Nice 1980s Survivor: 1987 Nissan Stanza XE

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Introduced in 1986, the T12 Stanza was designed to function as a family car. It offered comfortable motoring and reasonable levels of economy. Many have now disappeared from our roads, so finding an example as nice as this one is becoming a rarity. The owner has decided to part with this 1987 model, so has listed it for sale with the opening bid set at $1,987. You will find the Stanza located in Redwood City, California, and listed for sale here on eBay.

Nissans and Datsuns of the 1970s through to the mid-1980s were somewhat plagued with rust issues, and this claimed a great many of them. Basically, if a Nissan passenger car from the 1980s has survived to the present day, then that’s a pretty reassuring sign. This one appears to be the product of fairly careful ownership and is in really nice condition for a 32-year-old car. It’s a one owner vehicle that has spent its entire life in California, so this will have helped its cause enormously. The panels and paint look really good, with only a few minor scratches and chips, which you would expect after all of these years. The owner also has the owner’s manual for the car, along with the original window sticker.

Under the hood is the CA20E 4-cylinder engine, which sends its power to the front wheels via a 4-speed automatic transmission. Due to the fact that the Stanza shared its underpinnings with the Maxima, the Stanza was a vehicle that was considered to be a bit heavy and underpowered with this engine and transmission. However, while it might take a little longer than larger cars to wind itself up to highway speeds, once there, it will cruise effortlessly all day. The owner claims that this Stanza has only covered 69,000 miles. If this is true, then that engine and transmission should have plenty of life left yet. Judging by the physical appearance of the engine, it all looks tidy and clean under the hood, with no signs of any ongoing problems or issues. The owner also provides a YouTube video of the Stanza running and driving, and you will find that at the bottom of this article.

In the 1980s, Nissan had a lot of trouble achieving color consistency across its various internal plastic trim items, and this was not a problem that was isolated to any particular country. I have owned several 1980s-vintage Australian designed and built Nissans, and they all had the same problem. That is the reason why you can see a number of shades of blue plastic inside this Stanza. leaving that aside, the interior of this car is in quite nice condition. The material on the driver’s door is quite heavily soiled, and this was another common problem. However, this can be addressed to an extent, as this is usually caused by the oil and perspiration out of human skin. There are cleaning products on the market specifically designed for removing organic stains, and one of these should fix that. The seats in the Stanza are amongst the most comfortable that you will find in a volume production car, providing plenty of support in all of the right places. This Stanza also comes equipped with power mirrors, an AM/FM stereo radio with 4 speakers, and air conditioning.

This Stanza is not a car that will set your pulse racing, but these are a comfortable long distance cruiser that will return surprisingly good fuel consumption figures. They will easily seat two adults and three children, and the relatively small exterior dimensions make them a breeze to drive in city or suburban traffic. This also makes the Stanza a great candidate for a first car. You simply don’t see that many of these around today and any that have survived for this long must be good cars. This Stanza seems to meet those criteria nicely.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gVQqzD2u8g&feature=youtu.be

Comments

  1. Scotty GilbertsonStaff

    Nice! I miss my beloved and uber-rare rust-free 1986 Nissan Stanza 4WD 5-speed wagon every day, it would have been a great winter car. https://flic.kr/p/29Ds86W It’s easy to sink thousands and thousands (and thousands and thousands) of dollars into these cars (don’t ask me how I know) and you’ll never get it back again, much like any restoration project. But, we’re not in this hobby for the money, are we? The hatchback sedan is a rare bird for sure, nice find, Adam!

    Like 4
  2. DayDreamBeliever DayDreamBeliever

    As I said…. Scotty’s taste in cars is….. ;-)

    Like 2
  3. PDXBryan

    These were really good cars and, as I remember, were actually fairly quick for their day.

    Like 0
  4. Ralph

    Back in my day a Japanese car was a JAPANESE car

    I love the “super rad” graph paper background on the gauges. These had 2 trip odo’s which was kind of a clever feature, a stick would be better, but this is a cool driver, these also had those odd bathroom vent looking things on the rear quarter.

    Like 1
  5. Maxwell

    I own a collection of cars from the 80s and early 90s. From Supra to Datsun 280zx turbo to Mercedes W124 and W126 and more. When it comes time to haul my bikes or a large Costco purchase, my car of choice is my minty 88 Maxima wagon. It always puts a smile on my face and I get smiles wherever I go. I adore this boxy lines, flush mounted headlamps and graphic EQ.

    Like 2
    • Kenneth Carney

      Almost bought an ’83 off a friend in
      ’88 or so. After doing my homework,
      boy was I glad I didn’t buy it. What a
      POS! Oveeheating, brake problems,
      and wheel bearing issues were just
      for starters. The build quality of ’80’s
      Nissans was abismal. Count ypurself lucky if you got a good one.
      To cap it off, mechanics here in Winter Haven, Fl. wouldn’t touch ’em
      with a 10 foot wrench. If rust didn’t
      get ’em, the build quality certainly
      did. Used to see a lot of these and
      Yugos in U-pull-it yards around here.
      The nicest Stanza I saw there was
      almost new and junked at just 5K
      miles! After that, I just say no to
      Nissans.

      Like 0
  6. GeorgeL

    I had a 1987 Sentra I bought new back in the day, so seeing Nissans of this vintage certainly brings me back. Car is in amazing condition, but I can’t imagine there’s much of a collector market for these, even given the rarity of the hatchback Stanza. Hope the reserve is low, would make a fun daily for someone, requiring likely a new timing belt and a trip the detailer.

    Fun fact: in Europe, this generation (T12) was called the Bluebird, even though this model traces its lineage to the Japanese-market Nissan Violet, not the Bluebird.

    Like 0
  7. John Rayner

    Hi
    What a great find… in the late eighties I was working at a Nissan/ Austin Rover, dealership here in Yorkshire. I was able have a company car and we usually found one of the hire fleet with the most fuel in.Amongst the dismal Austin Rover cars, we had several T12 and it’s British T72 version.The car was badged as the Bluebird but essentially the same.
    I used 1.6/1.8/2.0 hatches & saloons, the diesel (yawn🙈), a 2.0 station wagon (known as an estate in the UK 🇬🇧) But top of the hill was the daddy – the Bluebird 2.0ZX Turbo…what a car!
    Interestingly many of the T12/T72 parts were different and didn’t interchange?
    We generally put them on the forecourt after a few months to avoid building the mileage too high.
    Aaah good times…

    Like 0

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