Yahoo Autos Junkyard Gem: 2008 Nissan Altima Hybrid Sedan
Once Honda blazed the trail for gasoline-electric hybrid vehicles here with the 2000 Insight, and the Toyota Prius proved to us that hybrids worked fine as real-world cars a year later, the race was on among other manufacturers to get into the hybrid game. GM managed to put together a "mild hybrid" Silverado for 2004, and Ford began selling the Escape Hybrid as a 2005 model. Nissan managed to avoid being too late to the hybrid party by introducing the Altima Hybrid for the 2007 model year; sales were poor, but I've managed to find one of these cars in a San Francisco Bay Area self-service wrecking yard recently.
Nissan was busy developing what would become by far the world's biggest-selling pure electric vehicle of the 2010s during the middle 2000s, and so the crew from Yokohoma saved time by licensing Toyota's hybrid technology for use in this car.
The Toyota system worked fine, and it allowed the 2008 Altima Hybrid to deliver 35 city and 33 highway miles per gallon. That was better than the 23 city/31 highway mileage of the ordinary '08 Altima sedan with automatic, but not enough better to tempt many buyers.
