The most complete story behind the groundbreaking old school sportscar that never got its chance.
Back to 1999, after the ZZ production was stopped for homologation issues, Tomita and Kaira wanted to persist in achieving the goal of producing their dream car, driven by a warm welcome from the press for the first car entirely conceived on their own.
The new concept was to sell a car solid and effective enough to be used in GT championships (FIA or All-Japan) by changing only the wearable, ie tires, discs, pads and clutch, adding a wing, and eventually replacing the engine depending on the category, varying from 2 liters to 3 liters and a half of displacement (but there could have been fitted a V8 and a V12, too). Tomita was aiming not only to Japan, but also and especially to Europe and the United States.
The simplicity of the car and the use of non-exotic components should have limited its price tag to under 10 million yen (equal to 95 thousand dollars in 2001 and 135 thousand dollars today, considering the purchasing power). Furthermore, the better interior's and construction's refinement made it a complete all-round car without excessive sacrifice.
Being the evolution of the ZZ, they named it ZZII. The presentation should have taken place at the 2001 Frankfurt Motor Show, but that didn't happen as probably the car was not ready yet, so the ZZII was first shown at the 2002 Tokyo Auto Salon, some months later.
They started from the well known extruded-aluminum lightweight chassis and they installed their workhorse taken from the R-Z, an inline six twin turbo with 530PS and lots of torque.
The result of this transplant would have been a 550PS berlinetta able to clock more than 330km/h, keeping its weight under the ton and covering nought to sixty in two seconds and eight tenths.
For instance, the Nismo BNR34 Z-Tune can achieve 330kph with fifty less horsepower, a 20 less Newton metres of torque, half-a-tonne more weight, and the aerodynamics of a brick. The ZZ-II could do better for sure.
Also, for comparison the B-Engineering Edonis, another stillborn supercar, clocked 360kph but, if it weighed as much as the ZZ-II keeping its own power to weight ratio, it would have had between 500 and 610 BHP, depending on the actual weight of the Tommy kaira.
In picture: a test-bed chassis for testing and validation of components and parts.
The ZZII naked chassis