1989 Nissan nxf ute

[kermy79]

heya,

looks like a ford, sounds like a ford, reads 'nissan' 'the ute'.

cant really find out much about this ute, except that it is a rebadged xf ute produced by nissan during some sharing thing australia had going.

and yes it reads as nissan nfx on the plate under bonnet, oh also has ford australia label, cant member what that was for lol

apart from being a ford essentially are they worth buying, from what I can tell they seem to be a rarity these days (could be wrong) which I would presume may make them a little more valuable, or just a novelty item lol

thoughts?

[chookaradley]

It's not worth anything. But as you say it is pretty rare. Nissan and Ford did some model sharing in the late 80s early 90s. Maverick-Patrol, XF ute-Nissan ute, Corsair-Pintara. Cars were really nothing more than the removal of one badge and fitting of another. Compare that for eg with the current BT50-Ranger which share the same underpinnings but look totally different.

[Lunch]

Its been a long time since ive seen 1.. For some reason ive always thought they were called 'the u-beaut ute'. Buy it and put it away, only time will tell, im guessing it wont break the bank and if nothing comes of it, at least uve got a ute, they always come in handy.

[blackf6]

Rip the stick on Nissan badges off. Happy days, sweet Falcon ute.

[devilcv8]

Originally Posted by DeJaVu GT

Rip the stick on Nissan badges off. Happy days, sweet Falcon ute.

Except when the local highway car does transport on your plates and they get back Nissan ute. Easily explained, but it will delay you while they check vin and ensure it isn't a rebirth.

[OwnTheRoad]

Nissan sold them at a loss in the end, no one bought them or if they did they were clueless to buy at full price because they were more expensive from Nissan than Ford.
There were stories about that some were bought at below cost then rebadged and sold again as falcons but build plate still had Nissan lol

[2011G6E]

I remember Wheels magazine had a write up about a guy (a plumber I think) who bought one as a work ute. People laughed at him for buying a rebadged Falcon..."don't you know it's not a bloody Nissan?", but then he said "If I buy that car from Ford, I get the standard Ford 12 month 20,000km warrantee. However, if I buy the exact same car from Nissan, I get the standard 2 year 40,000km Nissan factory warrantee. Questions?"

It was the same, but the other way around, with the Nissan Patrol/Ford Maverick...but it from Nissan you get the standard 2 year warrantee, but buy the exact same thing but with Ford badges and you only get a year.

[Polyal]

So they even stuck with the I6?

[Tommie]

Originally Posted by kermy79

heya,

looks like a ford, sounds like a ford, reads 'nissan' 'the ute'.

cant really find out much about this ute, except that it is a rebadged xf ute produced by nissan during some sharing thing australia had going.

and yes it reads as nissan nfx on the plate under bonnet, oh also has ford australia label, cant member what that was for lol

apart from being a ford essentially are they worth buying, from what I can tell they seem to be a rarity these days (could be wrong) which I would presume may make them a little more valuable, or just a novelty item lol

thoughts?

In the early 1980s the Federal Gov started reducing high tariffs on imported cars. To help out local manufacturers they came up with this sharing models idea. Was known as the Button Car Plan. Idea was for car makers to share models to save dollars and offer more models to compete with imports. Ford and Nissan shared models and Holden and Toyota shared models. I remember the Toyota Lexen the most which was a rebaged VR or something.... The whole thing was generally a failure and abandoned in the early 90s from memory.

[LoudPipes]

Originally Posted by Tommie

Was known as the Button Car Plan.

Yeah I was hoping they’d rebadge a few Ferrari’s and Lamborghini’s at Commodore and Falcon prices but it never happened.

[FERG_51]

Ford got the better end of the deal re the Maverick. They sold like hot cakes at the time.

[commodorenutt]

Ford were doing it with Mazda in the early days of the button plan:
Laser/323 & Telstar/626

The early cars were little more than a nose/tail job, but the 323/Laser evolved into looking quite different by the time the KH Laser appeared (last Aussie made one, at Homebush) they differed significantly

Holden also had a stint with Nissan before Toyota, doing the Astra/Pulsar for 2 model spans, before the Astra was replaced by a Nova/Corolla for 2 model shapes, and the Camry/Apollo sisters appeared for 2 model runs. There was also a stint with Suzuki too - Barina/Swift.

The Lexcen ran for quite a while - from VN to partway into VS. Lexcens were only V6 autos, no utes, manuals or V8s. Toyota also discounted them heavily to shift them, giving buyers who didn't care about the badge better value, until it came time to sell it down the track......

[blackf6]

The only good the plan did was to make spare parts for numerous cars interchangeable.

[commodorenutt]

Very true.

Most people know the obvious ones, but it had far greater reach than a lot of people realise - the twin piston front calipers, master cylinders, and even the banksia handbrake assemblies to name a few. Common core parts, with variations as required to suit each manufacturer.

The FG & Territory fuel tanks even use the same green O-ring as the VE/VF commodore (and both GMH & Ford tanks are made in the same factory in SA, after they closed the one in VIC a few years back).

Makes things a lot easier when service kits (such as caliper seal kits) have so much of their kit contents common across models too - economy of scale works in that respect.

