View PhotosRobin Riggs|Car and DriverFrom the June 1982 issue of Car and Driver.The small-car market isn’t what it used to be. High interest rates are choking car sales in general. The economic slump is especially hard on the less affluent, who make up a significant percentage of small-car buyers. And the now-you-see-it, now-you-don’t gas crisis isn’t helping either. With supplies plentiful and fuel prices falling, full-sized gas guzzlers don’t seem so unattractive anymore.This turnabout is reminiscent of the mid-Seventies, when gas-crisis worries were nearly forgotten. Big-car sales made a dramatic recovery, and brand-new Chevrolet Chevettes (the first domestic econoboxes) languished on dealers’ back lots. The situation is even worse today because a lot more cars are vying for the small-car buck. The Chevette is still with us, along with such standbys as the Rabbit and the Omni/ Horizon. The Honda Civic and the Mazda GLC have been redesigned to state-of-the-art standards. Totally new entries, including Ford’s Escort/Lynx and General Motors’ J-cars, have swollen the small-car ranks. A a result, there is now a nine-month inventory of idle Cavaliers and J2000s, and leftover 1981 Rabbits are available at unheard-of bargain prices. Even the seemingly invincible Japanese companies have been affected. Nissan, for one, is having a tough time selling the 451,000 cars that the voluntary import restrictions permit it to sell in the 1982 model year. View PhotosRobin Riggs|Car and DriverMost of the trouble in Datsun’s case centers on the 210 line. It’s supposed to be Datsun/Nissan’s bread-and-butter car, responsible for over 40 percent of total sales. Unfortunately, it’s a rear-drive econobox doing business in a hyper-competitive front-drive world. The new Sentra is expected to cure these problems and have Nissan chomping hard on its import-restriction bit. Like all new models from Nissan, the 210’s successor carries the parent company’s name rather than a Datsun badge, part of the plan to bring the American marketing organization in line with the rest of Nissan’s worldwide operations.View PhotosRobin Riggs|Car and DriverThe Sentra is an up-to-date front-drive design sharing nothing with its predecessor, though it does borrow its powertrain and rear suspension from its 310 stablemates. It’s about two inches longer and wider than the 210; combined with the space-efficiency benefits of front-wheel drive, inclined seat tracks, concave seatbacks, and a dropped rear floorpan, this results in substantially increased interior dimensions. The front compartment is every bit as spacious as a Ford Escort’s or a Mazda GLC’s, though the rear is still a bit smaller. (See chart below.) In any case, the Sentra is much roomier than the 210, swallowing four adults without forcing any unwanted intimacies. Car and DriverMore than mere space is required for a good driving position, however. The Sentra’s steering wheel is unfortunately high, and one feels a bit buried inside, though not because of a tall beltline. The feeling of containment stems partly from Nissan’s inclined seat-track design, which lowers the seat as it is moved rearward. Another contributor to the sunken feeling is the inverted-V sport steering wheel, which encourages letting your hands slide below the usual three-and nine-o’clock positions. Aside from this one minor deficiency, the Sentra’s interior is well laid out. Our top-of-the-line XE had full instrumentation and well-located, readily legible controls and switches. Its overall finish was excellent, with tastefully plush and carefully coordinated materials throughout. Such conveniences as remote-controlled pop-out rear windows are very well executed. View PhotosRobin Riggs|Car and DriverThis carefully conceived interior is offered in four configurations, just as the 210 was: two- and four-door sedan, five-door station wagon, and three-door hatchback. The most attractive editions are the four-door sedan and the wagon, which seem the least stubby-looking. Thankfully, the exterior trim is restrained on all models, though the upmarket cars are burdened with a garish chrome, horizontal-barred grille.Aesthetics aside, the Sentras do cleave the wind quite well, with claimed drag coefficients of 0.39 for the hatchback and 0.40 for the sedans (Datsun now admits that 210s were in the 0.50 range). These meritorious figures are matched by correspondingly excellent EPA fuel-economy numbers: 35 mpg for the regular five-speed Sentra, and an incredible 43 mpg for the one they call MPG. According to the EPA, the Sentra MPG delivers better fuel economy than any other gas-engine car in America. Related Story
- Tested: 1991 Nissan Sentra SE-R
Since at 2100 pounds the Sentra is not especially light (despite the use of 169 pounds of weight-saving high-strength steel), much of the credit for this efficiency must go to its E-series engine. Introduced last fall in the 310, this 1.5-liter, overhead-cam powerplant features the same high-swirl, fast-burn technology used in the Stanza and 200SX engines. It is 46 pounds lighter and takes up less space than the 210 engine it replaces, while developing two more (67) horsepower and three more (85) pounds-feet of torque. That’s enough to power the Sentra from rest to 60 mph in 12.7 seconds, and through the quartermile in 18.6 seconds at 72 mph. Such performance won’t bring an enthusiast’s blood to a full boil, but it’s quicker than that of most econoboxes and enough to handle any traffic situation, even when fully loaded.View PhotosRobin Riggs|Car and DriverExtracting this acceleration, however, requires full use of the Sentra’s gearbox—and 6000-rpm redline. The gear play is a joy, for the Sentra’s shift linkage (tied to the transaxle with a tubular member for maximum rigidity) moves easily and precisely, and the transaxle’s ratios are well paced; unfortunately, the engine emits a woeful wail at 5000 rpm or above. Even though it pulls well to the redline, the noise is severe enough to discourage the use of the power-packed portion of the rev range. Low-rpm acceleration in the upper gears is virtually imperceptible.
