Takusan Skyline desu.

It’s the end of the week and still so many Skylines left. I may just take it upon myself to decree another Skyline Week in the nearish future. As it stands, Ive obliterated my post count of 2010. That has to worth a beverage…

Also, if you’ve been here before I’m assuming you must be confined to quarters and prone to sniffing glue unless asleep. Further to that, you may have noticed that I’ve changed the “theme” of this page. That was because I was sick of the old one cropping my photos so cruelly and this was the first one I found that fit my current bill. I may do some more searching or tweaking. At some stage. Mebbe.

Today is about two years worth of Skylines from one used kuruma emporium – Flyrat in Minami Machida, right next to Up Garage and over the back fence of Tomei on Route 246. I may have posted a couple of these cars before, but for shits & giggles I’ll whack ‘em all in the same post this time ‘cos that’s just the way I’m rollin’ these days. Yo.

I’ll post them chronologically, because any other system would tax my feeble intellect too much at this hour…

This overfendr’d R32 was there for quite some months.

Four doors with an iron mask.

It is possible to improve on a clean family tekkamen – by sticking a Truckosuka on the background. This was my second sighting in the metal of a Hakosuka & the first I could capture with my point & shoot soul-stealer. Quite excited, I got.

Just realised that this one has the R30, R32, Hakosuka, C10 racecar and a Z30 in the workshop at the back. You takes yer chances when you gets them…

What’s that under the cover behind the Stagea, R32 & Z32 I wonder…

This sounded almost as badass as the window shaking YonMeri that I kept seeing but never got a photo of…

Things just kept getting better…

This car is perfect.

One of my favourite words. Might just make a t shirt from this.

I’ve never done so much gawping at a single location before.

By this stage Flyrat was starting to cause me physical pain…

Dont care what the badge on the back says. It’s a Skyline.

Fettlin’ chap tolerated my happy-snappery. As they all did really. Slack-jawed yokels probably didnt happen by too often, may have given them all something to laugh at over Kenyobi Nomunication.

Wouldnt it be grand to have that sight greet you when you opened your garage door of a morn’?

T-shirt #2.

Tommy Kaira M30. Wonder where it is now…

The restoSuka that I’ve featured before.

A blissful way to close out the week…

211 reasons to go to work tomorrow…

Prowling the carparks. Again.

Not far up the road from me old lodgings, on the way to the only purveyor of decent coffee locally, was this C210 GT Turbo. I passed by it over the course of a year and a half and it didnt seem to have moved at all during that time. Which made me go all heroic in the atama and consider rescue missions…

Ashita wa – the Skylines of Flyrat.

Also, today Ive added a link to Shawn Stussy’s excellent blog. If you dont know of at already, you’ll probably be glad to.

2011 #2. On a roll…

This R32 GT-R was owned by a fellow around the corner from me in Minami Machida. He also owned a sweet R34, but got rid of them both for a R35 at the beginning of 2010…

This choice number was in the same aparto carpark as yesterdays car.

Tomorrow we travel back in time…

Double my output? Why, I just might.

Firstly, a Happy New Year to you and thanks for visiting.

I received my 2010 stats from WordPress today and I notice that this blog was boosted by a  kaiju-like total of two posts last year. So I aim to at least double that this year.

In view of that, I have rather a few images from Japan to share and to begin the year, I declare this to be Skyline Week!!!!! Of Doom!!!!

Here is a sweet tuned R31 I found in an apartment building carpark up the road from Up Garage, Minami Machida.

R31 House! In the, ahh, carpark…

Tomorrow, I might just have to go GT-R. But which?

Baikin v. Sparkle Powder v. Zombie Pandas of Doom!

First painting in a year…

The stripes on the right are inspired by Jeff Koons’ BMW M3 GTR Art Car that ran at Le Mans in the GT2  class this year. I didnt really think about it at the time, but now the juxtaposition of Mr Sparkle (I am the Harsh Nemesis of all that is Unclean!!!) and BaikinMan (baikin being germ in Japanese) now strikes me as right nice.

Of Doom!!!

It’s been a while…

Been a bit busy hanging out with a young feller who is about to start walkin’ soon. So, being a dad who plans ahead, went shoe shopping…

There’s much more to share – my WTP cruiser purchase from W-Base in Shibuya (had to ride the thing 40km home to Machida, but couldnt sit down & pedal due to the miniscule seatpost, so stood up the whole way after not having ridden a BMX bike for 15 years), more Group C & Nismo goodness from KN’s Factory, a wrap up of my time at Fukushima San’s Grand Slam Pro, some more painting & stickerings and probably more guff.

Hope youve been well!

Kei Time.

Ive already posted about my fondness for Kei-class vehicles. In Japan (perhaps not so much in some other places) they make perfect sense. Especially with the taxing system that penalises larger displacement engines. Which makes the sporty Kei’s all the more alluring.

This awesome Autozam was in at Grand Slam Pro in Machida a couple of weekends ago.

Gullwings on a car this tiny are the coolest thing. This car also had a “Toshiori” badge in the rear window which is required by the Japanese powers that be to alert other road users that the driver of the vehicle is over 70. Given what I have experienced of elderley Japanese on cycling exploits, that is likely quite wise, but if an older chap owns a fine kuruma like this one and ingress & egress are able to be performed without problem, then he doubtless can perform on the road better than 90% of those half his age. The guy who owned this car was the coolest. He lifted the hood to show me uprated strut braces. “Touge?” I enquired. He just chuckled.

Mazda and Suzuki collaborated on the engine that went into this and also the Cappucino. Funny how they went in such different directions. Even down to the name – “Autozam”! is just comic book bitchin’, whereas “Cappucino” is hairdresser lame. Of course, some Cup-of-chino’s transcend the crappy moniker, being more steroid-ripped prison tatooist than hairdresser…

I spotted this Kaiju-chino at the ever enlightening Flyrat in Minami Machida a couple of months ago.

Kei muscle. Never thought I’d say that of a Cappuchino.

Much as Ive not been a fan of Cappucino’s in the past (the Kaijuchino as swung me ’round somewhat), Ive always had a hankering for the Honda Beat.

To copy & paste from my West Yokohama Honda Beat Shop flickr set – “

Abe San takes Beats, strips ‘em to a bare shell, adds new parts, rebuilds everything mechanical & creates a new car. Plus he can communicate with a Nihongo manus like myself.
Word.”

Word indeed.

This one had done about 70,000km before this…

…so basically a brand new Beat. In 2009!  For this…

Word. Again.

Monster Motorsports, next to Bee*R in Minami Machida is a good place for Kei-spotting. Here’s another Autozam, with a frothy wee Suzuki lurking in the background…

Just down the road at Up Garage last weekend was another Autozam.

The full cage is one hint that this is a fairly focussed Kei-beast…