[malazn mafia]

Originally Posted by commodorenutt

The Lexcen ran for quite a while - from VN to partway into VS. Lexcens were only V6 autos, no utes, manuals or V8s. Toyota also discounted them heavily to shift them, giving buyers who didn't care about the badge better value, until it came time to sell it down the track......

if I had to drive a ve/vf commodore with no choice, a set of toyota and lexcen badges would make the experience more palateable

[XR Martin]

Originally Posted by commodorenutt

Ford were doing it with Mazda in the early days of the button plan:
Laser/323 & Telstar/626

These cars wernt part of the Button plan, it was a separate venture between Ford and Mazda.

[Yellow_Festiva]

Originally Posted by Polyal

So they even stuck with the I6?

Identical to XF ute bar badges, price and warranty.

[Lunch]

Originally Posted by Lunch

. For some reason ive always thought they were called 'the u-beaut ute'.

Attachment 85787 maybe thats y

[Lunch]

Lol, you've gotta read the sales pitch under that picture, "the way only nissan knows how"

[OZQUAD44]

The best one I heard during that era, was a Toyota driver indicating he liked the Lexan better than the equivalent commodore because the Lexan had a bigger boot.

[malazn mafia]

Originally Posted by OZQUAD44

The best one I heard during that era, was a Toyota driver indicating he liked the Lexan better than the equivalent commodore because the Lexan had a bigger boot.

And the "just a little bit different" lexcen ad. Very very ironic.

[thehammer]

used to own one, bought a starter motor for it half the fellas at the parts shop didn't even know some were Nissan badged

was a white bench seat auto, no power steering, LSD dunno if it was standard or not, had 440,000 on the clock was still tough as nails

yes on the rego sticker it was a Nissan, and the vin, but someone before me put a ford grille on it, I didn't even know myself it was a Nissan when I bought it until I went to register it

I'm pretty sure Nissan just called it the "Ute"

was still running great when I sold it, unfortunately was a bit rusty and the guy who bought it off me was gonna part it and crush it, shame drove across 3 states in that thing

[dave351cid]

I used to have a " Nissan ute" for about 7 years.
it was the equilelvent to a XF - GLS with T-bar auto, power steering, air cond, LSD ( from memory I think that all the nissans came with lsd)
when I bought the ute in 1996 it was about $3000 cheaper than the Ford badged utes the same and was in better condition then the dearer Fords. I must admit I did walk straight past it at the car yard at first to look at a couple of Ford utes.

it had a big NISSAN sticker on the tailgate, small NISSAN UTE sticker on each front guard behind the wheel and a fairly big NISSAN badge on the grill that looked like it had come off the tailgate of the old Nissan 720 utes. the grill badge was held on with a couple of screws from the outside into the XF grill. when I unscrewed the Nissan badge I found the blue oval Ford badge still on the grill behind. also the cap in the centre of the steering wheel read NISSAN instead of FORD.
ID plate read " Nissan Ute by Ford Motor Company " .

I had to insure it as a Ford ute because Nissan ute didn't show up on their data base.


this is my old girl just before I sold it. I had replaced the XF grill with a XG longreach grill.
http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c2...cid/Top-41.jpg




.

[Franco Cozzo]

I can't believe cars back then had such small warranties, I was thinking the 3 years/100,000km had been the usual warranty on all new cars.

[commodorenutt]

12 months/20,000km was normal in the 80s. It was even worse in the 70s.

[Davehoos]

Dealer I worked for sold 1. warranty was great-parts supply we had to drive to the ford dealer for service parts.

It replaced the 1200 ute --XFN= 1200 ute. its obvious. 6 cyl auto V 1200 4cyl.

the same dealer was a holden Suzuki and mitubishi dealer so the fact they sold 1 was great. we sold a lot of patrols in the hunter valley.

the 1200 ute would not comply with ADR.

same marketing people gave us Nissan patrol long wheel base 1999Kg wagon to replace pintara wagon.
and maxima TI with pearl paint to replace R31 exectutive.

[Ford17]

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

I remember Wheels magazine had a write up about a guy (a plumber I think) who bought one as a work ute. People laughed at him for buying a rebadged Falcon..."don't you know it's not a bloody Nissan?", but then he said "If I buy that car from Ford, I get the standard Ford 12 month 20,000km warrantee. However, if I buy the exact same car from Nissan, I get the standard 2 year 40,000km Nissan factory warrantee. Questions?"

It was the same, but the other way around, with the Nissan Patrol/Ford Maverick...but it from Nissan you get the standard 2 year warrantee, but buy the exact same thing but with Ford badges and you only get a year.

I recall Wheels at the time saying how while the Ford executives were slapping themselves on the back over the success of the Maverick, meanwhile the poor old Nissan guys were stuck with a car "as recognisably Ford as the Edsel".

Wheels also once mentioned somewhere a story about the chief Holden designer during the time of "badge engineering", Phil Zmood.

While he had designed the HQ and various other important models for GMH, at the unveil party for the 'new' Apollo (i.e. re-baged Camry), industry colleagues apparently came up and said to him things like "nice grill there, Phil", "nice wheel covers Phil".

[fordomatic]

Love my Ford Maverick. Even has auto UP windows, pretty good for a 24 year old vehicle. Ford definitely won with that rebadge, they sold bucketloads. not even the current falcons or territory have some of the options i do.