Hands up everyone who enjoys driving a 4WD with a V8 engine. Our cousins across the ditch have once again shown the truth: Australia is indeed the Lucky Country.
Over there, Nissan is expecting its second year of record Patrol sales in a row despite the platform being more than a decade old. In particular, a new Warrior version is causing quite a stir.
The current Y62 model is in the final stages of being reworked by Australian engineering and manufacturing firm Premcar to create a Warrior-badged flagship.
Like its Navara Warrior stablemate, the Patrol Warrior has the full endorsement of Nissan Australia. It uses OEM-quality components and has a full five-year factory warranty.
Premcar’s tweaked Patrol will be the culmination of an extensive engineering and development process that has been underway for the last few years.
The model is an obvious competitor to the Toyota Land Cruiser 300 Series GR Sport.
Premcar says its top priority when designing the Warrior was ‘bandwith’.
Its suspension programme could not sacrifice on-road comfort for off-road capability – or vice versa.
The Warrior retains the standard 298kW/560Nm naturally-aspirated quad-cam petrol V8 engine, coupled exclusively to a seven-speed automatic transmission, a driveline that in many ways remains a major drawcard for the Patrol.
Side-exit exhaust tips on the right-hand side are part of a bi-modal system which during ordinary driving sends exhaust gases to the rear Flicking the shifter over to the manual gate, holds the bi-modal system’s valves to remain wide open.
The Warrior sits 50mm higher than a standard Patrol.
A softer front spring is fitted along with triple-rate progressive springs in the rear.
Nissan’s Hydraulic Body Motion Control (HBMC) semi-active suspension system is retained and eliminates the need for anti-roll bars.
New black 18-inch wheels are wrapped in 34-inch Yokohama all-terrain tyres.
New guard flares have been designed to fit the beefy tyres inside the arches.
A blacked-out exterior and interior, doing away with most of the donor car’s chrome accents, has modernised the looks of the Warrior and custom Alcantara interior trim adds some premium flair.
