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Nissan IDx 'in the plan' for production, needs support from fans [w/poll]

If there's a trend in the auto industry we can firmly get behind, it's the small, light and affordable rear-drive coupe. The positive critical reception to the Scion FR-S and Subaru BRZ twins has encouraged other manufacturers to look at building their own rear drivers, and even a few to show actual concept cars based on the idea. The Chevrolet Code 130R from 2012 and more recently, the Nissan IDx twins that were first shown at the 2013 Tokyo Motor Show both come to mind, as does the brand-new Kia GT4 Stinger Concept.
Nissan trotted out the IDx Nismo and the IDx Freeflow for another showing in Detroit and we'll admit to being totally smitten with both cars. Again. The duo draw inspiration from the iconic Datsun 510, a lightweight, affordable rear-driver that remains a cult favorite decades after production ended.
Now, a report from our friends at AutoWeek reveals that we may, possibly, hopefully see a production IDx, provided fans make a strong enough case for it. "It's in the plan," Nissan product boss Andy Palmer told AW. According to the report, Palmer said the IDx is "into the first sage of the development process. The next stage is project validation and then looking at the business case. It's no one's intent to waste millions of the company's money, so obviously we have a good feeling about this one."

Asking price for Paul Walker's GT-R from Fast & Furious nearly triples [w/video]

The German owner of the only Nissan Skyline GT-R to survive filming Fast & Furious (a.k.a., The Fast and the Furious 4) has put his car up for sale following the death of Paul Walker, Yahoo Autos reports. The original sale price was reportedly an already hefty 300,000 euros ($412,110), but it has since been raised to 1,000,000 euros ($1.37 million).
Despite many well-intentioned efforts, the Skyline GT-R was (and still is) illegal to import for street use in the US, so this R34-generation GT-R and seven others were shipped here without engines and classified as kit cars to sidestep federal law. Once here, the engines were installed, and seven street-legal GT-Rs proceeded to be destroyed during the filming of F&F. But one car, the "hero" car for sale here, was driven by Walker in non-violent scenes and thus is the only GT-R that survived filming.
Then, in July 2009, the federal government cracked down on importers of these cars, seizing almost 50 GT-Rs, including this one, telling owners to export them or risk having them destroyed. The hero GT-R was therefore exported, and its whereabouts have been unknown until recently, when the current German owner allowed it to be featured in a review (watch the German-language video below). You can see the online ad (also German) of the heavily modified GT-R here, where it sits proudly with its sky-high price tag.

Nissan Qashai gets the Juke R treatment

It would appear that we're a little behind the times on this one, but a UK-based tuner of the Nissan GT-R is creating its own take on the lustworthy Juke-R starting with the Nissan Qashqai crossover. Severnvalley Motorsport claims to be the leading authority for tuning of the current GT-R in Europe. The outfit is now turning its attention to stuffing the drivetrain of a GT-R under the body of a Qashqai+2 - a seven-passenger compact crossover similar in size to our Nissan Rogue - resulting in the Qashqai-R.
The project started back in March when Severnvalley took delivery of a new Qashqai. After stripping the crossover down to its bare essentials and building a custom jig to support the body shell, it was then transferred onto an awaiting GT-R chassis. The crew aimed to keep Qashqai's appearance as stock as possible, but fender extensions and hood vents were required to accommodate the sports car underpinnings.
The white Qashqai-R seen above will be tuned to produce 900 horsepower, while a black version will get bumped up to 1,000 hp. And, looking at the build photos, we surmise that this project will take nothing less than a herculean feat of supercar determination before it's through.