The Nissan Cube is a small Nissan that looks really different—more boxy than most cars. People either love that style or hate it, but it’s also fun and easy to drive.
A digital dash means the instrument panel is shown on screens instead of classic needles. It was considered more “techy” and modern when it first appeared.
They’re talking about cars that were a little weird or not what most people asked for. Even if they weren’t popular, some people still end up loving them.
The Nissan FX-50 is the V8 version of the FX crossover. The speaker’s saying it’s basically the same idea as the smaller FX, but with a bigger 5-liter engine, which makes it feel more powerful and different.
Sport SUVs are regular SUVs/crossovers, but made to feel more fun to drive. They usually have stronger engines and sportier handling than typical family SUVs.
They’re talking about typical car mods: new wheels and lowering the car (“a drop”) to change how it looks. They’re saying they don’t see many of these cars modified that way.
Torque is what makes a car feel strong when you’re not revving much. The host is saying this engine didn’t have much low-end pull, so it feels better higher in the rev range.
Front suspension is what helps the front wheels stay planted and ride smoothly. If it’s simpler or less advanced, the car may not handle as sharply or feel as “tight” in corners.
“Shifters” here refers to the feel and quality of the gear lever and shift action in a manual transmission. Enthusiasts often judge a car by how precise, notchy, and satisfying the shifter feels, not just by horsepower or acceleration.
A body kit is a set of add-on parts that changes how the car looks, like bumpers and spoilers. They’re saying the car later got a more aggressive styling package.
They’re talking about exhaust tips that look real but are basically just decoration. The car may not actually route exhaust through them, so it’s more for looks than sound or performance.
Aftermarket means upgrades you buy after the car is sold—like performance parts or cosmetic mods. They’re saying there weren’t as many options for this car as there were for some Hondas.
“Murder it out” means making the car look really dark and stealthy, usually with blacked-out parts. The goal is to look tough without advertising performance.
This means the car uses an automatic transmission with only four gears. Fewer gears can make the engine work harder and can make the car feel less quick.
BMW is the brand the brother-in-law usually likes. The host is pointing out that even though he’s into BMW, he still enjoys this Suzuki for its off-road oddball charm.
The Honda Pilot is a family SUV. The speaker is using their Pilot as an example of Honda reliability, saying it has a lot of miles and hasn’t needed major work.
A V6 is a type of engine with six cylinders. It’s called a “V” because the cylinders are arranged in two banks that form a V shape.
LIVE
What's up, everyone? Welcome back to the Behind the Wheel Podcast. Today, we're talking about
vehicles we probably shouldn't like, but for some reason, there's something about them. We do.
Yeah, this is gonna be a fun one for me because I have some, I definitely have some eclectic taste.
I mean, you guys hear me talk about the normal vehicles that I rock with, but I've always had
some, you know, fun ones that are always thrown in there that I think people are gonna be kind of
like, what do you got? So starting off, we all know I'm a die-hard Nissan guy and I always
love tripping people up. I have a massive infatuation with the Nissan Cube.
All right. I get that. It's not everyone's cup of tea. When I worked at Nissan when I was first
starting out in the industry, that car was out and it was one of our loaner vehicles. And
on the weekends, we didn't have a shuttle driver. So I got tasked with driving customers home on
Saturday mornings when I was, you know, supposed to be actually working on cars, but regardless,
I got caught in a snowstorm at the dealership with this car and I'm driving this thing around the
back a lot, ripping the e-brake and having the most fun I've ever had in a car. And it's all of
like a hundred horsepower and is, you know, a tiny little thing, but it was just so viscerally fun.
It was like throwing a go-kart around in the backyard. So that's a very guilty pleasure of
mine that car. That sounds super responsible. I think from a Nissan Campbill, one thing that
came to mind, do you remember the NX2000? Yeah. Yeah, that was an ugly duckling.
Yeah, it was like a really goofy, I don't know, it was a very strange looking car, but
at the time, I thought it was pretty cool because it was very unique. When that was coming,
coming around, like when I was living in San Diego and there's a lot of
street racing activity that may have happened, there were a lot of SCRs out there, but there
were only a couple of NX2000s and there was a couple of them were pretty well built, pretty quick.
