The Nissan '400Z' Will Look Just Like The Proto-Z Concept, Patent Images Reveal

Goofy tyre lettering aside, there didn’t seem to be any outlandish or unrealistic details on the Nissan Proto-Z concept. Sure enough, it looks as though the car revealed last autumn will barely change at all by the time it gets to the showroom.

A series of images filed to the Australian Patent Office last year and found by Car Expert this week show that the new rear-wheel drive sports car has only received very minor tweaks.

Nissan‘s senior vice president of design Alfonso Albaisa had already pledged that his work was done and that all that remained was for the engineers to integrate necessary practical considerations. As such, the only tweaks of note are some slightly more prominent door handles and the appearance of reflectors on each side of the rear bumper.

The car’s 370Z-like silhouette is retained, as is that whopping rectangular front grille. The patent images don’t show any of the detail in the lights, but we can’t see Nissan fiddling much with the concept’s 300Z-inspired rear clusters nor the nod to the 240Z in the DRL signature.

The patent images don’t help when it comes to the wheels or the cabin, although we’re not expecting any significant alterations there either. The concept car’s interior looks as production-ready as the exterior, with its 12.3-inch infotainment screen and digital instrument cluster.

Nissan didn’t confirm much in the way of mechanical details when the concept was revealed, other than to say it was powered by an “enhanced” twin-turbo V6 mated to a six-speed manual gearbox. We’ve been reasonably sure for some time that this unit is a fettled VR30DDTT pinched from the Infiniti Q50 and Q60, providing around 400bhp. The Z-Proto name meanwhile will likely be switched for ‘400Z’.

We should see the production 400Z at some point this year, although it may not go on sale until 2022.