For years, the GT-R has long become synonymous with Godzilla. And we're not talking the bastardized U.S. version that employed the digital services of a Jurassic Park reject, but the Toho one, rubber suit and all. Both share some obvious characteristics: Japanese origin, freakishly brute power, the ability to bring a nation to its knees, and a roar likened to a derailed freight train being castrated. The R35 however, is not Godzilla. Far from it. If I were to pick a fictional character, it'd be Bruce Banner.
The three previous iterations of the GT-Rs were pure unadulterated sports cars: Power begging to be released from its twin-turbo'd, individually throttle-bodied straight six-, and competition thrashing handling thanks to it's all-wheel-drive ATTESA equipped goodness. With aggressive body lines, Spartan interior, huge wing, responsiveness to tuning, and unbeatable performance for its price, you can see why a Tokyo-crushing, radioactive lizard the size of a building is an apt comparison. But, with the R35, say good night to that bad guy and say hello to Dr. Banner.
For the comic-ignorant, Bruce Banner is a mild-mannered nuclear physicist in the Marvel universe. Gifted, cutting edge, and ahead of his time, he is the pulpy counterpart of the R35. Take for instance the six-speed dual clutch transmission with paddle shifts capable of swapping gears faster than girls do spit around Joe Francis. It shifts as quick as 0.2 seconds and has three cockpit selectable modes (Normal, R-mode for quicker shifts, and Snow mode). For improved weight distribution and center of gravity, the transmission is separated from the front engine via a carbon composite shaft and mounted above the rear axles. With the ATTESA E-TS, power is biased to the rear with up to 50 percent transferred to the front and independently distributed to each axle. If drivetrains could have engineering degrees, the R35 would have a Ph.D., Summa Cum Laude.
Just as intelligent is the cabin of the R35. Gone are the race seats, sparse interior, and accoutrements circa King Leonidas found in previous GT-Rs, and in are leather-trimmed seats, high-grade materials, standard navigation, padded and stitched interior, and a shiny red engine start button. Even the steering wheel now has, gasp, switches. Clearly, Nissan's learned a thing or two from their Infiniti experiment.
With assistance from Polyphony-the peeps behind Gran Turismo-the Multi-Function Display has seven fixed and four customizable screens capable of spitting out as many as 17 performance parameters-lateral, braking, and acceleration G's; TPS; steering angle; boost; oil temp; and so on-making aftermarket gauges as redundant as a third nipple. Most impressive about the solidly built and surprisingly silent interior is, take away the strategically placed GT-R logos and you'd swear you weren't sitting in a Nissan, which is a compliment...I think.
The aluminum 3.8L V-6 VR38DETT engine is a patent-warranting technical marvel in of itself. Contrary to ignorant belief, this isn't just a tweaked VQ35 out of the Nissan stable. First off, like the transmission, the VR is hand-built with Japanese pride by a single technician from start to finish to tolerances rivaling F1. The bores are plasma-sprayed for increased efficiency and heat transfer, and the oil system's temperature is regulated with a thermostat, wet and dry sump oiling, and an oil scavenging pump. The "R" in VR? Apparently it stands for really different and new.