I’ve been seeing this Sentra two-door sedan running around town. It got nailed pretty hard, but not enough to put it out of commission. Good thing, as two-door sedans aren’t exactly a growing demographic. I’m surprised the rear suspension escaped serious damage, although that rear wheel is obviously not the original one, which undoubtedly did get hit.
Ouch. I don’t have a whole lot of love for these — college buddy had one and it was the cheapest-feeling car I’d ever ridden in. But yeah, they’re mighty rare today and it’s a shame to see this one crunched.
You have obviously not ridden in many cheap cars.
I’ve been in my fair share of ’80’s and ’90’s economy cars and these cars made my Cavalier feel like a Cadillac. I’ve felt more substantial doors on a port-a-potty.
No doubt these Sentras have some virtues, but my buddy’s specimen stands out in my mind as the flimsiest feeling car I’ve ever been in.
Flimsy and cheap are not the same thing. They did have very light weight doors. But they also had exceptional engines/transmissions, exceptional performance, great handling, and exceptional steering and shifter…for the money. If you were looking for performance on a budget, this was it. They were definitely NOT “cheap feeling”.
Funny story.
In 1999 I left Brazil and came to Atlanta GA as an immigrant. A year before, a very good friend of mine did the same, after a couple months working in the States, he sent to us a photo of the first car he bought in America. It was a 2 door Sentra just like this one… His whole family and I were pretty disappointed with his new acquisition… We were expecting something way cooler.
I do not see that damage being easy to fix, but who knows, maybe the steel bends back easily and I bet the speed of the T-bone is lower than we think it was. Who knows how long they will drive it for. SE Stark and SE 60th Avenue in Portland is one of the intersections where you can easily attain this kind of damage since the two streets do not make a perfect intersection for some reason.
Ouch! I hope no one was hurt. If the other driver hit hard enough, he could’ve bent the car out of shape, rendering it unsafe to drive. I’ve seen a few two door Sentras in the Seattle/Tacoma area.
Only in America could that not be considered a fatal blow!
Fair enough, but don’t forget about Africa:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/overloaded-ccs-in-africa-a-gallery-of-use-and-abuse/
Have a close friend that bought a 1989 base Sentra coupe, bright red, gray vinyl buckets. It was a 4-speed, no options, paid $7400 for it brand new out of the showroom! Had absolutely NO problems with it right up to 100k miles. Sadly it was totaled and junked, but would have easily hit 200k without a glitch. Did it feel tinny and cheap? Yes, but it was also $7400!
I don’t think the passenger side door opens anymore.
I learned how to drive a stick on one of these! It was an ’89 2dr sedan just like the one in the pic.
With a 5 speed, these were actually pretty nimble and fun to drive.
A shame about the T-bone crash–I suspect frame damage.
From what I’ve seen, the B12 Sentras are fairly rare, but B13’s are still relatively common. I’ve spent way to much time on Craigslist looking at Sentra’s….. If the window was broken and can’t be replaced, I’ll bet it will be driven thru the summer and then junked once its starts to rain more.
Not a fatal blow, but it’s what I would call a Career Ending Injury. That car ain’t long for this world. Unless the owner a very rare combination of cheap + poor + motivated + not image conscious + good at bodging, it will probably get junked pretty soon.
Yeah I’d say it gets driven to the wrecking yard within a month or two of the cold weather/rains taking hold for the winter at the latest. Unless as you said the person just can’t afford to replace it in which case it may make it a year or two.
The “B12” Nissan Sentra of the late 1980s looks eerily similar to the Audi 80/Fox from ten years earlier, as well as other contemporary VW/Audi designs.
Nissan in the 1980s was building B2 Passats under license in Japan as the VW Santana, so I wonder if they “absorbed” some styling bucks and design inspiration in the process.
I would suspect the ’68-73 Datsun 510 was a major inspiration, but how those lines were interpreted for the ’80s was definitely Euro-inspired.
I very highly doubt, those POS Brazilian VW Fox or 70’s Audi Foxes were inspiration for the B12 Sentra… The inspiration was the U11 1985-88 Maxima.
The Sentra already had a proven track record of reliability as a good car, as was it’s predecessor the Datsun 210.
No 70s – 80’s VW or Audi could say that… Except the Audi 4000, very reliable lil car, and wasn’t plagued with sudden acceleration of it’s big brother the garbage 5000 1978-87.
