This SEMA Nissan Frontier Really Nails the Nickelodeon Hot Wheels Monster Truck Aesthetic

There’s a pretty neat batch of Nissans at the SEMA tuner show this year. Besides the V8 manual Xterra that Nismo Nick built, the company internally is presenting a cool desert-running Armada SUV, a sweet Saudi-style old-school Patrol, and this delightfully silly “Frontier Rapid Runner” with a river kayaking theme and splashy graphic set. I had so many toys like this as a kid, and I’m guessing the people who put it together did too.

Apparently, this is the same Frontier that came out to the show last year as the “Trailgater,” an off-road adventure vehicle designed to turn any campsite into a TV-watching area. I like this river-running version a lot better. Mostly because of the splash-themed wrap and lack of doors.

I love driving Jeeps with the doors removed so much. Every time I acquire a new project vehicle, I think about how practical it’d be to make some tube doors for the same experience (and every time I arrive at the same conclusion: no, it’s not viable). But Nissan and build partner POWERNATION TV have more resources and creative engineering capabilities than I do, so they were able to make it happen.

We’ll dump all the images of this thing into a slideshow for you to scroll through:

The wide stance of this thing, due to Titan truck suspension, pushes it into caricature territory. But I think that was probably the point. The wheel fitment, colorway, and accessories make the whole package look exactly like a toy I would have gone nuts over in the ’90s without really trying to be retro, and I’m all about it.

Here’s the full parts list as provided by Nissan:

Got a tip? Or had any luck making tube doors like this? Drop me a line at andrew.collins@thedrive.com.

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