And it was interesting to see those because they, you know, typically you wouldn't see them anywhere,
like in parking lots, just cruising around. I would never see them, but there was a couple of
pretty clean ones back then. I can't imagine anybody like these days fixing those up. I never
see them now, but that was essentially a B13 Sentra underneath, right?
Yeah, I don't know if that vehicle, if that chassis was heavier or lighter than an SCR.
No idea, no clue, but I just remember them being pretty unique. I think it had T-tops to it,
didn't it? Yeah, if I remember correctly, it had T-tops. I think it also had a digital dash,
which was... Oh, really? If I remember correctly, it was like kind of like similar to the
85-300 ZX1, had like that glowing-ness to it. I'm pretty sure that was an option on them. And
there was a couple like little sportier, I guess, trim levels. I barely remember that car was such
a flash in the pan. And as you said, it's kind of an oddball thing. Nissan tends to do that, though.
You'll find like these really weird, like, nichey cars that they made. And I'm not putting these on
that list, but like you have the Murano Cabriolet, which nobody asked for, anyone asked for.
But in that same vein of things that nobody asked for, I actually like the FX-50. And that was the
FX-35, but with the 5-liter in it. It looked a little weird because it had like the kind of like
bug-like headlights. Yeah, really round back, you know. But at the end of the day, it was
essentially a G37 with a 5-liter, 390 horsepower V8 in it. Yeah. You know, yeah, it weighs a little
bit more. But I can throw the kids back in the back more comfortably. We already know that I have
like an obsession with some sport SUVs. And that kind of falls in that same category before they
kind of became popular. Like nobody, you know, nobody talks about that. Like I've seen a couple
of them here and there. You'll see like the 45. But I think I've only seen one of the 50s.
All these years. And it's interesting too. You don't see a lot of, at least I haven't seen a
lot of them fixed up like, you know, the wheels, maybe a drop, things like that, but nothing like
too far. I'm sure they're out there. Like don't get me wrong. Same with the NX2000. I'm sure there's
like a club that has, you know, a ton of them and stuff. I just haven't seen them very much.
Well, hopefully I was talking about this. We'll get to see more of them. That's actually the goal.
That's the whole goal of this podcast is just to see your guys' cool cars.
But it would be cool though to see, I think it would be cool to see like a really well-built,
heavily modified NX2000. Because I think if you have that farm, you're kind of like driving
around the street and it's fixed up and everything, a lot of people aren't going to,
they're not going to know what it is. Oh no, no, of course not.
What are you driving? What is that thing? You know, they don't know. Especially like if you
be badgered or something, no one's going to know. It's crazy. And then you got, you get all the fun
of that you would have got with those old centers, which they're kind of hard to find these days.
A lot of them guys, yeah, the old SCRs, if people have them, they're not letting them go
or they're all rotted out and gone by now. Yeah, my very, very first car, like not to
like a modifier thing, like my first commuter was a Nissan Sentra, but the older style,
right? Like an 87 I think it was. And then when the SCR came out, I thought it was pretty cool.
And then a lot of those guys would get offended if you call it a Sentra. No, no, no, it's an
SCR. I'm like, all right, man, relax. Hey, hey, I'm just, you know, I'm to call it what it is.
But, um, yeah, those are, those are interesting ones. One that I had on my, on my list was,
I think from like late 90s, early 2000s, the Celica GTS, I feel like that car was pretty underrated.
Kind of a, kind of a quirky style. You're talking about the buggy looking one? Like,
I think every one out of that. Oh, the one before that. So the four I won is the one we're talking
about. No, the one after that. Oh, okay. The one, the elongated. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And then they
did the body cap for like a little bit more of a modern style, especially for that time. I feel
like that would kind of flew under the radar. A lot of people, um, underrated that one. It had
pretty stiff competition because it was put up against like sort of the end of the DC Integra
and then the incoming RSX type S. And so that one had, um, a six speed, which was pretty cool,
especially because, you know, when, uh, the DC Integra was, was, was new, that was one of the
only things I didn't like. I wish I had a six speed instead of a five speed. Um, so that had a six
speed. It had a high ribbon engine, right? It was like 8,000 or 8,200 RPM, uh, red line. It was pretty
high. Um, no torque, right? But most of the 1.8 liters of that era didn't have torque anyways.
