Meet Sparky, The Electric El Camino

When a mechanics' shop is looking for a truck to haul various parts short distances, they usually look for something that ties-in to their business. If they restore old cars, they will find a 50-60’s Chevy, for example. But what if said shop belongs to Nissan? Sure, they could just take a stock Frontier or Titan and call it a day, but that would be boring.

The team at Nissan’s Technical Center decided to make sure their shop truck would stand out: they took a brand-new Leaf, chopped the rear off and bolted the rear half of a Frontier truck to it, thus creating the very first Nissan electric ute.

The engineers modified the vehicle themselves, stating that the project would boost morale. The Frontier had to be cut in the middle, since the Leaf is narrower than the midsize pickup. Interestingly, the bed’s length stayed the same. To wrap things up, the rear glass comes from a Titan they salvaged from a scrapyard.

As you can imagine, this Leaf truck – dubbed Sparky by the team- is not road-legal. And while we may never see a 2-door Leaf carrying a load of 2x4s down the highway, let’s not underestimate Nissan: after all, they sold the Juke and the Cube.

Share on Facebook

More on the subject

Test DrivesGas-free Driving: Life with the LEAF
Electric cars are now part of our everyday lives. As proof, Nissan recently delivered its first LEAFs. The idea of going to and from work every day for a week without racking up gas charges on my credit card was enough to make my mouth water. After a week of …
RecallsNissan Leafs Recalled
There seems to be a structural problem on Nissan’s all-electric car. The manufacturer has received some alarming reports about the front subframe assembly of their car. On 211 vehicles sold in the United States (and 65 in Canada), it is possible that some of those assemblies were badly welded, or …
NewsNissan Sells its 100,000th LEAF
After a very modest start in 2010, sales of the Nissan LEAF – a fully electric vehicle - have exploded since last year. So much so that the Japanese manufacturer announced that it sold more than 100,000 units of the car, half of which were sold in 2013. For the …
NewsA Crossover Based On The Nissan Leaf?
Nissan has been building the Leaf for a few years; the small electric car has been a success (especially here!) even though it is a little expensive, because it is a bespoke platform with a bespoke motor. This is why, when the next generation of the car arrives, it would …