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2023 Nissan Z on Display at the Petersen Automotive Museum

Can a car be art? Yes, but not exactly any car. The question is, can the 2023 Nissan Z be considered art? The Petersen museum thinks so, which is why a pre-production model is now on display on the third floor.
2023 Nissan Z on display at the Petersen Automotive Museum 76 photos
Photo: Petersen Automotive Museum
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Greatly influenced by the design of the 240Z that started the Z-car lineage in 1969, the latest generation retains the Z34 chassis code of the 370Z because it shares the front-midship architecture of the previous model. Given that sports cars are not selling well, it was the right call for Nissan.

We also have to remember that plenty of four-wheeled art doesn’t feature bespoke platforms. This trend was particularly obvious in Italy in the heyday of Pininfarina, Zagato, Bertone, and countless other coachbuilders.

On display at the Petersen museum until April 22nd, the pictured car is riding on Rays aluminum wheels complemented by red-painted brake calipers. No fewer than three specifications will be available in the first year of production, starting with the Proto Spec, which costs 6,966,300 yen in Japan.

That’s $54,110 at current exchange rates. Lesser siblings come in the guise of the Z Performance and Z Sport. Available with a nine-speed automatic produced under license from Mercedes-Benz or a six-speed manual transmission, the Japanese sports car flaunts rev-matching technology and a mechanical-type LSD as long as you go for the Z Performance manual.

The go-faster specification also flaunts super-lightweight forged aluminum-alloy wheels mounted with Bridgestone Potenza S007 summer-only rubber shoes. Another way to tell the Z Performance apart from the Z Sport is the rear spoiler, which mitigates lift by creating positive pressure where the rear hatch and spoiler meet. A grand total of nine exterior finishes are offered: Black Diamond Metallic, Gun Metallic, Rosewood Metallic, the pictured Boulder Gray, Brilliant Silver, Seiran Blue, Ikazuchi Yellow, Passion Red TriCoat, and Everest White Pearl TriCoat. The latter six are combined with a Super Black roof that gives the redesigned Z a more dynamic and aggressive look.

As a brief refresher, the only powertrain available is a 3.0-liter V6 with a couple of boosty snails for good measure. In this application, it makes 400 horsepower (405 ps) and 350 pound-feet (475 Nm) between 1,600 and 5,600 rpm.

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About the author: Mircea Panait
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After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well.
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