It was all on the top end. I think the main thing that really separated that one and kind of pushed
it down was the fact that front suspension was not that complex. It wasn't that advanced.
And up against like the DC Integra and the RSX type S, like kind of as the transition happened
there, both of those were known for being really, really good handling cars and, you know, great
shifters. The Celica didn't really have that. So it's kind of where it fell short. I wouldn't
buy one. I don't want one. I just think that they were pretty cool. Um, there were, I saw, you know,
a pretty good amount of them. None of them that were like heavily modified, but usually be like,
you know, dropping wheels, um, you know, intake exhaust, like the typical stuff.
Was that the one that very like near the end of its lifespan, they, they started selling it with
like the really aggressive body kit on it? Yeah. I think it had like a squared off winged and like
a whole lip kit. And the best part was is, and this is actually why I brought that up, the bumper
had probably the first time I ever saw one of the fake exhaust tips as part of the bumper. It was
like a, yeah, it was, it just had a regular exhaust sitting in it, but it was, it was literally a
piece of plastic like painted to look like a muffler tip on it. And that's, I remember that.
Maybe I'm, I could be mistaken. People correct me, but I'm pretty sure that's exactly what the
memory I had. Cause my mom had went out and bought a Scion TC back in like when they first came out.
And I remember that car also being like either used at the dealership or because there was a
moment there where my mom, my mom was into kind of like some cool cars and she looked at it and
she's like, Oh, this could be kind of cool. And then she's looking at it. She's like,
I don't know about this and kept, kept walking around the dealership. But yeah, that being said,
it didn't seem like I had the, the biggest aftermarket, you know, there was stuff out there,
but not nearly as big as a Honda stuff. Honda stuff at that time was, was huge. The sort of
like the diamond star stuff was still really, really big. I mean, other Toyota's as well,
and obviously super and stuff like that. But I mean, they're, they were out there just, they
seemed to be really, really underrated and kind of skipped over. And I think that
a lot of that had to do with, like I said, the competition, because it was a really,
really good time for Honda in terms of like, you know, the DC and Tigra and then the Type R too,
right? So it was tough. Now, do you feel that any of that also was because
it was kind of filling the shoes of that, of the four eye Celica? Like that, that was legendary.
Yeah, they're rid of the old dry version, right? So always even a possibility. So
yeah, I mean, there's that too, for sure. But then, you know, Toyota has some stinkers like
kind of like in the 90s to like the Paseo and stuff like that. So, you know, stuff that didn't,
they didn't click too well. So yeah, there's that.
So actually, when you were talking about the competition for that car, that kind of brings
me back, I had a weird obsession with the SCR of later. I actually really wanted one of those
spec Vs. Like the, what was it? Oh, rounder, right? Yeah, like the, so it was that 2013,
2014, that so the SCR spec V to me was like, Oh, I can get a front wheel drive car that might,
you know, because I had friends that were into the Hondas and things like that. And I was an
Nissan guy and I wasn't really thinking that I was going to eventually buy a 240. They weren't
really on my radar at that point. Because I was kind of looking at like semi new cars. And
obviously I would have had to go older. And then all of a sudden I got bit by the 240 bug. But
regardless, that, that Sentra always kind of spoke to me in a lot of ways because it was,
it was cool. Like you got a, you know, cool stereo system. It had all the right bells and
whistles. And then at the end of the day, it had Brembo calipers and it looked sporty. Like it felt
sporty and my high school age self didn't, you know, didn't really know the difference. I mean,
I guess this was after high school. No, this would be, yeah, this would have been after high
school. I would have been, yeah, 2010. So it would have been actually a little earlier than that.
So what else you got in your list? So you guys always riff on me on the SRT4. And I got to tell
you, man, I loved that car. It was so like, it goes back to just fun cars, like kind of like the
cube and things like that. But this was obviously, you know, fun in a different way. But I, I enjoy
that fun factor. Like, I don't want to always have to get in a car and have a serious time. And
that was what was cool about that is that it just made all the right noises. It was small and,
and could kind of get in and got out of its own way when I wanted it to. And it wasn't a bad little
car. But I've always, always, always wanted a PG, PT GT, which is the PT Cruiser version of the SRT4.
