Have you ever looked at a Jeep and thought “That would make a really decent drift car”? Neither have we, but a gentleman in Japan thought that taking a Mitsubishi-licensed Willys Jeep body and placing a Nissan Silvia (240SX) drift-car chassis and Nismo 2-way Limited Slip Differential underneath would be a great idea.
Drifting fans will be pleased to hear that the engine is also sourced from the drifting realm. The familiar SR20.DET (here displacing 2.2-litres) and running a TD-06 25G turbo with 256˚cam control is doing the business.
And so the drift jeep was born, complete with McLaren F1-esque centre-wheel drive and a low-slung body that would make Gordon Murray proud. This can be likened to taking a Lamborghini and turning it in to an off-road machine, no wait that has been done already which just goes to show you that where there is petrolhead there is a way.
The video of the beast is titled “JEEP of drift specification appears!” (we smell a whiff of Google Translate in the air) this was confirmed by the presenter whose translation turned him into master Yoda from Star Wars, which reads “Interested in the car I am”.
The drift Jeep is quite an interesting looking brute and is sure to spark the creation of similar vehicles, perhaps even a drifting series where only Jeeps are allowed to compete. Instead of “DK” (Drift King) we would now see “JDK” (Jeep Drift King) sliding his or her way down the slippery Touge’s (mountain passes) of Japan.