Couped up

One way to make sure Trini reads this site is to throw in something about the Nissan GT-R, which is hitting dealerships even now at a price that will make your nose bleed. Car and Driver actually managed to hook up its test gear to one of Nissan's engineering mules, and they titled their review "Big, Heavy, and Incredible." I was reading over the spec sheet, and one number jumped out at me: 232 cubic inches (3.8 liters), within 2 cc of the Ford Essex V6 that had been dropped into my old Mercury Cougar. So how does today's oversized two-door compare to the oversized two-door of twenty-five years ago? We've got numbers:

Horsepower:

• Cougar: 120 hp @ 3600 rpm
  
• GT-R: 480 hp @ 6400 rpm
  

Zero to sixty:

• Cougar: 11 seconds
  
• GT-R: 3.3 seconds
  

Top speed:

• Cougar: 105 mph (though speedo quits at 85)
  
• GT-R: 191 mph
  

Gas mileage:

• Cougar: 16 mpg
  
• GT-R: 16 mpg
  

Price (2008 dollars):

• Cougar: $23,050
  
• GT-R: $70,475
  

Oh, well, you can't lose them all.

Posted at 1:16 PM to Driver's Seat