Nissan Patrol GQ Y60 Used Review: 1988-1997

These can feel pretty antiquated to drive now, and they’re hardly what you’d call efficient.

Modern crossovers and SUVs do a better job for 90 per cent of the time.

The best thing about a GQ is its ability to conquer to bush on a recreational or work basis.

That means it’s the old-school construction and rugged engineering that are its best features.

Convenience and luxury weren’t really the GQ’s focus, so don’t expect to be lavished with standard equipment.

Instead, use the GQ for what it was designed for to get the most out of it.

In terms of factory accessories, things like a bull bar and side-steps were popular choices and can be found on many second-hand GQ Patrols.

Modern camping has dictated where the accessories market has gone these days.

Instead of mud tyres and winches, modern families are looking to add-ons such as awnings, fridges and roof racks to make the most of their vehicles.

The Patrol lends itself beautifully to these activities and accessories.

The fact is, you’d be mad to buy a GQ Patrol unless you had plans to use it off road.

These were one of the absolute best off roaders in their day and not much has changed.

The SUV and crossover markets might be where the action is these days, but neither of those will stay with a GQ Patrol in the rough stuff.

The 4 wheel drive Nissan was born to go off road.

You’d be mad to buy a GQ Patrol unless you had plans to use it off road.

There’s really only room for the seats in the cabin of the commercial versions (apart from the load area in the tray, of course) but even the wagons aren’t as big on the inside as they appear from the outside.

The short wheelbase is really tight on luggage area and won’t be big enough for camping families.

The long-wheelbase wagon is the pick, but even then, the old fashioned packaging means a roof rack is a common fitment, and towing a trailer for longer getaways is not uncommon.

In terms of actual abilities, the GQ was on point right from the factory.

So the accessories people seem to need these days are all about comfort and keeping their ice and bait cold.

With that in mind, no camping holiday is complete now without a fridge.

Good tyres are a must for the bush, and an all-terrain style of tyre seems to work best with a decent compromise between on-road performance and off-road grip.

If you’re crossing rivers and creeks, a snorkel is a necessity, too.

The GQ wasn’t the first Nissan Patrol to offer diesel power, but it really took the concept and ran with it.

When it first launched, the Patrol was available with two engines; a petrol and a diesel.

Both were six-cylinder units and neither had a turbocharger, which sounds odd today, but back then was actually the normal way of things.

Both engines also displaced 4.2 litres, but they really couldn’t have been more different in how they delivered.

The petrol six was good for 125kW of power and 325Nm of torque and would propel the Patrol to well over 160km/h in the Northern Territory back then. It was available with a five-speed manual or a four-speed automatic.

The diesel, meanwhile, could muster just 85kW on a good day and 264Nm of torque. The automatic was also offered, blunting performance even further.

And that diesel was s-l-o-w. Combined with the relatively heavy Patrol body and the lacklustre numbers, you really had to plan ahead for overtaking in a diesel Patrol.

In 1990, Nissan slotted a budget Patrol into the bottom of the price-list, fitted with a 100kW 3.0-litre six-cylinder petrol engine and a five-speed manual.

The engine was basically a Nissan Skyline (or Holden Commodore of the time) engine with a carburettor instead of fuel-injection and while it did use a bit less fuel than the bigger six, it was underdone given the job it was being asked to do.

For 1992, Nissan fitted the 4.2-litre petrol six with electronic fuel-injection (it had been carburetted up to then) and while power crept up to 129kW, fuel economy was the big winner.

Then, in 1994, Nissan revisited the diesel engine and gave it lightweight internals, in the interests of getting it to spin a bit more freely and use less fuel.

Which it did, up to a point, but the changes also meant it was suddenly no longer the bulletproof unit it had been.

Like the 3.0-litre six, the advice with a post-94 diesel Patrol is not to tow anything heavy with it. The later diesel doesn’t take too kindly to aftermarket turbochargers, either.

The final under-bonnet fiddle came in 1995 when Nissan offered an alternative diesel engine in the 2.8-litre six-cylinder turbo-diesel.

Although it had a similar power output to the bigger, non-turbo unit, it was a cheaper alternative by thousands of dollars

Hardcore off-roaders continued to buy the 4.2-litre diesel and then spent a bit more having an aftermarket turbo kit fitted.

The Patrol sits you very upright in the front seats and, with a big, bluff dashboard, the impression is of being in a big, truck-like vehicle.

The rear seat is less impressive with thinner padding and a too-upright backrest.

There are plenty of instruments and gauges, although none of the frippery of some of the competition such as altimeters and inclinometers.

There is, however, plenty of plastic trim bits and pieces and some of these can be relied upon to look and feel pretty second-hand nowadays.

The exterior of the Patrol, too, seemed a bit tinny (it actually shared some pressings with the previous MQ Patrol model) and the doors clanged when they should have thudded.

Again, time and kilometres won’t have helped in this department.

