Apparently, ten years ago I was wrong about a particular Nissan Micra I found parked down on the street. Very wrong. The Micra in question featured a retro-styled front end and I thought, back then, it was some bodykit for the March in Japan.
Apparently, it is a Nissan March Tango produced by Autech in 1996 and 1997! So how did I manage to finally identify this front end after 10 years? And what’s the Autech March Tango? Are there others as well? I’ll try to answer all these questions today but a follow up has to come soon!
Connecting the dots
When I was on a voice call with my friend in Japan Daniel O’Grady (Wasabi Cars) talking about his awesome Mitsuoka Ray, I briefly mentioned encountering this car over ten years ago. He asked me to send him a picture, which I did. Modern life is so convenient: While talking to each other over WhatsApp, I was able to search my blog, find the post in question and send the photos. When Daniel saw the Micra in question he told me it was a Tango, a March Tango. Boom! Mind blown!
I was wrong 10 years ago and the humble Dutch Micra owner modified his Micra with a JDM March Tango front end! I was ignorant.
What is a March Tango?
The Nissan March Tango was the first Autech March K11 special released in 1996. There is a whole story on why Autech built these cars, but I’ll leave that for another day. On the engine and suspension side, Autech didn’t alter that much. However, they did make some changes on the in- and outside.
The changes on the outside were quite apparent with the different grill, bumper, side mouldings, coloured mudguards with chromed (fake) over bumpers, chromed door mirrors and steel wheels with chromed hubcaps. In other words: it’s a dressed-up March for the most part.
Full circle back
So now we circle back to the originally Dutch Nissan Micra I spotted parked near my home. What was it? And what did the owner transfer from the Tango?
I think we can be quite brief here. The grill, bumper and one chromed-over bumper were added to this Micra. The headlights, bonnet and front fenders are all from the original Micra. The latter is quite apparent as it is missing the chromed pinstripe moulding at the top of the front fender.
At the rear, I’m not 100% sure if the overbumpers were just bolted on the existing bumper or the entire JDM bumper was shipped and mounted to this little Micra. It doesn’t matter that much as the Tango retained its original bumper as well.
Conclusion
I found it remarkable I missed such a great opportunity, hence I take it right now and put everything right! Together with the Tommy Kaira M13 I featured earlier this week, I realized there are so many Micra K11 variants that each and every one of them deserves its own story. I’ll name the series March-athon and I’ll stick to the K11 for now, but other generation may also get their own series. Tomorrow I’ll kick off the first in the March-athon with a more in-depth story on the Tango!
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