When the Japanese brands began their onslaught on the hold of European car makers for control of the luxury market in the USA circa the 1990s, some great cars were the result. Acura, Lexus, and Infinity all brought the heat and changed the game in short order back then. While Lexus certainly emerged as the largest of that small group, Infinity was known for their unique styling to start and for making cars that were really packed with technology and that extra touch of lux that their customers were wanting.
If they had one early misstep it was the styling of their flagship Q45 sedan. Remember those things? The cars had no grill on the nose and were basically flat fronted with a big Infinity badge in the middle. It was different than virtually anything else on the road and a little much for lots of people.
In 1994 they changed the front end to be more traditional and sales followed suit. As you will see, this big bastard was packed with everything from rear wheel steering to a cross-mounted 4.5L V8 that made just shy of 300hp, pretty heady stuff for the time.
Looking back at this time and being a teenager then, I remember thinking that these cars were neat. Little did I know about things such as reliability, maintenance costs, and all the other junk that goes along with owning a car. My sons actually spend too much time hunting Craigslist and other places for potential cars to buy when they get their license and these old 1990s luxury runners always enter the conversation. Probably a nightmarish idea at this point but part of me would love to see them rocking a modern day barge like this…until we had to fix it.
