Three of Japan's major manufacturers embarked on a quest to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans in the 1980s. Eventually only Mazda succeeded, but both Toyota and Nissan came close. The latter's challenge was temporarily interrupted after Group C was phased out, but Nissan returned in 1995 with the production based Skyline R33 GT-R LM. Prepared and entered by NISMO, the GT-R LM faced off against purpose built racing cars and could do no better than a fifth and tenth in class in 1995 and 1996 respectively.
Nissan followed the trend by using a loophole in the rules and built a prototype racing car for the 1997 edition of the legendary race. They attained homologation by adapting one of the racing cars for road use. Dubbed the R390, the new Nissan racing car was developed together with British experts TWR. They supplied the carbon fibre chassis and the design penned by Ian Callum. Nissan's biggest contribution was the ferocious twin-turbocharged V8 engine that a few years earlier had produced well over 800 bhp in the back of the Group C cars. The Nissan R390 proved to be quick straight out of the box, but not very reliable at its first outing. In 1998 the four examples that started the race all finished in the top ten, but the placed Nissan could do no better than third behind the dominant Porsches. Rule changes left the R390 obsolete at the end of the season and Nissan did return in 1999 with a new car, which failed to impress.
Although Toyota, Mazda and Honda all look likely to return to Le Mans with a full factory assault, Nissan has been awfully quiet on the subject.
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