All right, it goes over. We're going to, we're going to pack it in now. So I lost all credibility
as everyone's turning this off, but, but there's a reason for it. Okay. I've always wanted to make
it look like one of the old Chevy sales vans, I guess you would say, like an old, like,
murder it out, make it, you know, look slammed, slam it down, get some good power out of it,
and have it almost be like a sleeper. Because nobody's going to expect, no one's going to expect
it to be fast. And then yeah, murdered out. It's just kind of like, makes it cool to look at,
but not going to stand out enough that somebody's going to think it's fast. So it's always been one
of those, like, I want to be able to play with it and, and, and kind of have the fun of, of people
being unassuming when you're next to them. And I always thought that was kind of cool. Like,
you pull up an SRT4, most car guys are going to look at it and go, I know what that is.
You pull up next to them in a little SRT4, a little SRT4 powered, you know, work van,
essentially, it's going to look like kind of like a work van, I guess you could say.
Nobody's going to expect it. I like that. I always thought that was cool. And then
the biggest problem I had was that I, that at that time period, I feel like Plymouth and,
and Dodge were doing a lot of really cool things. Chrysler included obviously with the
one of the Plymouth prowlers always. And I don't know if people hate that car necessarily,
but I hated the engine platform, you know, and obviously a four speed automatic is not what
that car desires. I'd be okay with if, if we could just put a, you know, a smallest placement V8 in
it with a, you know, a little four speed manual transmission. I'd be even okay with that because
I mean, it's a light, it's a light car. What, 2,800 pounds those things weigh less than, they're
less than three. I'm pretty sure they're less than 3,000. My knowledge in that section, in that
sector is, is nil of nothing. You have nothing, nothing no offer. I'm pretty sure they're just
under like 3,000 pounds. And I think that given that you could probably get some more out of
there. I mean, I guess we could probably get a 2,700 pound vehicle. And I would like that with
like 400 horsepower compared to the factory 200 and something that it came with. It was, it was a
little, it couldn't have its own way in my opinion, but I think that with the right modifications,
you could have a lot of fun with that car. There's such a weird mashup of like this very
aggressive looking style and then not much under the hood and then automatic. It was almost like,
give you the look of yesteryear, but then make it very, very mild under the hood. I didn't
understand that part of it. I don't know if anybody understood that part of it. I don't
think that it sold very well, but if I remember correctly, the problem was, is that at the time
that v6 made more horsepower than the v8s that were coming out from Dodge. And that was the
problem is that, yeah, it was more of the problem that they were like, Hey, listen,
we can't do a v8 because it's going to have less power than our v6 platform. So how do you,
how does that make sense? And then it would have been heavier anyway, because let's be honest,
at the time those engines weren't light. They were so
that's, that's really the problem. I think it was, it was kind of born at the wrong time.
If it would have been born at the time wherever Dodge was putting the, the SRT8 platform or
however you want to term it, you know, in everything, I think the car would have been a
lot more successful if it would have ended up with that engine in it and been marketed. And I
know there was a guy a couple years ago that did a Hellcat swap or whatever, you know,
blow her out the hood a little bit. But even if you took the blower off and just ran a low rise
intake, that would all fit in there. Yeah, there's more than enough power, right? Yeah,
exactly. If that thing had 400 to the wheel, it would be a monster. So I always thought that
those were kind of those little go-kart cars that had that classic styling that I really like.
Like I know that it was helped developed by like Chip Foose and the guys over there. And
it has that hot rod feel. And I think if you do like little modifications, the car would also
stand out. Like you could change out things in the modern times where you redesign those like
bumper winglets that it has and things like that. And you could make it look like a hot rod and
drive like a hot rod where that car never had that potential because of the shortcomings
of the engineering at the time. Yeah, right. So being that I've kind of ran in the far direction
from kind of where you're at, what were you thinking for cars that? Oh, I'm going to take it
way off in the left field. All right, what do we got? Do you remember the Suzuki? Just to say
Suzuki is crazy, right? The V-Ecross? So funny enough, my brother-in-law, and I'm going to send
this to him, Max, clip this out. My brother-in-law actually has a V-Ecross here in New York. Really?
Yes, he does. And I don't know, I think they're cool. I think it's, you know,
you're going to talk about oddballs, right? It's a very, very strange looking vehicle.
