1991 Nissan Figaro aka "The Wife's "Fun" Car"

So you might be asking yourself what is a Nissan Figaro, do yourself a solid and go to google type that in and check it out. Seriously, its ok, I will wait...

Well you probably just wasted like 3 hours of your life learning about the "retro" style car that Nissan put out before it was "Cool" looking at you VW and Ford.

So why did my wife somehow get the first right hand drive car ever in our stable (I have a recurring Craigslist search for RHD for goodness sakes). Well it went a little like this.

Wife: I want a fun car, you have fun cars I want one too

Me: OK what kind do you want?

Wife: I want it to be a convertible and automatic and I have to like it, not just you

Me: So you want a Miata (clearly the answer)

Wife: Nope, we already had one, I want something that seats at least 4

Me: You should look at Saabs

Wife: *Looking* No those are "you" cars

GRM readers I will save you some time (like 6 months) she settled on a Nissan Figaro or a Mitsubishi Eclipse. Then she found a clean 1991 Nissan Figaro that is pink. She fell in love and it was hard to say no, when for years she has supported my hobby, and we are finally at a place in our life that we can afford to buy this car because we have been very responsible. We now have a 1975 Datsun 280z, 1972 Datsun 510 (I have an active build thread for this on here as well), the 1991 Nissan Figaro, and a 2012 Chrysler Town and Country. So here it is, pictures below. I am planning only minimal work on the car. A good cleaning, and figuring out why it idles so rough. Some details below as well:

Car:

- 1991 Nissan Figaro

- Transmission: 3 speed auto

- Engine: 1 Litre Turbo

- Wheels: 12" (HAHAHA)

- Paint non-original color

- Clarion CD/Tape Player

- AC does work!

Mods: 

- None that I can see

Problems:

- The idle is very rough

- There is very light surface rust on the rear apron

- The interior needs a deep cleaning

- Figure out a better stereo solution

Pictures:

The day we test drove it.

Danielle in the driver's seat

Tonight after we washed it and I looked at the idle circuit

Very nice. These look like a lot of fun especially with the turbo. I had a '89 Micra for a while and loved it.

Nice car, looks fun. But, that said, the red Z in the background looks truly bada$$, especially under the lights at night. 

ManhattanM (fka NY535iManual) said:

Nice car, looks fun. But, that said, the red Z in the background looks truly bada$$, especially under the lights at night. 

The Z has been pretty much complete for the better part of 5 years

Ive never seen these, i am sort of suprised its a 4 seater though

I keep looking at these then keep pulling myself away.  They’re very reasonably priced 

Patrick said:

I keep looking at these then keep pulling myself away.  They’re very reasonably priced 

I bet you cant fit an ls in it....

Mndsm said:

Patrick said:

I keep looking at these then keep pulling myself away.  They’re very reasonably priced 

I bet you cant fit an ls in it....

yeah, i heard there's *no way* an LS will fit in one of those.

Nice!  Nissan really did a fantastic job with the Figaro. I'm sure your family will have fun with it.

Nice. About a year ago several of these showed up on used car lots in my area. Like, 4 of them on separate, low rent car lots in central GA, at the same time. It was weird. I stopped and looked at a maroon one since I'd never seen one, and then I saw all the others within about 2 weeks. They were asking $6k but it sat for a loooong time so you could have had it for much less. Neat little cars.

Is your wife single?!  J/k, that's awesome and I'm glad you guys got to buy this thing.

ultraclyde said:

Nice. About a year ago several of these showed up on used car lots in my area. Like, 4 of them on separate, low rent car lots in central GA, at the same time. It was weird. I stopped and looked at a maroon one since I'd never seen one, and then I saw all the others within about 2 weeks. They were asking $6k but it sat for a loooong time so you could have had it for much less. Neat little cars.

That would have been cool, this was the first one I saw, but I couldn't find rust on the car anywhere (except surface on the back of the bumper). The wife LOVES the color and we are very excited to have yet another car in the driveway...

Alright, the first video is up!

Cleaned the car, used cutting compound to clean the paint, cleaned the Idle Air Adjuster system 

Cleaned up idle screws

About to go back together

Video: 

My wife likes these too.  We saw one on our first trip to London and she loved it.  I’ve thought about buying one and surprising her with it at some point,  but I’m not sure how she’d feel about the rhd.

In reply to Cotton :

My wife was worried about the RHD as well, because the car is so small she hasn't had to much frustration (though she hasn't put a ton of miles on it) she has however turned on the wipers several times instead of the blinkers, they are on different sides.

We cleaned the carpet and seats today!

Taking a page from Turbo Tom's Garage on Youtube I used scrubbing bubbles and leather conditioner to clean the seats while the wife cleaned on the carpet and interior. Really like the car. We took it to a car meet up on Friday night, it got a ton of attention and the wife really enjoyed walking people around her car.

.