STORY: Aerotechnik – A swiss Datsun parts dealer that became a big car parts company

If you’re a Swiss car guy, the chances are very high that you have heard of a Company called Aerotechnik AG in Stein am Rhein, Switzerland. It’s not too far away from Schaffhausen and therefore well known among car guys from this Area.

Today the company is most known as being the wholeseller for Big brands like Remus exhausts, their own Barracuda and Team82 wheel brands, K&N Filters and other car parts. JDM fans will probably recognize them as being the company that imports and homologates Work wheels to Switzerland, including the vintage EQUIP 03 and other designs, which are still a favourite among the S30 owners.

What many people don’t know, however, is the interesting Story that this company has behind it. Even though I know Aerotechnik for many years (my first car had their Barracuda wheels installed, and i some friends of mine worked there over the years), I wasn’t aware of this whole story until I recently picked up some Datsun parts from a nice guy, who told me that Aerotechnik in my Area used to be a Datsun tuning parts dealer back in the days. That made me curious, and I started to investigate a bit. I first contacted the Man himself, who is still the owner of the Company: Gerhard “Geri” Mösl:

Geri was happy to tell me the Story, which goes like this: His dad used to have a Datsun / Nissan Dealership and workshop at the Fulachstrasse 229, in Schaffhausen (Today you’ll find a Nissan GT-R tuner at this location, but they have no relation).
Geri worked there and during the early 80ies, they got a lot of requests from their customers for Datsun Z and ZX Tuning parts. Geri started to source parts from UK (Wolfrace wheels), Japan and USA and sell them to customers. Because of the initial success, he founded his Company on the 14.03.1983 and made it all official.

On the 25. in february 1985, the Company got renamed to Aerotechnik and moved to a different location, and he also started to sell his parts via Nissan dealerships in whole Europe to his customers. According to Geri, with a quite big success.

Later Aerotechnik became a stock Corporation and at some point they moved to their new purpose-built Office and warehouse building in Stein am Rhein (see first photo). Additionally, they have a subsidiary address in Rielasingen (Germany), just across the border for distribution in EU.
During the 90 however, the customer interest in Datsun / Nissan Z cars started to drop, and they began to focus more on other brands and general purpose products like wheels and Remus exhaust systems – which they still do today.
According to Geri, the business really picked up in the 00 years when they started to introduce their own brands and became the Remus exhaust wholeseller for Switzerland. Back in those days, it was one of the most popular aftermarket brands over here. At the tuning peak times around 2012, they had 74 employees and the company is still going strong these days, despite the fact that general interest in cars / tuning has gone down a bit with the young people. A trend you can see around the globe.
I asked Geri if he still has documents and photos from the beginning of his old company, but unfortunately he said during the various moves all the Documents, photos and even information about their original lineup went lost.
However, I was able to find an old Aerotechnic Catalogue from Fall 1986. Geri said he still remembered the Photoshooting with this 300ZX:

As the Company name suggests, and the catalogue confirms, they were mainly involved in selling Aero-kits, Spoilers and louvres for Datsun Z and ZX cars, but not limited to those products or cars. (Note SH Number Plates = Schaffhausen)

Another famous product (which you still can find on cars from that era these days) were the 240Z / 260Z headlight covers, which were sold for 228.- CHF back in the days.
The 240 / 260Z Lineup also included a 4-piece mud flap set and a front spoiler.

For your pleasure, i uploaded the full catalogue as pdf scan here:
Aerotechnik katalog 1986 WM www.JDMjunkies.ch

At one point i stumbled upon this photo from a swiss homologation document for those said 240Z headlight covers, issued by Datsun Suisse SA and given to their customers by Aerotechnik AG. This document confirms that those headlight covers were indeed Nissan OEM Covers, sold by Nissan in various markets, and therefore original Nissan Parts.

Update 24.01.2025: I got this old list of the former Swiss Datsun “Fairlady Z / ZX club Ostschweiz” (east Switzerland) sponsors, which also mentions Aerotechnik as one of their sponsors in July 1986:

Overall it’s just a little Side-note in the Datsun switzerland history, but the Company, who is today one of the biggest wheel and exhaust wholesellers in switzerland, once started as a Datsun parts dealer in my neighbourhood, makes this all so interesting to me and i think many others too.
I still hope to find photos from the old days. Geri still has one of his original Z32 show cars from the company in his collection and sent me this Photo from it.

Special thanks go out to Geri and his Family and the Aerotechnik team for sharing the information with me and for Remo to give me the initial hint for this story.