, with pastel shades and white - national colour of Japan, the Cube's home country - being the best bet.

Step inside and it reminds you more of a Tokyo flat than the inside of a car, with more in the way of colour schemes shipped in straight from the Far East, thin, bench-like seats and lots of storage nets, which are not only handy for smaller items but actually lift the ambience of the entire car, adding to the very airy feel created by the expansive window space. With masses of head and legroom, it's about as far removed from the Micra as you can possibly get. You could spend hours marvelling at the ornate netting covering the sunroof in particular, because it honestly looks like the papery walls you imagine line every flat and hotel room in the whole of Japan.

Where it falls down is in the dynamics created by that tall, boxy body, suffering from vague steering and straight-line performance that's nowhere near gutless but not class-leadingly brilliant either, so keen drivers are better advised to look elsewhere. It's still worthy sacrifice to pay for the style and clever packaging, but it's not a car to reward on quiet country roads.

The starting price of £14,000 might put budget-conscious buyers off too, putting it straight into the sight of Volkswagen's Golf and the MINI, but where it scores highly is in providing a car that dares to be different that'll be endlessly reliable.

It's not for everyone but if you're smitten with the style it's well worth a look.

As published in The Champion on December 8, 2010

Nissan Leaf is European Car of the Year 2011

FOR a change I actually agree with fellow Champ columnist Jim Sharpe, of One Man and His Dog fame. Because, judging by this latest evidence, the tree huggers and greenies have won.

In order for the Nissan Leaf to be chosen as this year's European Car of the Year the judges, who are expert road testers from across Europe and therefore know far more about cars than I do, had to do something spectacular. They had to overlook the sporty Citroen DS3, the quirky Dacia Duster, the fun and frugal Vauxhall Meriva, the stylish Volvo V60 and S60, the spacious Ford C-Max and the gorgeous Alfa Giuletta.... and choose an electric hatchback costing £23,000 as their winner.

Regular readers might remember that last year I disagreed with the experts' opinion that the Volkswagen Polo, a worthy-but-dull supermini, was better than the radically packaged and intruiging little Toyota IQ, but this year really is proof that the official contest is a waste of time. For anyone who thinks this moment of madness is a one-off I refer you to the Talbot Horizon and Renault 9, which weren't particularly worthy winners either.

The Leaf might be built in Britain and boast of a greener, cleaner automotive future, but it's still a car which asks you to stump up the price of a Golf GTi for something which can't get you to Glasgow for that all important meeting because it'll run out of battery power and has all the visual appeal of a piece of lettuce.

I admire Nissan for at least trying to solve the problem of global warming, but the Leaf is a spectacularly stupid car.

Worry not, though, because Life On Cars' own Car of the Year award is on the way soon, and the Leaf isn't anywhere near the shortlist of cracking cars launched in the past year.

A Car of the Year special of the Life On Cars Magazine will be published next month.

Forget salad, what the people want are sports cars

JAWS to the floor: it’s the new Nissan Leaf. It’s an eco-friendly motor to save the environment and – if press reports are to be believed – the company’s Sunderland plant. And it’s about as exciting as lettuce.

If you’re going to save the world, at least follow Christopher Reeve’s example and do it in style, not with an electric hatchback which looks suspiciously like a Toyota Auris with larger headlights. Even the name’s unexciting; you’d want to spend a week taming a Mustang or a Celica, but calling a car Leaf makes me instantly think of salad.

Don’t get me wrong, going green is a great idea, but I wish car company executives would get it out of their head that anything with an electric engine, whether it’s got wheels or not, has to be classified as white goods. Why not stick the Leaf’s 90kw batteries into something smaller and sportier?

We British used to be brilliant at this sort of thing; the MG Midget and Lotus Elan might run on planet-killing petrol but they’re small and light enough to get around it, while looking and handling in a way which still embarrasses today’s hot hatches. They prove that small, friendly cars can still have a soul, a point lost with the Leaf.

Mazda’s MX-5 is the nearest modern equivalent but even Nissan has a history of making cars which are frugal and fun. You might dismiss the early ‘90s 100NX, pictured, as being a Sunny in a sequin dress but when you lift out the glass panels and turn it into a micro convertible, you won’t care. It’s also an acquired taste in the looks department but at least it gets an opinion, which is more than you say for the indifferent shrug you’ll give the Leaf in ten years’ time.

The small sports car thing is way overdue a revival, and there’s no better way to replace V8s with voltage. Stick the Leaf’s ‘leccy motor into the 100NX’s modern equivalent, and you’d have the perfect socially-minded sports car. You could even call it 150Z, to make it the 370Z’s smaller sister, give it some mini sports car styling, and it’d be jaw-dropping in a completely different way.

People get paid far more than I do for offering up ideas worse than this.

Can you guess what it is yet?

IT’S time to begin 2010 with something car manufacturers love - one of those awful teaser shots which tell you absolutely nothing!

This is the new Nissan Juke, apparently, but the really rather rubbish picture they’ve just sent me says almost nothing about it. You can see it’s got a rakish roofline and a quirky set of lights up front, but what about the bottom half? Does it have wheels or skis? Until it’s officially unveiled, nobody knows for sure.

Teaser shots are hugely annoying because they do exactly what they say on the tin; they tease. Among my favourites was a series of badly drawn lines which TVR once pretended gave a glimpse of the T350C, and a slightly Dali-esque image which Bentley released shortly before it launched the Continental GT.

But Nissan seems particularly good at it; several years ago a teaser of the 350Z showing a mysterious metallic stripe had the motoring mags stumped. Only when the car came to light a year later did they work out the strange shape was…a door handle.

Cars, no matter how secretive they are, should get shown in their full glory. Unless it’s a Porsche Cayenne.