By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

Yesterday I had a hell of a good time…until the moment when I had a hell of a bad time. Let’s start with the good: Some of the guys at the office and I decided to spend a day enjoying scenic Malibu and the amazing canyon roads that it offers. Mike in his Voltex aided S2000, me in my S2000 and Jason in his tuned Evo X met up at Neptunes Net on the PCH to start off the day. We then proceeded to have a hell of a time driving our native Malibu beach-side touge roads. I was loving it, I pulled the hardtop off and was enjoying the sun all while getting used to the feel of my new Recaro RS-G Super Stark seats and Keys Racing steering wheel that we installed two days earlier. Continue reading at the Real JDM…

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

Today’s photo comes from The Real JDM, where you can get this gorgeous Rocky Auto Skyline in wallpaper size. Keep those Photo of the Day nominations rolling in!

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

Today I was talking with a client who asked me what I felt about the Tamon Design RC370Z which debuted just recently in Tokyo. Not only was I happy to answer his question, but I was glad because it reminded me that I’ve wanted to blog about this car for the past couple of weeks now.

On January 5th I put up a sketch here by Tamon Design which showed the concept of the car in early form. At the time I was extremely excited by the very unique image on the sketch and I was prepared to be blown away by a very controversially designed and aggressive car whenever it did materialize in the flesh.

Continue reading "The Tamon Design 370Z" »

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

I came across this picture from our archives and it made me think about the transition…The transition from our last blog post (the flawless old school Z) to what I want to write about next (Eco tuning) is what this picture represents…but also it represents the old and the new of JDM tuning which are both celebrating new heights of popularity at the very same moment in time. Granted the two cars are totally incomparable, but if i had to isolate two prominent themes of Tokyo Auto Salon 2010 it would be nostalgic car tuning and eco tuning. These two massively contrasting mediums of JDM tuning are what made TAS 2010 most different from previous shows.

So what about Eco Tuning? Well, there is one point in particular that I wanted to share. Often I learn profoundly interesting things in meetings with my friends and suppliers over in Japan. Although I wont say the particular company or the person in this case, there was an interesting perspective mentioned in private that I feel is worth mentioning publicly with my source being anonymous. Continue reading at The Real JDM

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

Video is good for capturing a few things that hi-res pictures just cant do justice to. One of my favorite details that I saw at TAS can be found in the rear wing of this Lexus IS-F CCS Concept (CCS = Circuit Club Sports). So rather than try to photograph it, I decided to take a video to show you how cool it is!

The side plates of the rear wing do something I’ve never seen before. They showcase the IS-F logo in multiple segments of dry carbon yet integrate it seamlessly in a way that blew all of us away. Afterward I was wondering how they did it. My guess is that they used a template and laser cut the pre-preg dry carbon to remove the total shape of the IS-F. Then I’m thinking that they laser cut the components of the IS-F and then re-arranged them all so it fit perfectly before putting it into the mold and then the autoclave. That’s my guess…whatever it was they did, it was brilliant.

Continue reading "IS-F CCS Concept Video" »

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

(the car below is made out of cardboard! I can’t stop thinking about how amazing it is!)

Here’s a 2:30am early access report to Tokyo Auto Salon 2010.

I caught two themes to this show this year, the most obvious was the tuning of hybrid cars. The Prius and the Insight were everywhere as expected by most. Everything from a crazy widebody LF-A inspired Prius to simple tuned ones to VIP tuned by Garson, it seems like everyone had a Prius or an Insight. Mostly Prius though…

The other theme of the show was more subtle…the resurgence of retro JDM tuning. Two of my favorite cars at the show fit into this category.

1. A Hakosuka retrofit onto a Nissan Stagea which included a full Hakosuka GT-R front end swap and also even tail lamps that were Hakosuka styled. This takes the typical R34 front end swap and flips it on its head.

2. A Miata (1st Gen) fully converted both exterior and interior into a Toyota 2000GT Roadster. This car was flawless. I want one. Badly.

Continue reading "Tokyo Auto Salon – Day 0 Early Access" »

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

It is no secret that I’m really into cars…One of the things that happens over the years of being a car freak like me is that it takes greater extremes of unique things to impress me. So just when I thought I had seen it all from JDM tuning, I found this. A very rare TVR Sagaris in itself, but then modified with a custom titanium exhaust produced by Heat Magic Japan. The guys that made this exhaust are the same crazy guys who made that 4 muffler motorcyle exhaust I recently posted.

Before TVR was sold off to a rich young Russian guy who gradually ruined it, they were producing some really crazy cars. Unfortunately I’ve never had a chance to drive a TVR but it was always a dream of mine. To me, TVR embodies the light weight concept of Lotus but with an added level of insanity because all the TVR cars tend to be about 2-3x the power of Lotus cars. I’ve heard they are a nightmare to drive…it sounds like a fun nightmare to me! Continue reading at The Real JDM

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

David Kao emailed me recently and shared a drawing he made by pencil. I thought his technique was so good that I wanted to share it here. See more at The Real JDM

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

Happy New Year everyone! I’m excited about 2010! During my hiatus I spent some time thinking about life, cars and the future.

One thing that reoccurred a few times during my time reflecting and reading was the theme of electric cars and eco cars in general. Now if you’re like me, this probably sounds like a boring topic…but if you’re like me, you’ll give reading this a chance because you know how much I care about sports car tuning and where I’m coming from. I wanted to share the cliff notes of my thought evolution during my time off.

Continue reading after the jump!

Continue reading "Welcome To 2010 Post – A Forward Thinking Post" »

By Ben Schaffer

The Real JDM

I wanted to share with you a video I took during my last trip to Japan. The video is an up close look at Nissan’s R35 GT-R FIA GT1 Race car. This was one of those cars that was far more impressive in the flesh than I ever expected. Of all of the cars that I enjoyed seeing at the Nismo Festival this year, these GT1 cars were my favorite. The quality of the car’s construction, the sound, the details in the design and the closer resemblance to a street GT-R all made these cars more special to me than seeing the Super GT cars (which are closer to resembling rocket ships than street cars these days).

Having felt that pictures do not do the car justice, I jumped behind the ropes with my press pass and shot a walk around video of the car. My hope was to try to show the car from my perspective there at the event, getting a closer look at the design and also getting a chance to hear the sound of another nearby GT1 rev its insane V8 engine. Pictures in my opinion have a hard time doing this car justice.

I just put this up on youtube a minute ago for you all to see. I hope you enjoy.