Definitely turning heads.

Especially with this setup “lurking” under (and over) the bonnet!

1UZ-FE with Super Charger.

Hard to miss the V-can green paintjob – itself a bit of an inside joke

Dem flares and dat wing!

And as a bonus, here’s a tidy facelift KHR30 Paul Newman Version for old man Michael. One day, he says to himself…

PNV Envy.

Nostalgic Car Show Nagoya (part 2) photo album on Minkara »

Zeb's 260C-izzle

Slide-ways Retro

…or the Dunedin hillsides.  One of the two.

-Michael

"Insert TrendwhoreStanceflushNationSlamWeinerSlogan"

I wonder if this will see the Kenmeri getting a bit more exposure or rather saturation in the US scene.  Likely so.  That’s the last thing I need, prices for parts getting even worse, hahah.  Still though, amazing prize.  Someone is going to be a very lucky chap or chapette, especially after they sell the TE37V’s of ultimate bland off it and put something decent on.

(found via Eric @ JDM Legends)

-Michael

Torana, Hiace, Commodore, Cedric & Rodeo.

Celica, Celica, Celica, Celica, Celica, Civic.

Closer of the Torana, Hiace and Commodore.

Minty Fresh Mazda's

Corolla Time (+ Starlet)

Crown goon and E7 boxness.

More Celicas, this time of the MkII Supra persuasion.

Escort, RX7 & Avenger.

Bluebird & Violet

…and that’s us for now.  No doubt there’ll be a few more scattered here and there in the coming months, I believe I read somewhere that Mr. 86fighters was there taking photos, so hopefully his blog will be updated soon with some classy shots.

Cheers again to ShavenYak for the photographs, maybe one of these days I’ll be able to attend and take shots myself instead of having to request it of other people.

-Michael

Leon's Isuzu Gemini

JZ-powered Hilux

KE26 goon on solid 8-spokes.

Toymota X6, if memory serves... it's wearing the wrong face.

Toyota Supra MkII - The coolest Supras.

Al & Lee Want You!, not for anything, they just want you.

With that done, I’ll round this out by a few more shots of the other cars you’ve already seen.

Mistubishi GTO

The S5 Crown goon, wearing it's Steel hooves. It has alloys of interest too, I'm keen to see those attached to it at some stage.

The S5 brigade, minus the coupe version. sheepers... I'm looking at you.

S4 Crown magic, the latest "barn find" Crown

...and from the back

With that we come to the end.  All photographs in this post were taken and shared by Richard Opie, you may remember him from such cars as; AlfaSud, Toyota Starlet, Triumph 2500 (x2), Honda Integra, Torneo and some I’ve likely forgotten.  Cheers for the pictures man.

Enjoy!

-Michael

A trophy cabinet full of slammed Crowns with various motivation.

This event started with very humble beginnings, the idea and thought that most people have had, to start an event that caters for Japanese classics.  It’s very few and far between in NZ.  Our small country’s classic car scene has been dominated for the most part by the rodders of V8 and concourse of European (including British) types.  Japanese cars (as with a lot of western society, I imagine) tend to have been looked down upon and scoffed at by such crowds.  The reality is though that Japanese cars are more accessible to most, as in their heyday, they’re cheaper and more reliable than their more “prestigious” counterparts.

Enough of the blather though, this is an online blog, you didn’t come here to read my dribble, you came to check out the photographs.  So here you go.

70's Mitsubishi GTOs.. remember when the GTO was awesome?

Two of the best Celica's in the country. Owned and built by one guy. 1x UZ & 1x JZ

A pair of Gen. I Civs

Fantastic condition KE25 with a terrible P/Plate.

Mazda 808, one of my favourite cars from the oldschool.co.nz fleet.

The timeless S30Z

Toyota's, they're urvreewhurr!

Alistair's Toyota Century. Class.

…and that will do it for Pt. I.

(all these photographs were taken by Mitsubishi and Car Parts Guru – Phillip Weston, I hope he doesn’t mind me stealing them…)

-Michael

I’m no fan of the TE37V and their ability to make stylish cars bland.  The bonnet in carbon would be alright, had they not added the god awful American muscle-look raised section, purposeful or not.  I’m also not a fan of that manner of air dam, it’s especially evident from the angle this photo is taken on that it seems more to distort the front end shape of a beautiful car than it does improve it.

Super-charged L-series

What IS awesome about the car, the L28改 3.1L stroker motor with super-charger attached.  I’m quite keen to find out what kind of numbers the car makes, you can read in the SH article itself that it’s estimated to be around 400hp.  Given what other awesome L-series I’ve seen in G-Works, I can imagine this being quite likely indeed.

-Michael

Then this morning I was browsing the ever wonderful JNC forums and stumbled upon this;

1960 Prince Skyline ALSIE-1

Yep.  New/Recent pictures of a recent purchase of one of only 600 Prince Skylines exported to the United States.  There are survivors!  So cool. (literally, look at that snow!) It really does appear to be in fairly decent condition too…

The snow photographs appear to be the more recent ones and then there’s a couple from perhaps where it was found/picked up from or perhaps just earlier in the year.

…and one of the interior with what looks like a spare gauge cluster.  I wonder whether another of the 600 has given a few of it’s dying parts to keep this one alive.

It looks super tidy.  It also makes me curious about whether the other one known to exist has been completed by MOONS as the rumours told.

Nice.

Blue 1st Generation’s are the order of December it seems.

-Michael

It ain't pretty, but it's got it where it counts

Even with my relatively conservative (read: noob) lines I still managed to punt said racecar to a 1:56 PB around Track 1 at Taupo with the new ‘slow’ turn 12, which trumps my previous record in my own FWD TX3 by a whole twelve seconds. I can only imagine what sort of laptimes a more experienced/ballsy driver could be capable of doing in that thing.

the Mirage is running a mildly tickled Dirk-spec 4G63 out of a VR-4 and tricky diffs front and rear (yup it’s 4WD). There has been talk of re-tuning the car to run 20psi of boost; now we’re getting serious.

Thanks to Logan/Gorgasm for the photo, and to the guys from Rogue Racing for the chance to blaze around Taupo in this