Import a classic from Japan yourself – prologue

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December 22, 2008
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So let’s just say that you happen to be sitting on a bit of cash (maybe the house market happens to be extremely unappealing at this point in time?) and you feel like buying a “new” car for yourself that isn’t just another bland modern mass of metal.

Debonair

1974 Mitsubishi Debonair - your new fambily sedan?

fortunately for those of us that live in New Zealand, the current vehicle importation laws allow for right hand drive cars 20 years and older to be imported and registered for road use with very little red tape. This technically means (as of writing) any RHD vehicle registered in its country of origin on or before 22 December 1988, opening up a limitless amount of options as far as classic or “nostalgic” Japanese cars are concerned.

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: Automotive Documentation

Introducing Cam…

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December 21, 2008
by

Hi there,
I’m another contributor here… some of you may know me from www.oldschool.co.nz , you poor people.

For those that don’t, I’m Cameron, I’m 23, I live in New Zealand.

Without going into a long winded history of what I’m into, what I’ve owned and what I’ve failed at, I’ll just chuck up a couple of pics of my current fleet and give a summary….
I’ve been into cars since day dot. First car was an oldie, then I started getting into newer stuff…. something was missing… character. Buckets and buckets of character… My current fleet shows how I’ve been trying to make up for this ever since.

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: Authors

Hidden wonder.

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December 21, 2008
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As is likely the case around many places, there’s a lot of rare and/or simply badass cars, hiding behind hedges, in garages, tucked away in sheds.  Recently I visited a friend I’d not seen in a little while, he popped open the door of his garage and sitting infront of me were two cars of epic awesomeness.  One I knew about, the other was a recent addition to another’s flock that he is currently storing.

Here is the scene that greeted me as the door was opened;

For those who can’t figure out which cars these are.  I would wonder why you’d even be reading this site if I’m honest, that and your capability to read badges must be fairly slim at least for the car shown on the right hand side of the picture.

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: Car Spotting

Skyline History, Part 3.

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December 21, 2008
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Continued from; “Skyline History, Part 2.“

In the early 60′s, the Skyline was to take another path.   Autumn of 1960 the Italian designer Giovanni Michelotti was asked by Prince, to design for them a Coupe for the Skyline range.  The result was the BLRA-3 Prince Skyline Sport.  This car became commercially available to the public in April of 1962.  It was available in both Hardtop (R21A) and Convertible (R21B) forms.

Prince Skyline Sport BLRA-3 (R21A & R21B)

Prince Skyline Sport BLRA-3 (R21A & R21B)

The Sport ran the same GB4 engine and using the chassis of the BLSI-3, the wheelbase was identical to all previous models of Skyline but the shell was wider, longer, though obviously a sight shorter than it’s predecessors.

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: Automotive History

Skyline History, Part 2.

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December 20, 2008
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Continued from; “Skyline History, Part 1.”

As mentioned, the rest of the 1st Generation of Skyline did not change dramatically from the very first release.  Cosmetic and minor mechanical advances were made, the compression of the engine was increased to up the performance on the higher capacity and sportier versions and the car sold enough and was popular enough to maintain it’s production.

The second release of the Skyline was the ALSI-2.

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: Automotive History
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