You know, a two-door SUV, kind of before the SUV boom, this came out higher than that.
All the plastic cladding, you know, it's kind of an oddball V6, very capable. I remember
four-wheeler did some testing with getting into the competition. It held its own,
it did very, very well. I mean, Suzuki doesn't make a bad off-road vehicle. I mean,
it's fantastic. They know what they're doing when it comes to that. I mean, the Suzuki Samurai was
a monster for what it was. I think probably the plastic cladding is a little bit too much for me,
and it's awkward looking, but it's kind of cool. I don't know, I like it. I think it'd be cool to
play with one of those off-road. And I know that there is an aftermarket for them, and they do
pretty well with mods. So, you know, lift and, you know, bigger wheels and tires, the whole thing.
It's funny that you mentioned that, because as I said, my brother-in-law picked one,
he actually got it as a hand-me-down from his dad, and he is really into it because of that.
It has a very big aftermarket support. He's a BMW guy. He's into BMW trucks and stuff like that,
but this is his guilty pleasure, because it's this cool thing where he's like,
oh, I can get a light bar, I can get all these things, and they're all, the community is really
supportive. Like, these guys are all, you know, they still have that close-knit community that
we all kind of miss these days. Right. And he said he was able to, you know, he's able to talk to
people on Facebook, and it's like the same 20 guys that he's talking to, because it was such a,
you know, small, upset. Yeah, it was pretty ugly, but I just thought it was kind of cool. It's like
very, very unique. I think, you know, I never see them nowadays ever on the road, but it would be
cool to see them. I think I went to a meet one time, an Irvine, and there was one there. It was
just stock, but it was cool to see, you know. Yeah, so I think they're kind of getting a little bit
of a resurgence, ironically enough, because I think Kanye West actually bought one. Oh, really?
Yeah, I'm pretty sure Daryl was telling me that he's like, oh, this is so cool. Kanye had one.
I was like, wait, what? I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but apparently
he had one for a while, and it kind of pushed the price up on him, funny enough.
Let's say these days, maybe keep having a low. Yeah, that lowers the value.
So we got S-E-R. We have My Little Toys. Well, I'm not S-E-R. I apologize. You're NV2000.
You have the Suzuki. Go back, go back. So from mine, it was a Celica GTS.
Oh, Celica GTS. So, all right, let's go back. So for you, we have the NV2000.
It has the Celica GTS. Oh, NX2000. You're the Nissan guy.
Yeah, I know, right? The ones that I did not ever work on, that's the problem. They were before my
time, old guy. So the NX2000, we have the Celica GTS and we have the Viacross.
What a weird collect. I mean, at least you got a nice variety. I mean, you got a little sports car,
you got the not-so-sporty-but-look-sporty car, and then you got the ugly duckling off-road guy.
It's kind of odd to have a two-door SUV. I think that'll probably be kind of weird nowadays,
but at the time, since SUVs hadn't really hit that market and they hadn't taken over the world,
it was pretty unique, pretty forward-thinking at that time. Yeah, it was definitely not what
the market was desiring at the time. I mean, I feel like everyone at that time was buying
Chrysotown in countries. So I don't know if they were buying a two-door SUV at the time,
but now, ironically, I feel like it would almost do better. I feel like you could
vent some of these younger guys that want to be able to go out on the weekends and go to the beach
and want to be able to do a little light off-roading. I think they would be a market for it.
Right. If it wasn't ugly as in, but that's besides the point. What else do you got?
That was all I had on the list, but I can always spitball more. You got one more?
I got one more. I'll take it. Sorry, I'm asking you one second. This is my backup.
Yeah, I had all the Chrysler stuff together because...
Okay, ready? Yeah.
You know what? I got one more. I went from the off-road vehicle to 2017 Accord Coupe V6.
I think a lot of people slept on that car because the idea of a faster Accord didn't
really appeal to the masses. It's like a family car. It's known for being super reliable,
people mover, all that stuff. But the Coupe V6 with a manual transmission was a lot of fun
for people that didn't drive it. It was a lot of fun to drive. I think Accord sales, like...
I'm sorry, Coupe sales for that time were like, I don't know, it was like 6% of Accord sales,
which is nothing. That's all Coupe. It's not just the V6. It wasn't good.
