Light-duty, two-wheel-drive pickup trucks are a sleepy segment in the enthusiast vehicle marketplace. They don’t exactly meet the definition of “high utility” like a traditional 4WD pickup would, and most of them were used in fairly crude fashions, from parts store runabouts to the cheap option for a workhorse if you ran a contracting business from the back of your garage. Suffice to say, there aren’t many left that don’t have a giant “TOYOTA” on the tailgate worth owning. This 1986 Nissan 720 King Cab pickup is a pleasant exception to the rule, and is listed here on eBay with bids to $3,450 and no reserve.
I have fond memories of a junkyard find truck that was in as nice of condition if not slightly better condition than this one. It, too, had the desirable “ST” – or “Sport Truck” package, with its unique decals on the rear fenders and some nice upgrades in the cockpit. The Nissan I saw was red with a gray interior and it was from Florida, so rust was non-existent. It’s a shame it got junked, and I wish I had known then what I know now, which is that clean examples like this 720 in Alabama are very hard to come by.
But rarity doesn’t translate to value, as the bidding on this truck goes to show us. It’s too bad because the ST package actually got you some nice add-ons, like the three-spoke steering wheel shown here and a sunroof. Interestingly, the truck I saw in the bone yard in Orange, Massachusetts, also had a cool auxiliary gauge cluster in the lower center console with readings for oil pressure and battery voltage; I don’t see it on this truck. Check out the very 80s upholstery pattern.
Like all 2WD, Japanese pickups from the 1980s, horsepower was not a priority. After all, just what are you even hauling with such a light-duty rig? The four-cylinder is likely perfectly reliable and sufficient to move a light-weight truck like this around, but the 5-speed manual would have been a far better match in a truck like this. But again, this is a vehicle you’re buying for a the honest preservation and the low likelihood of finding another “ST” Nissan 720 this clean any time soon.
I had a 79 Datsun 620 King Cab, one of the best and most reliable vehicles I ever had, unfortunately rust liked it more than i did…
I had one also – a 79 PL620 (no name given it) King Cab variant.
It had a niggling carb problem, and I was living financially on the edge…and it was ten years old. A Texas trucklet that somehow wound up in a used-car lot in Ohio. No rust when I bought it, but one Northern Ohio winter changed that, drastically.
For all that, it was a great rig. It had MUCH better road manners than an Escort – a CAR, for cripes’ sake. The seat was perfect – sitting higher, comfortably. Manual steering was light; and the four-speed gearbox was precise. Only issue was the carb, and probably a replacement would have solved it…but I never had enough money in a stack to do it.
And the styling…it was crisp, clean…very American, almost, with the blade front fender lines, almost something out of the 1970s GM styling studio. Nissan/Datsun would never repeat those golden years.
It was far from perfect; but if such a truck, just as it was then, were to appear in dealerships…I’d buy one in a second.
This one, the 720…the styling didn’t work, any more than the 280-ZX’s styling upgrade worked. I never drove one, but I don’t care for the awkward block design.
The D50 “Hardbody” was a much-better styling exercise. But everything that made the 620 great, was missing in the D50. Heavy steering. Cramped seating. Mediocre gas mileage. A trucklike transmission – not the crisp, light shifting of earlier Datsuns.
Well, times change – and that’s why these transportation utility rigs now command such high prices. Because, frankly, they’re far superior to the limited, pricey options we have today.
Wow, if this was red it would be identical to my first car. I don’t think we got 3 years before the bed rotted through, with the floors and doors following shortly after. The spare tire fell off on the highway when the cradle rotted off, and the exhaust fell off after hitting a pothole. Needless to say, I haven’t bought a Nissan since.
Smart man!
A little bit of PM (washing the sludge off the bottom) occasionally might have helped to slow down the tin-worm. Tough for any vehicle to be rust proof, especially the low cost ones with thin metal to keep them light.
Yeah they were junk out of the box. Had one hated it. Anything over scrap price you paid way too much
My dad bought one just like this.. w/5 spd.. and put 300k+ miles on it. It was a great little truck. If i needed this i would not hesitate to buy it. My El Camino does my light hauling.
I had several MD21/Pathfinders/Terranos, whitch came after the 720 and they where the most reliable vehicles I ever owned, though they where all diesels. All of them had 200’00 miles and more on the clock when I bought them but they just kept running. Over here in New Zealand we call them “bulletproof” and there are still lots of them on the road.
Second half of 1986, the body style went to the next generation.
I had an 85 model regular cab in this same color with an automatic tranny. It sorely needed the five speed unless all you do is very light duty. It carried itself down the road very well, but didn’t get near the gas mileage of my 92 I had later with five speed.