Nismo Festival 2010 at Fuji Speedway from Remi Schouten on Vimeo.

Nismo Festival @ the Fuji Speedway. This video truly brings out the racing culture in Japan.
















Driving in the Fuji Speedway with Mount Fuji at the background. =)

DraggerFest

Sick Evo. AND what on earth was the M3 doing?

Photoshop fun

Dug up a couple of photos taken in Sepang.
Miss those times dearly.
Hope to head up north again when there's a chance.
















Too much torque for the TCC sticker to handle?
















Old school EG screams with its vTec.
















Ever so lovely.
















Rear Alcons. Must have cost a bomb. Love the signature slotted rotors.
















k20A showing whose boss.
















Pride of Japan leaving some semi slick rubber on Malaysian soil
















We can admire him all day.

HellaFlashed

Went down to Big Splash @ East Coast for HellaFlash, a car event for enthusiasts of mainly JDM rides. Well organised by CrankSG under the scorching heat.

Support their blog!

http://cranksg.wordpress.com/

Just pictures! Enjoy.

How do you scare your freaked out competitors?

A fitting nickname for THE car.

Speedhunters

They won't be extinct, at least not at the moment

Whenever I leave home and take a leisure drive around Singapore, I'll tend to leave a small gap on the driver's window for two reasons: ventilation and preparing myself for potential "music to my ears" if a monster appears in my rear view mirror.

Singapore has possibly the highest concentration of souped up cars. You'll most likely chance upon a tastefully modified machine regardless where you are, be it in the neighbourhood or downtown.

Once in a while, you can find a Gallardo Superleggera parked in Holland V on a Saturday.. or a convoy of FD2Rs at a T junction somewhere in Bukit Merah. The range of performance cars here in Singapore is huge, from head turning Italian exotics to JDMs boasting tremendous horses and not to forget a bone shattering ride.

I heard him first before spotting him, thanks to the quad MINES exhaust.

JDM at its best

R34 GTR in the Tsukuba circuit.

Can it beat the Challenge Stradale in the Time Attack?

Changing gear at 8000rpm?! It sure needs lots of rest after a hot lap.

GTR has a local competitor

MotorTrend had the pleasure of pitting the Nissan GTR against Japan's new SuperCar: the $400,000 Lexus LFA.

Its high time that the Godzilla has someone to play with in the Japanese backyard instead of traveling abroad to disturb German and Italian counterparts.

If looks could kill, you'd be motionless in front of your screen now.

This high revving V10 redlines at 9000rpm. The engine weighs not more than a V6 though. Technological marvel. The front-mid engined 4.8 litre V10 is good for 552 bhp with a 0-60 timing of a mind boggling 3.7 seconds. One of the more impressive feature of this Japanese samurai is the LCD instrument cluster. It looks stunning and readings are more responsive than the usual analog tachometer.

Triangular styling seems to be the main theme of this RWD monster. Triangular headlights, air vents, sharp wing mirrors, two huge grills at the rear and the unmistakable stacked triple muffler complete the look of this car.

Traction is an issue during pedal to metal acceleration due to its RWD drivetrain. However, adopting a 4WD layout wouldn't be feasible if shaving weight is instrumental in the overall vision and concept of the car.

Here's a compilation of a few videos featuring the LFA and keep your heart pumping till red line.



V10 vs twin turbo V6: who will come out tops?

Sepang Drag Battle

Sepang Drag Battle

Left Singapore in the afternoon of 8th May for Sepang.

Sepang Drag Battle commenced at around 2030hrs. Cars prepared themselves for a couple of practice runs.

Noise from the decatted straight pipe exhaust of countless Honda eg6 and Protons was extremely loud, and the sound was amplified probably due to the echo coming from the grandstand shelter.

We waited and waited for cars from our local tuners to strut their stuff. Spark Motorsport's Rex was one of the highlight of the battle. It sounded like it packed some serious horses under the hood. The huge turbo was located in the left headlight area for better cooling.

The driver waited for a good 6 seconds before he was flagged off. The high cams were working overtime, side planted exhaust produced countless back fire similar to a machine gun and all it wanted was for the signal to dump the clutch and propel forward.

Initial acceleration looked ok until we saw trails of oil on the drag strip. From then on, the Rex couldn't recover and it had to make a disappointing and painful journey back to the Paddock.

A few minutes later, we noticed two cars with LED strips. We knew that the Godzillas were here to play. As they lined up at the starting point, you can feel the tense atmosphere at the grandstand. Will the R35 live up to its name? Can the Supercar shake off the competition? No it cant. It looked sluggish during take off probably due its 1.8 tonne body. An old Suzuki Swift torque steered its way to victory, leaving the Godzilla to find a corner to hide.

We managed to salvage some local pride with ST Powered's yellow Evo 9. It's blistering pace was good for a sub 11 quarter mile drag. The best timing for an eg6 was around 11.5 seconds.

On the whole, it was an eye opener to see so many heavily modded cars in the Sepang F1 circuit.

I have to learn the art of shaving weight.

WEIGHT>PERFORMANCE?

Best Motoring International provides one of my favourite series of car comparison. It may not be that accurate due to skills of different drivers, but they are still professionals who have a supreme knowledge of performance cars.

