Technically, it is in Japan as the 350GT. The GTR has now been made into its own make in the Nissan stable. Personally, I think this is a mistake and the public scorned the GTR concept. Latest reports have the GTR coming out in 2005 after a serious body redesign. Everything else is good to go, but the ass ugly body that Nissan hoped people would love on the concept. Man...they were were wrong
The basic Skyline is exactly like the G35 (there is a coupe and a four door). Its rear drive. Basically, the Jap market Nissan Skyline was brought over here, they slapped Infinity badges on it, and called it the G35. Like the Jap version it's got the 280 horse inline 6.
But the GT-R is another story. It's the big daddy. All-wheel drive, carbon fiber, turbos, traction control, every Jap tech goodie known to man. It looks quite different from the reg. Skyline. Check out the versions in Gran Turismo and you'll see what I mean. The GT-R does have the same engine under its hood, but its loaded with waaaaaaaay more stuff, and was engineered to be about 400 horses. The catch is that in Japan the car companies have an unspoken agreement to avoid a horsepower war, and put govners on their engines, limiting them to 280 hp. But the dealers will give you the factory perf. chip in the showroom, and thats all you need to get the 400 hp out in a matter of minutes.
This is why Japan is a serious custom car culture- the aftermarket parts companies like Nismo, Spoon, Renntech, TRD, etc, are huge. The Jap car companies often design their top-performance engines to handle 700 horses, especially Supras, NSX's and RX-7's. The current GT-R just ended production.
Anyway, the G-35 is the new Skyline, but NOT the new Skyline GT-R. Nissan showed a concept car at the Tokyo auto show in 2001, and THAT is what the new GT-R will look like. The big question is whether they'll finally build a left-hand version to sell here. The last one was only exported to England and Australia.....and it sold only to a small cult of fanatics because it was so damn expensive, most guys with that kind of cash are not interested in a car with a Nissan logo on the nose-no matter how fast it accelerates. They but Porsche's and TVR's.