In all other respects, the Sentra is a quiet car. The double-walled panels (two layers of sheetmetal sandwiching a foam filler) in the lower-dash and rear-floorpan areas are very stiff and vibration-resistant, effectively limiting noise transmission. Nissan engineers also took pains to minimize road harshness—and therefore noise—with special coaxial rubber bushings at the top of the MacPherson struts; these provide individually optimized load paths for the shock and spring forces. Consequently, at cruising speeds, when engine noise is quite subdued, the predominant sound is wind noise. You hear the ruffle of air over the car only because it has little noise to compete with. View PhotosRobin Riggs|Car and DriverThis excellent isolation doesn’t come at the expense of road manners. The Sentra steers well, with fast, linear power steering and good straight-line stability. During hard cornering, the Sentra is quite neutral and generates a reasonable 0.69 g with its skinny, 4.5-inch-wide wheels. The good steering, balanced cornering, and a pedal layout suited to heel-and-toeing help the Sentra give an excellent account of itself when the going gets twisty. The suspension is not as happy flattening bumps as it is straightening curves, however. On the freeway, tar strips and expansion joints are quite effectively absorbed, but when the bumps get bigger, the suspension can’t keep the Sentra from bobbing. Fortunately, when all of the travel is gone and the bump stops are engaged, there is no sudden crash. Instead, the bumpers in effect serve as secondary suspension elements to keep the more extreme body motions under some degree of control.
Nissan hopes the Sentra will do the same: its mission is to damp out the irregularities and add a little control to the ups and downs of the econobox business. While it’s a tremendous improvement over the 210 in every respect, the Sentra is not the roomiest, the fastest, the most luxurious, or the snazziest-looking small sedan in America. Furthermore, it has not so much as a Datsun nameplate to woo previously satisfied customers. As an eyebrow raiser in the highly competitive small-car lots of America, the Sentra is bound to have its work cut out for it.View PhotosRobin Riggs|Car and DriverSpecificationsSpecifications
1982 Nissan Sentra
Vehicle Type: front-engine, front-wheel-drive, 5-passenger, 3-door hatchback
PRICE
As Tested: $7300 (est)
ENGINE
inline-4, iron block and aluminum head
Displacement: 91 in3, 1488 cm3
Power: 67 bhp @ 5200 rpm
Torque: 85 lb-ft @ 3200 rpm
TRANSMISSION
5-speed manual
CHASSIS
Suspension, F/R: struts/trailing arms
Brakes, F/R: 9.4-in disc/7.1-in drum
Tires: Bridgestone SF Radial
175/70SR-13
DIMENSIONS
Wheelbase: 94.5 in
Length: 167.3 in
Width: 63.7 in
Height: 53.3 in
Passenger Volume, F/R: 49/32 ft3
Cargo Volume: 13 ft3
Curb Weight: 2100 lb
C/D TEST RESULTS
30 mph: 3.5
60 mph: 12.7 sec
80 mph: 25.8 sec
1/4-Mile: 18.6 sec @ 72 mph
Top Gear, 30–50 mph: 14.8 sec
Top Gear, 50–70 mph: 17.8 sec
Top Speed: 97 mph
Braking, 70–0 mph: 201 ft
Roadholding, 282-ft Skidpad: 0.69 g
C/D FUEL ECONOMY
Observed: 32 mpg
EPA FUEL ECONOMY
Combined/City/Highway: 40/35/50 mpg
C/D TESTING EXPLAINED
Source: caranddriver.com