I am particularly impressed with acceleration of the Lotus Exige Cup 260. Be amazed at how it weaves past other cars with ease. You can see how the Cayman S and M3 struggle against the more track focused Lotus and Scooby Spec C. Even Drift King Tsuchiya can't do much to salvage some pride for Munich's M3

Mod like there's no Tomorrow, the AMS way

The boys from AMS performance well know how to extract the most out of the Pride Of Japan.

Achieving a sub 10 sec in the quarter mile drag, AMS Performance's GTR pumps out a mind blowing 764bhp on the dyno.

Hear the V6 grunt followed by the twin turbo whistle and you will know that this car has some power under that bonnet.

An increase of 280+ bhp, up from the stock 485, is simply astonishing.



They are not new to the tuning world, as more petrolheads will relate AMS to their venerable Time Attack Evos. Yes, there is a JDM following in the States, and its not all muscle in the West.









These 700+bhp Evos are a true work of art.

Photos courtesy of AMS

Defining speed

Sat in a Rhommel tuned stage 2 gti today.

ABT quads look and sound sweet.

3 dr version adds a touch of sexiness to the ride.

I've always felt a sense of adrenaline whenever i sit in a performance car.

The Elise, 645i, legacy GT, Evo 10 all gave me that "wow this car is quick" feeling, but just now i did not feel what i thought i would.

Its not that this stage 2 gti is slow.

Its because...


... of the GTR's surge i felt 3 weeks ago. Nothing will feel quicker than that. Ever.

Withdrawal Symptoms

It has been 2 days since I last sat in the GTR. That immense torque pull was unforgettable. That V6 rumble was fierce. Those twin turbo spooling simultaneously was more than enough to send your heartbeat into Sports Mode.

It was not more than 3 seconds, but boy did it feel great.

This is one of the few things that you'll remember for the rest of your life

That 3 seconds

That 3 seconds

- felt like warp speed

- wasn't enough to catch a breath

- was all it took to reach 90km/h

- was short but hell did it feel out of this world

- was unexplainable

- needed to be longer

- was crazy

Let me congratulate myself for being able to sit in an all out accelerating GGGTTTRRR

Made in Japan

A rather old video but still worth watching over and over again.

It's amazing how the R35 can lap the Ring ahead of the mighty 911.

It's amazing how the puny 2 litre 4B11 turbo unit can accelerate from 0 to 60 in 3.5 seconds.

Both are winners

3.5 seconds

Sat in a red hot R35 GTR last Friday.

The engine start up was pure motoring symphony. That V6 grunt might not be as beefy as, let's say, a c63's V8, but just the thought of this Supercar beating the 911 Turbo round the Nurburgring sent shivers down my spine. I am sitting on an engineering marvel.










Spanking new 7 day old GTR. Absolute head turner.










Godzilla takes a rest in his stable.










PS3 inspired dials. A joy to operate.











Keeping the Godzilla tradition by having minimal alteration on the 4 tail lamps.










Golden Brembos provide more than enough stopping power. But its never enough, that's why Alcons have brakes just for the GTR haha.

Role reversal

It's rather rare when u compare 2 entities and one is bigger than the other when it's not supposed to be so. How can Godzilla be smaller than the building? Maybe its his new born child.

Enough of this nonsense. This is one of the nicer car shots i have taken so far, perhaps due to the amount of space i'm able to play with.


(Click the picture for a clearer view)

Godzilla madness

Saw 2 r35 GTRs roaring down Hillview Ave. Both Black, both with aftermarket exhausts. Damn that exhaust note sounds glorious.

Both stopped at Rail Mall, but i was only in time to catch up with one up close.

Heard the other blasting down Jalan Jurong Kechil. Change of gears sounded so distinct. That guy must be having enormous fun playing with his Playstation-inspired toy.


Matt black bonnet and DRLs really stand out from stock GTRs.


Within 10m from the fastest production car ever in the Ring.

Super Import Nights

SIN was a build up to the following week's heart pumping F1 weekend.

Was rather disappointed with the cars on display. Where is the SUPRA?

This year's event was spiced up by a drifting Altezza who never got tired of doing donuts. He was drifting for the whole Sunday afternoon. Maybe not as he needed to top up vitamins for his rwd monster every now and then.



Godzilla with mascara and foundation to mask his wrinkles



Don't think you'll wanna speed up when you see this in your rear view mirror along the NSH



Pride of the land of the rising sun



Nice brakes



Looks like a 1.4 tsi with this bodykit on.

Preferred last years SIN as they had just launched the R35 gtr and the hype was just mind boggling.

I think i would still go down next year anyway... can't imagine missing these events even after negative feedback.

Godzilla's little brother

I've always not been a huge fan of the Z33 (350Z) at stock form.

In car craze Singapore, your perceptions change because you'll hardly see performance cars not going under the knife. With a proper bodykit, it can turn this Fairlady into one menacing looking Dark Knight.

With the new 370Z, it surely sent heart rates soaring when it was featured in the main entrance of The Cathay a few months back. "Boomerang" looking head and tail lights enhances the aesthetics of this already fierce machine. No wall of texts here.. just admire this Beauty.

"Behind that new face is a brand new V6 engine. Known internally in Nissan as the VQ37VHR, the 3.7-litre unit is 35% new compared to the old engine when it comes to components. The V6 makes 333bhp and 363Nm worth of torque" - respectable numbers in stock form.



Auto version has the world's first "SynchroRev Match" No more heel toe when downshifting

Link


Nismo version




Link