Obviously, sedans are far more popular. I think people were kind of just like
shrugging their shoulders like, yes, four-year Accord, but it's a lot of fun to drive.
There was a couple of different generations of it. I like the body style on that one,
particularly. Super torquey. Like I said, six-speed manual. I think it's a perfect daily.
It's one of those things that really got sucked on. You can find them nowadays for a decent price,
but I think the people that have them, they want to keep them. They're super reliable. They'll run
forever. It's got a great engine. Which engine? Is that the 32 or the 35 that's in there?
Actually, I don't know. I don't know if they did both because when it transitioned over to the
2017 model, but it is a J-Series for sure. Those things went forever. I have a Honda pilot that's
just by my daily. I don't know, a couple hundred thousand miles. I haven't done anything to it,
but it just changed the oil. It's changed the oil, a couple of belts. I feel like that's a lot
of the V6s. I hate to get off on a tangent slightly, but I feel like that time period between
Nissan's V6s, Toyota's V6s, and Honda's V6s, they were all on their A-game. Everybody, you had
the VQ, you had the J-Series, and it's blanking on me. What is it, 2G? 2GR? I can't remember the
designation for the V6 out of the Sienna and stuff, but all those engines were really top-notch,
well-put-together things, except for the connector clips on the Toyota. If you know, you know.
Those are notoriously bad. They're connector's break on every single harness. It drives everybody
that does the tune up absolutely nuts. Other than that, they were stout cars. I feel like
they were built reliably, and I agree with you the Accord, especially because I feel like Accords
had that pedigree of the two-door touring car for such a long time, especially in Japan. I know
that was the Euro R and stuff like that, but at the end of the day, that two-door Coupe Accord
was kind of a thing for a while, and then it kind of fell off. I feel like I stopped.
Yeah, at least for Honda anyways, all their coupes pretty much fizzled, like the Civic Coupe
fizzled. I know, obviously, when the EM1 came out, that was very popular, but as the years went on,
it just fell by the wayside, and they stopped making them as a result. There went the Accord
and the Civic Coupes, and they're all gone, and then obviously Accord as well.
I feel like the eighth-gen Civic was that last golden era where you had a two-door and four-door
option, and then all of a sudden after that, I know I'm sure they made them, but I feel like all
I saw was the four-door option kind of start to dominate. Yeah, especially with the Japanese
front-end conversion option, that helped a lot too. I'm sure that people have their own lists,
their own vehicles, that their secret shame, some vehicle that they think is kind of cool,
but everybody else is like, I don't know about that. Maybe let us know in the comments below,
give us an idea of what you're thinking, and we'll see you on the next one.
About this episode
Nissan loyalists trade stories about loving “wrong” cars anyway—starting with the Nissan Cube, remembered from a snowstorm loaner run where the tiny, e-brake-happy hatch felt like a go-kart. They also revisit oddball Nissans like the NX2000 and discuss the FX50 as a weirdly practical V8 sport SUV. The conversation expands to underrated Toyota and Honda-era quirks, including the Celica GTS and the appeal of high-rev, six-speed fun despite weaker handling. They add guilty-pleasure off-road picks like the Suzuki V-Ecross and wrap with a sleeper nod to the 2017 Accord Coupe V6 manual.
Some cars are supposed to be bad…. No car enthusiast ever woke up thinking “you know… the PT Cruiser actually isn’t half bad”…. or did they?
On paper, they miss the mark. Weird styling. Questionable performance. Odd positioning. Maybe even straight-up hated when they launched.
…but then you drive them.
In this episode of the Konig Behind the Wheel Podcast, we dive into the cars that should have sucked—but somehow didn’t. The unexpected heroes. The guilty pleasures. The cars we shouldn’t love… but absolutely do.
We’re talking about machines like the Dodge Neon SRT-4, the cult-favorite Nissan NX2000, the bizarre-but-brilliant Infiniti FX50, and more that completely defy expectations.
Why did these cars work when they shouldn’t have?
What made them fun despite their flaws?
And are we all just lying to ourselves… or were these actually great?
If you’re into underdogs, hot takes, and cars that don’t make sense—but somehow do—this episode is for you.
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