JDM Export Blog - Exporting, Auction, Car Shows, Car Life

 

 

The day started off nicely with a trip to McDonalds. We parked near the seaside after an hour and a half getting out of Yokohama. I was very happy to get out of the city and took some time to stretch since I knew I wouldn't want to get out of the car for a long time.

From here on out we went south to where the mountains were. The vegetation here was very green and nice. Getting excited...

We got stuck behind a really really slow car and decided that this highway pulloff was a nice location to give him a chance to get ahead before we caught up.

So we were now officially off the beaten trail and we were passing through some interesting parts. This is a small town in the valley before we went to climb our first mountain. Look at how small and secluded this town is in the photo below. It's a big change from the 15 million people I live with every day.

It would have been nice to find a soba or ramen shop down there for breakfast instead of McDonalds...

Here is the starting line of the first road we drove on. This was an exciting road to drive and was just amazing to experience. It was everything you would have wished for in a Japanese mountain road. It was twisty, lots of ups and downs, and a permanent smile was on my face the whole way. It was also very narrow (like three to four meters), so I couldn't stop anywhere on the road to take some pictures without stopping on the back side of a blind corner... Sorry nothing much to look at here. Traffic was just enough to prevent me from driving quickly. I got a video of this road but the camera is very shaky and you have to listen to Offspring Smash (It was a highschool friend so nostalgic music was a must). 

We got to a break in the mountain and came across a small farm in the valley. This really was in the middle of nowhere.

Being Japan, of course there was a small temple that we stopped at to check out... Maybe about 400 years old? I don't know.

Now we were hitting some higher speed roads so the temptation to put the power to the road was greater. Just as we start to speed up...

We get passed by a hella fast Forrester (I think)... With stickers everywhere on it... Only in Japan would you see somethign like this. You can't see it in the picture but the lights were all strobes so it was pretty funny to see this thing rip past us.

It was now lunch time so we wound our way over to a city. We eventually caught up with the Forrester as well... This town must have had a population of about 8,000 people but it had a nice beach and a large(ish) hotel on the beach. Parking was free at the hotel so we went to check out the beach... We soon saw a dark staircase peeking out from behind some green leafies. Time to investigate. 

Let's see what's up here.

Looks like another temple... But in a strange location.

Inside the temple there was a gong, a taiko drum and a box to put donations... The finny part is that there was no way to get up here besides the narrow and scary staircase. The builders would have had their work cut out for them.

Follow a scary dirt path up more and you get to see a beautiful bay with a single grave marker...

Neat.

Here we are on the top of the mountain. Hey, you guys get to see what I look like. That's me on the right, the ugly guy on the left is my buddy from middle school. That was a very scary picture to take since we were inches away from the cliff that was about 200 feet up... Yikes.

Okay, we ate lunch (I have tempura ramen) and got some snacks and drinks for the road. On to the fun part.

This road was almost dead. We could drive for about 10 minutes before we found an oncoming car and the roads were wide and very well maintained. The down side was the slippery pine needles on the side of the road. Driving on this road was a real Initial D moment. I could drive aggressively yet still safely. 

After about 45 minutes of windy fun roads we came to something that caught my eye. Here we have an exposed gutter on the side of the road. it's hard to see in the pic but this gutter is about a meter deep and 70 cm wide. This would eat a car quite easily if you were to lose control.

So that portion of the drive would have made the trip all worthwhile but it's what came next that really took the cake.

I pulled over to the side of the road since it looked like we were in for some highway driving. The road widened and the forest stopped. We checked out some hiking trails for a short time but not for long. The bridge above us could be heard making sounds like an RB26dett or a 2JZ-gte does at full throttle. It wasn't long before we heard more. Some SR20 with a dash of Porsche flat 6 thrown in. It was time to investigate.

What we found was a touge drift area and a high speed touge area both side by side on immaculate public roads. I will let the pics do the talking but we ran into a drift Cefiro, A Carrera GT2, and an Alpha Romeo 8C. All doing their things. The 8C was very fast and the driver was amazing. I tried to keep up but my 260ish hp felt like 75.

Look at those tire tracks. This is where the drifters in the area come. This would be their home course.

Complete with broken fibreglass panels...

...and heaps of old tire bits. I didn't want to ever leave.

At the top was a meeting area where the drivers might hang out between runs or use to turn around. I have to say I am guilty of running a few circles in this lot. I don't drift but I had to leave my mark. I know you would do the same in my shoes.

