This Hakosuka Nissan Skyline Has A Crazy Rotary Engine

When you think of rotary engines, the Nissan Skyline is probably about the furthest thing from your mind. But someone took a Hakosuka (the really boxy old Skylines) and modified it to be a drift monster, dropping a four-rotor engine into the car. As odd as that sounds, it works.

This truck might be the ultimate personal snowplow.

We’ve never seen anything like this build. The guy showing it off told Larry Chen, who documented it on his YouTube channel, that the whole goal of the builder was to make something extreme. We’d say he did that and then some.

While it looks like Skyline with a body kit, there’s so much more going on. First of all, the whole front clip and hood are a single unit. The owner has to unbolt that and lift it off to get to the engine, which sits nestled low in the full tube chassis.

Of course, the Mazda rotary engine was built up with four rotors. Without any forced induction, the little engine is whipping out a claimed 460-horsepower on the dyno – not shabby for something so lightweight. It also has a dry sump, which would be necessary for drifting.

The exhaust outlet is right in front of the now-passenger door, being a small extension on the headers. That makes this ride quite loud since there’s no muffler and there doesn’t appear to be a resonator anywhere.

The car has been converted to left-hand drive, which for over in Japan is exotic and therefore cool. And the interior is stripped down just like a racecar.

Something this JDM weird could only be built in Japan, which is exactly from where it hails. A shop over there did the extensive work. The guy showing it off here in the US claims to have seen it go drifting at Fuji International Speedway.

Check out the video to hear this thing and see more details.

Image via Larry Chen/YouTube