(first posted 8/9/2013) How could I forget the Nissan Rasheen, when writing about the Wartburg 353? But thanks to Flipper, who posted a picture of the Rasheen at the Wartburg post, I must now give it its 15 minutes of CC fame.
Technically, it’s not one of the Nissan “Pike” retro cars (Figaro, Pao, S-Cargo), but it was built in the same factory. And historically, it’s a significant car because with AWD, passenger car underpinnings, and a unique four-door body, it was argualbly the first modern CUV. Arguably, I said. Its formula became the blueprint for a vast segment of the market today. As such, it predated popular CUVs from Japan like the Subaru Forester, Honda CRV and Toyota RAV4. The AMC Eagle, often bestowed that title, didn’t have a unique body. An obscure but significant footnote to automotive history.
I haven’t seen that one before. What a neat little motor.
We have these in New Zealand. The looks are certainly an acquired taste! There’s a faclifted version named the Rasheen Forza too, slightly better looking in my opinion. The Forza lost the C-pillar windows but gained a four round-headlight front end. There’s also a Hummer kit available for them:
Look close, the name on that silly grille is ‘LUMMER’. Shouldn’t be too hard to turn the ‘L’ into a ‘B’.
Lol, my sentiments exactly! 🙂
Wow, its the Hummer version of the old Rolls Royce Hood on an air cooled Beetle.
A few days ago I saw one of these on the Wellington motorway, a bronze coloured one, and went looking on Google for what the —- it was……..!
But why is there no information to be found online about the Hummer conversion you are talking about? This should be all over the “laugh of the week” category of sites online………
You seem to be the only person who has posted any picture anything like the vehicle I saw. Pimped, Hummer grille, etc
I really like the way this thing looks!
Forgive me if I come across as blunt, but the Rasheen is not the first CUV the world has seen, not even a close call. Toyota’s RAV4 was on sale in Japan starting late spring of 1994, with the Rasheen following nearly half a year later. Outside of the production models, the RAV4’s concept was shown way back in ’89, WAY before anybody was really thinking about “CUVs”…
No need to apologize. Ultimately, these kind of “titles” are often a bit arbitrary and easy to challenge. But FWIW, the RAV4 was a very short, 2+2 vehicle; basically a more civilized version of the very popular shorty 4x4s like the Suzukis.
So although it may well deserve the title technically, CUVs didn’t really take off until they became longer, roomier four doors. And in that regard, the Rasheen deserves the title more.
It’s a bit comparable to what happened in the compact SUV field: there were a number of short compact 4x4s (Montero, Bronco II, Blazer S10, etc), but the field really took off with the Jeep Cherokee (XJ), and it has come to define the genre. Me thinks the Rasheen, although never popular, played the same role as the Cherokee, in defining the CUV genre in the way it came to be successful.
As you know, the shorty CUVs like the swb RAV4 are long gone, having been an evolutionary dead end. Meanwhile, the four-door CUVs have become the some of most popular vehicles on the market.
I knew this title would likely stimulate debate, and there is certainly room for alternative POV.
The 4-door version of the RAV4 appears to have been released in 1995. So, the Rasheen does, indeed, seem to pre-date the car-based (Corolla), unibody, 4-door RAV4 (which is commonly accepted as the first vehicle to define today’s CUV market), but not by much.
On the whole, the theory that the Rasheen is analogous to the Jeep Cherokee in how the SUV/CUV market developed would seem to be apt.
Different OEMs have made what we would now call a CUV in the past. AMC tried putting their Station Wagon atop Jeep running gear with the Eagle. Nissan and Mitsubishi offered their Station Wagon People movers with AWD in the 80s as well. While all of these were popular up here in Sierralandia they never really caught on in the core of the US market.
Toyota and Subaru we’re the 1st to really hit paydirt in the CUV segment in the mid 90s with with RAV4 and Outback. These were the 1st vehicles to offer a higher seating position and optional AWD while retaining most of the better driving dynamics of the cars that they were based upon. Once this proved popular other OEMs followed the playbook of taking a AWD car and adding some combination of higher greenhouse, seating position and larger wheels.
A few years after the Outback & Rav4 the Camry based RX-300 was another major smash hit that really proved the profitability of the CUV market.
My theory of CUV popularity is that people want the utility of a station wagon/hatchback/minivan type vehicle without out the uncool family toter status that such a vehicle signals. Throughout most of the 90s people were willing to tolerate the harsh ride quality and reduced space of “real” truck based SUVs. Now this side of the Jeep Wrangler & 4Runner/FJ “real” SUVs are just about extinct.
It may be a little ugly but it’s a Nissan. To me that means it will probably be capable of covering a lot of miles without drinking too much gas and breaking too much. That will do.
I think I would like to have it right now. I have started to need a back seat.
Thank you. You’ve finally dropped something on me that I’d never heard of, nor seen, before. Absolutely love it.
I don’t know if it was first, since the Citroen Mehari was CUV-esque, but the Matra-Simca/Talbot-Matra Ranchero came along in 1977.
No all-wheel-drive on that one though
Reverse CC-effect, I saw one of these last week a couple of days before the post. As Styles79 says, they are surprisingly low and small – shorter in height than a Corolla
John, you saw a Rancho in Australia? Wow! I’ve always wanted to see one. They look big in photos but I’m not surprised to hear they look much smaller…
No a Rasheen. That really wasn’t clear was it! I see the Rasheen fairly regularly actually.