We headed down from tehe mountain with stupid grins on our faces and the odd, "Did we actually just see that?" It was a memory to keep for a nice long time. the road down included a neat area of about 10 switchbacks all in a row... Unfortunately there were some anti drift pegs and no curb to drop your front tire into (Takumi style)... Still fun though

Driving on roads like these is really the reason to have a car in Japan. Day to day driving in Yokohama or Toyko is awful. Imagine 10 kms in 1.5 hours... But after driving roads like these, it is all worth it.

From here, the sun goes down and we start using my friend's $900 camera instead of my $320 one in an attempt to get better pics. I will have to get the pics from him. there was much more driving and some quick night time twisties to report but that will wait for another time.

Lastly take a look at the maps I got of the areas where I drove.

127 was the drift road. Further up it was a high speed section as was 411. the fast and fun road I drove on with the pine needles is the yellow one on the left side of the map.

The yellow road was the 10 switchbacks. Look at the elevation lines to get a good idea about how steep it was.

Road 401 was driven at night. It was something special to experience.

The biggest surprise was that during the whole trip I saw not one police car. I'm not telling you to go nuts on these roads but it is nice to know that you have the freedom to drive above the "lowest common denominator" speed. Just keep it safe and don't do anything stupid. If you live by these guidelines then it seems that the police will turn a blind eye.

The entire trip was 16 hours long and 450 kms. Fuel was 6800 yen. In terms of cost for benefit, I can't think of much better than this. It's a bargain for a day of fun and experiences.

A trip like this should be done by any car enthusiast who visits Japan. If you are coming my way, let me know and I will do my best to make a trip with you to show you some areas.

Best case scenario... Buy a car from auction through me and take a drive in the mountains of Japan before shipping your car back to your country. Sounds like a good plan to me.

Derek

It is easy to buy a car direct from Japan. You send in a deposit, pick your car, and get it delivered to you in your home country. Buying a car from Japan has many benefits we all know about.
 
So now you imported your vehicle from Japan and have had it for a while. If you are like many performance oriented people, you want to squeeze a little more out of the car. Buying parts for your SR20 or RB26 might be easy in your country but consider that Japan has one of the world's biggest tuner markets and that prices for parts are cheap here.
 
Many of the best tuning companies come from Japan. Think names like Blitz, RE Amemiya, HKS, Fujitsubo, Impul, Tein, Mine's, Apex, and Greddy just to name a few.
 
Just think of how many aftermarket parts are bought, swapped, replaced, and upgraded over the years. Japan is an excellent source for used tuner parts as well as new ones.
 
Besides tuner parts, consider that you could source regular maintenance parts too. Parts like timing belts, hoses, water pumps, headgaskets, radiators, or interior pieces could all be sourced from Japan.
 
Pacific Coast Auto has the ability to purchase new or used parts for you, direct from Japan. For more details please follow the link below.
 
Used parts direct from Japan
 

One of the wonderful parts of being in Japan is that you are in Japan... Particularly for a Canadian who loves cars.

In Canada, there are strict import laws for grey market vehicles and many manufacturers choose not to sell in Canada since the market is small and expensive to penetrate.

Because of this, we get excited when we see vehicles that are uncommon or never sold in Canada. Here we come back to the Japanese side of things.

In Japan you can buy any car worldwide and import it into Japan. In order to see rare cars all one has to do is take a stroll down the right street. Take this picture for example. Here we have a GH-NB Mazda Roadster Coupe (Miata to you non-Japanese. I would have to say that I am enjoying my time here.

Sorry for the bad pics but when the opportunity knocks...

Okay, so we all know the 180sx. It's the car we see driving sideways on racetracks and streets around the world. The sport of drifting has really brought this car out to the forfront and why not? This car is everything a drifter could ask for. It's light-weight, has a powerful engine, is cheap to buy, and is easy to find. The Turbo I4 SR20DET engine is one of the world's most tuned engines, and can easily be upgraded to big power numbers.

Here is an example of a nicely tuned version. It has been lowered with some nice rims and a subtle body kit. This kind of car is seen at Japanese car auctions quite often. It would be a nice starting point for getting into drifting.

Next we see the Sileighty. Most of us know about these. They are an S13 180sx with the front bumper, lights, and fenders from an S13 Silvia. These came about from Japan's early days of touge and street drifting. As you can imagine, racing down Japan's famously norrow and dangerous moutain passes at night leads to many accidents. And what is a 180sx driver to do once he smashed his front end on the guard rail? Install the cheaper, easier-to-find Silvia front end of course. That's right, touge racing directly influenced the popular Sileighty trend. This particular Sileighty has the drifters' signature mismatched wheels, cracked bumper, and poor colourmatching...

