Motorsport: Nissan to join V8 Supercars

Holden and Ford will be joined by Nissan and Chrysler in the coming years as V8 Supercars opens up to other manufacturers. Photo / Getty Images

V8 Supercars have drawn the line at no more than five manufacturers in the championship series after Nissan confirmed it would enter and take on Holden and Ford next year.

Nissan will join the series from 2013, with Rick and Todd Kelly's Kelly Racing defecting from Holden to become the Japanese giant's factory-backed team.

And Chrysler is expected to announce in the new few months it will become the fourth make on the grid as V8 Supercars' Car of the Future blueprint allows other manufacturers to join Holden and Ford from next year.

But V8 boss Tony Cochrane said the series needed to be sensible about the number of manufacturers allowed into the sport - saying five was the maximum they would consider.

"We would be very reluctant to go above five manufacturers," Cochrane said in Melbourne today.

"At the start of 2013 there'll be at least four manufacturers there. Nothing's happened to change my view on that."

Nissan has not competed in Australian touring car racing since the early 1990s, when it unpopularly dominated the sport.

The powerhouse R32 Nissan Skyline GT-R known as Godzilla gave Holden and Ford a torrid time, winning the Bathurst 1000 twice and dominating the championship with now V8 Commission chairman Mark Skaife at the wheel.

But they were unpopular with traditional Aussie motor sport fans - the nadir coming with a Bathurst win in 1992 when Skaife's co-driver Jim Richards labelled a booing crowd "a pack of arseholes".

- AAP