Aaah, the Rasheen, one of the less loved Japanese imports in NZ. Based on cross between the B14 Sunny and N14 Pulsar platform, I’ve long mused of getting hold of a 4wd one and stuffing the engine and drivetrain out of a GTi-R Pulsar into one for the ultimate sleeper. These don’t get a lot of love down here, which would only add to the sleeper element.
I’d also note that the photo doeesn’t really put this car into perspective very well, these are pretty small, and surprisingly low for a car that’s gone for a “4WD” style look…
It Looks like kishkhodro sinad.
Does anyone know the origin of the name? And by the way, the Outback was not and is not a CUV, regardless of marketing or even industry categorization. It’s a lifted and trimmed-out Legacy wagon. That’s my view and I’m sticking with it ?
Well, this is what Urban Dictionary says. Don’t click if you’re offended by racism and sexism. https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=rasheen
As soon as you said “Urban Dictionary”, I was girding myself for something really offensive. That was a bit underwhelming. “Rasheen” is clearly the name of the guy who uploaded that definition… You’ll see that a lot on UD, search any person’s first name and somebody who has that name will have posted an extremely flattering definition of themselves. So lame, haha.
Always thought these looked cool.
Incidentally, I just moved to a new neighborhood and I keep seeing a mint green Figaro driving around. I hope I can get some photos of it…
There is something very appealing to the lack of pretense in the styling of this car. Its not trying really hard to impress anyone.
Having been a fan of these, I finally saw one of these in the basement of the Lane Museum a couple of years ago. As stated above, it is surprisingly small, in my mind I had always figured it about 25% larger than it actually is. Very cool little machine though. Function before form.
I’m gonna say Subaru beat them by a good 14 years. We owned three of them- at the time, they were the only game in town if you wanted a 4X4 compact wagon. No one thought to call them a CUV back then.
That’s because they’re not CUVs. The definition of a CUV that we adhere to is that it is passenger car-based, but has a unique body. Subaru wagons and the Outback are thus not true CUVs. The Forester does qualify, though.
OK. But by that definition, a ’84 Tercel 4WD Wagon would, wouldn’t it?
Maybe. I agree it represents a good argument as to why it should be. But here’s the argument as to why not: It was just a 4WD version of the regular FWD Corolla wagon, which happened to have “tall boy” styling, which was a big thing in Japan at the time. It’s analogue to the tall boy Honda Civic wagon from the same era. But the Civic wagon was not intended to have 4WD, and was only adapted to it later.
Both of these tall boy wagons were designed to maximize interior seating and space over their sedan counterparts. And the FWD versions were the main sellers, globally.
My definition of a genuine CUV is that it was designed specifically to be an AWD vehicle, a compact, car-based SUV, in other words. Admittedly, non-AWD versions of some SUVs and CUVs did come along later, but that was not how they were originally intended.
I admit that like most automotive definitions, “CUV” is nigh-near impossible to pin down perfectly. And I admit that the case for the Tercel wagon is a pretty good one. But what do we call the base FWD Tercel wagon? It omitted some of the trim, sat lower and had smaller wheels, etc. Nobody would call it a “CUV”.
Ah- I’m thinking locallly, not globally. When the Tercel Wagon was first introduced here, no mention was even made in the brochure of a 2WD version. It was marketed as the “Go Anywhere” version, as opposed to the more traditional FWD Corolla Wagon. This page comes from Toyota’s late ’83 full-line brochure. I honestly wasn’t thinking of the car in terms of Toyota’s global marketing efforts.
I agree with you Paul that the Tercel wagon / Sprinter Carib is somewhat problematic to label as a CUV. The preview concept RV-5 of 1981 clearly indicated Toyota saw this as an off-road capable vehicle with plenty of utility. That said, I really think it was more of an exercise to see how much Toyota could steal away from Subaru’s 4WD market share.
“I’m sorry, Mr B, but that scratchy rasheen you have has come from a small wartburg and we’re going to have to remove it.”
“But doctor, will I be able to go back to my old job as a rogue forester again?”
“Of course! Rav parties too. 4 of them at once, in fact!”
My last trip from FL to PA I passed a “car” that from the back looked quite similar to this. Without consulting Wikipedia I can’t say how this is related to the Nissan Xtrail. I was surprised to see such a small SUV looking vehicle with a Nissan nameplate….and I had never heard of it before. With my favorite Nissan engine, the SR20DE or it’s turbocharged sister, I would be interested in this.
Just checked Wikipedia and this preceded the Xtrail, with both being built on the Sunny /Sentra platform. The Xtrail almost looks like a miniature Pathfinder.
Bet that Xtrail had Canadian plates. I’ve seen a few in the PacNwst.
I saw quite a few Rasheens when I was in Hokkaido, Japan 10 years ago. Not so many when I went back to live a few years later. They are a cool looking practical with a hatch that folds up with some of the loadspace roof. Also a space saver that is rear mounted and swing out with some ridiculous engrish.
I saw a cream one in Melbourne, Australia once. Chased the owner down. It was the owner of a Japanese restaurant in Brunswick St. He was amused that anyone was intersted in his car.
Never saw one of these in person, but I do remember hearing it was based on the Sentra – maybe the Juke is what replaced it in Nissan’s lineup, given its rather off-beat styling? I see a bit of the original Honda HR-V in its squared-off looks too.