It didn't take long before people were installing the Silvia front end for style. In fact, It was so popular that Nissan, in 1998, did a limited run of official "Slieighties". The trend started to see S14 and S15 front end conversion kits like the one you see below.

The S15 Sileighty is a brilliant looking car. The headlights give it a very nice aggressive look. I looked at this picture for a while wishing it were in my driveway (or parking lot as I live in Japan). A drive in this car on an open curvy road would be like heaven. I stared at it for a while before I scrolled down in the weekly auctions and found something truely special.

This is something we don't ever see. Someone put an S30 Fairlady front end onto their 180sx. Everyone knows the S30 Fairlady, but some of you know it as the 240sx from the eighties that started it all. This is an interesting fusion of two popular Nissan cars and just really stunned me when I saw it at first. I have to say that I am a big fan of how this turned out. The old meets new(er) thing is neat and I always love seeing the original Z, even if it's just the front. Love it or hate it you have to admit that it will garner lots of attention. I'm on the side of love it.

I guess in keeping with the nomenclature I should be calling this a Faireighty...  Although it seems to be called an S30180sx if you were to search on Google. Whatever you call it, the reserve was not met on it this week at auction in Japan. The high bid was 496,000 yen. Will we be seeing more of these in the years to come? I don't know, but I'm sure the S13 chassis will be here for many years to come.

It has been a really long time since I update here due to a surprising increase in customers. Thank you everyone for supporting me.

Here is a small post of pics I took while at USS Tokyo looking for some M5s, Skylines, Alpinas, and other vehicles.

Everyone should make it to USS Tokyo some time. If you are coming to Japan, let me know and I can take you.

This is my first time finding an H1 in Japan. You would have to be crazy to consider purchasing one of these if you lived here. It would be nuts to try to drive it. Consider that the average road here is half the width of roads in Canada. My street is only three meters wide...

Here are a couple of "Itasha" cars. It's too bad for the stickers and graphics, the mini actually looks cool with the widebody flares. It reminds me of the sportspack arches from the original. My first car was a mini... The Land Rover... Well, I have never seen one done up quite like this. I wonder who bought it.

Okay, so I got excited and took a couple pics of this AE86 Levin. Nothing wrong with being obsessed with this car. Was too busy to pop the hood on this guy. I wonder what surprise is waiting inside. the last time I did that to an AE86 I found a tuned blacktop. Man I've got a hard job.

I am a car guy so wherever I go I am looking at cars. On the street, in parking lots, in the back yards of people's houses. Living in Japan is excellent if you like nice cars and I found a nice one last night.

So I am an Integrale fan. The car just has so much history in rally, not to mention the badass Group B styling. Stock they have turbo 2.0 liter engines and 4WD. It puts out 200bhp in standard trim and has a squat wide stance. This car is awesome.

Abarth was Fiat's racing division and they offered tuned versions right from their plant and offered upgrade parts. People would go to them if they wanted to have a rally car made. A common tune was around 300bhp (running an air restrictor). They generally had full stripped and caged interiors.

So it was night time as you can see in the pics so they didn't turn out as good as it could have. Nonetheless this is a car you don't see every day and a nice condition version at that.

I was just down in Yokohama taking a nice trip with my daughter when we noticed the new Nissan World Headquarters has opened.

We went in a took a peek and some photos.

I sent the pics to Justin at 7tune and he wrote an article on them.

http://www.7tune.com/nissan-gallery-at-the-new-global-headquarters-in-yo...

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It seems that the Toyota / Subaru awesome RWD lightweight sports coupe is on again and it will be revealed at the Tokyo motor show in October 2009, This along with the Lexus LF-A.
 
The show has seen manufactures dropping attendance all across the board. Every manufacturer has atleast cut space due to the world meltdown but not Toyota. In fact they may have gotten more room because of it. I expect to see good things from Toyota at the show and I hope that Toyota is not going back to the "off again" side.

Lancia Delta Integrale Evoluzione Martini version

Renault 5 GT Turbo

BMW E36 3 Series Touring Wagon

Audi 80/90 2.6e V6

BMW 5 Series

Volkswagon Corrado VR6 2.9

Volkswagon Golf GTi 2.0 16v ABF