From the driver’s seat, the bonnet was also long and flat and restricted the view forward, particularly when edging over drop-offs or down steep hills off-road.

Given that the GQ was sold in an era before SUVs and crossovers, it’s a fair bit more agricultural than passenger cars of the time.

But compared with the models from other makers it was competing with, the Patrol was regarded as absolutely one of the best options on the market.

It competed with the likes of the Toyota LandCruiser and Mitsubishi Pajero and, frankly, could stay with those vehicles pretty much everywhere.

The fact that you still see GQs in the bush and in outback towns says all you need to know.

Both, in fact, but only on some models.

The commercial range was manual only (a five-speed) but petrol wagons could be had with a four-speed automatic for extra money.

The diesel version was available with a four-speed automatic as an option, but only if you specified the bigger, 4.2-litre unit.

The smaller, 3.0-litre petrol in the ST30 model was strictly a five-speed manual vehicle.

If you’ve grown up thinking that a modern SUV is what a four-wheel-drive feels like to drive, you’ll probably be horrified when you drive a GQ Patrol. At first.

The body-on-chassis construction means the vehicle doesn’t feel all that 'tight' and the thin panels Nissan used at the time were a bit floppy in their own right. Rattles and clanging noises are all part of the deal, especially these days when an early GQ is well into its fourth decade on the road.

Those big, live axles at each end also give an impression of lots of unsprung weight, and the three-link front suspension can contribute to a bit of wandering, particularly at highway speeds where you might find you’re chasing the nose down the road.

Both the front and rear suspension are slow to react to bumps and the long travel means it does well off-road with lots of articulation, but it’s no sports car on the bitumen.

For all that, though, the Patrol is no armchair ride. In fact, the ride is quite firm and, even back in the day, there were questions over just how Nissan had managed to combine so much body roll with so little ride comfort.

Performance varies enormously according to what engine is under the bonnet, and for everyday use, our pick would be a fuel-injected 4.2-litre petrol six.

The bigger diesel is okay if you can live with the relaxed acceleration, and the 3.0-litre petrol six (if any are still out there) is slow and hard work.

The turbo-diesel hardly seems worth the bother in hindsight, but if you find one cheap enough, it is an alternative of sorts.

If you need an automatic (and they’re very good off-road and make the hulking Patrol more manageable around town) you need to buy the bigger-engined versions, as the 4.2-litre twins were the only versions that got a two-pedal layout.

In the day, the larger petrol version was considered to be quite quick for this type of vehicle.

Even so, don’t be expecting 0-100km in under 10 seconds, because this is still a 2.5-tonne commercial vehicle, after all.

The diesels – even the turbocharged ones – were pretty slow and slow revving, but they do tow well and thanks to the low-range gearing on offer, low performance doesn’t inhibit their off-road skills.

Cab-chassis and pick-up versions of the GQ Patrol had standard 90-litre fuel tanks.

The wagons (both long and short-wheelbase) carried 95 litres, giving them just enough range for outback touring.

Many owners fitted aftermarket long-range tanks to maximise that touring ability, and it’s a worthwhile option to seek out when shopping.

The more you use your Patrol off-road, the more the service cost will spiral upwards.

Running repairs are often necessary to the driveline to keep everything working properly, and there are jobs such as greasing the front axle swivels that simply don’t exist on a conventional car.

Don’t forget, too, you have two differentials instead of one and a gearbox and a transfer-case to consider.

But even if you only drive on the bitumen, these are heavy cars so they’re hard on suspension bits, brakes and tyres.

Running costs for a GQ Patrol will never be what you’d call small.

Depending on whether it’s a diesel or petrol engine involved, the fuel filter either needs to be replaced in its mounting unit under the bonnet (diesel) or replaced from underneath the car from its position in the main fuel line (petrol).

But the point here is that the fuel filter is only one part of a Patrol’s servicing regime, and you really need to look at the big servicing picture and proceed accordingly.

Correct servicing might cost at the time, but it will save much more money in the longer term.

If only the globe has blown, the old globe can be removed form the back of the headlight and a new one installed easily and quickly.

If the whole headlight assembly is damaged, pretty much any universal seven-inch round H4 headlight assembly can be used to replace it.

Simple hand tools are all that is required.

Depending on what trim level you buy, a Patrol might only be fitted with a scratchy AM/FM radio and a single pair of speakers.

More upmarket models such as the Ti had better entertainment systems, but even on those, the standard speakers are almost certain to be junk by now.

And forget about a subwoofer, CD player or DVD player, as this stuff just wasn’t fitted to vehicles like the Patrol back when it was brand-new.

So it all comes down to what a previous owner has replaced them with and how much they spent at the time.

It breaks down like this: the RD28 engine had a timing belt, the petrol sixes used a timing chain and the TD42 turbo-diesel used a novel, and interesting set of timing gears rather than either a timing belt or chain.