Surprised Audi survived after that fiasco, funny how they are still plagued with electrical gremlins. Always liked the way Audis handled, the Audi GT coupe Quattro, my fave… But those vices keep me away.
Looks better than this one I found.
Now if that one got T-boned – ouch!
A friend of mine had one of these and got rear ended by a full size pickup doing about 50. The seatback broke, and he fell back just as the leading edge of the trunk lid passed above him. That forward edge ended up even with the B pillar. He wasn’t injured at all, but it would have been curtains for anyone in the back.
I had the seatback on MY 2007 sentra break when I was rear ended. I wound up unconscious in the backseat. The driver that hit me ran but was caught and cited for felony hit and run because witnesses got her tags and I was injured. I still have part of a bottle of painkillers from then left over because percocet gives me migranes. I save those for really bad arthritis days.
Still wondering why the seatback broke. Should there be a recall? Is there some federal standard for seatback resiliency?
You might not want to mention that online. A quick google search of your user name did yield a city and state and even a photo, presumably identifying you. http://bangordailynews.com/2015/05/30/news/mid-maine/home-invasion-victim-hopes-others-learn-from-her-mistake/
Nice…
BTW this Sentra is a 1990 model recognizable by the one-year-only shoulder belt buckles on the doors. This type of passive restraint was among the worst to live with from day to day (no way to flip the front seats forward and climb in the back!), so it doesn’t surprise me at all that they’ve been disconnected on this car.
Hopefully they were connected when the owner experienced this inglorious wreck…
That wouldnt have got past one traffic cop here the deformed sill is enough to render it unroadworthy never mind the bent B pillar.
Interesting as I well remember many oldies like this still being daily driven years after by poor folks .
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When I was 15 or so i swapped the labor of a valve job on a ’56 VW Beetle for a fire engine red ’56 Beetle (Oval window) that had similar driver’s die collision damage , I popped an engine it and forced the driver’s door to open and close ~ ! VIOLA ! I was driving again .
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Some months later a mechanic told me I should use a hydraulic bottle jack and some 4 X 6 wood to push the B pillar back out because it looked so bad ~ I did so then waxeds that old $29.95 Earl Schieb resale red paint job to the max and drove it a while longer .
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-Nate
I owned one of these for a few weeks in high school. It was a 1989 the first year they refreshed it (you can see the ever so slightly rounded corner/headlights.) I bought it in 2010 for about $400 with the intention of keeping it around to recycle come smog time. I was driving a 1991 Mirage at the time and although that car was pretty cheap, it felt like a Lexus compared to that Nissan.
It would stall at stops frequently but I remember the engine in that car was quicker than I expected. I got tired of moving it for street cleaning and sold it fast to a guy for about $100 less than I bought it for. There are more than a few still puttering around Los Angeles along with their successors. My mother liked that car for it’s sheer simplicity and still suggests I find another one as a beater.
Yep, like Bryce said, structural damage like that would render it instantly unroadworthy in New Zealand, and if you tried to use it you’d likely get it pink-stickered (which means a huge fine and possible car-impounding if you dare drive it again before it’s fixed).
But as we both know people do drive dungas like this, mind you a few shoves with a porta power in strategic areas and a little bog and paint and it would be all good again (a coat of paint will hide a multitude of sins) as they say.
Even in America this car would be a rolling excuse to be pulled over.
A Sentra 2-door of this generation has recently showed up at a shopping center I frequent. I’ve seen it twice, on different trips and in different spots, so perhaps it’s an employee car. Need to remember to get some photos the next time I see it–Sentras of this generation aren’t common, especially as 2-doors. (Though not as rare as the 3-door hatchback, which I’ve only seen one of in the past 10+ years.)
Who says, Eugene has all the CCs?
My part of Southeastern MA has our fair share of CCs.
You feel like your in a 70’s or 80’s time warp, sometimes.
BAM!!
Since this thread I’ve been thinking about it every time I see another old beater that’s smashed in but still out driving around (pretty much daily) ~ what nazi state would sideline a car for simple collision damage that doesn’t affect safety / driveability ? .
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I wish I had a camera at the ready as So. Cal. is littered with rigs like this , puttering along taking Working Class Folks to and fro .
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-Nate