Not Something You See Everyday

Posted on July 30, 2007 by Kevin San

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From 1972 to 1977, Mazda’s entry into the Japanese Kei Car market was the Chantez. Unlike the kei-cars of the 80s onwards, the 70s Keis were nothing special technologically, and the Chantez was no different. Whereas 80s Keis had 4 (or 5) valves per cylinder, twin cams, fuel injection and turbos to compensate for their dinky 660cc capacity, the 72 Chantez debuted with a 360cc 2-stroke V2….now I’m not really sure how much power the stock Chantez put out but it’s safe to assume that it was not a lot.

But the thing that attracted Ama-san (from famed rotary workshop RE- Amemiya) was that the Chantez, for all its shopping car mediocrity…was rear wheel drive. And there was just enough room between the shock towers for a 12A rotary….

Continue reading →

Posted in mazda | 9 Comments

Toyotas of Puget Sound Off

Posted on July 30, 2007 by Ben Hsu

Motoring J Style might have been the most publicized nostalgic car event of the weekend, but it wasn’t the only one. The Puget Sound Toyota Owners Club held their third annual Toyota Festival on Sunday, July 29.  The event welcomes Toyotas both new and old, like this bosozoku 1JZ-powered Corona Mark II wagon, as well as their Lexus and Scion badged cousins.  Check out this Flickr album for pics of the gathering.

Thanks to the Classic Toyota Town Group for the tip.

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Motoring J-Style. A Sign of the Times.

Posted on July 29, 2007 by Van

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More than being a top idea for an event, touted as the first car show to focus specifically and exclusively on Japanese cars (mostly classic), the Motoring J-Style event stands out as a brilliant example of just how prevalent the classic Japanese car movement is becoming here in the west. The inaugural outing came and went this weekend, and by all reports, it was one unreal day.

You can check out some reviews and photos at the following links!

Japanese Nostalgic Car
Auto Otaku (photos here)

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Motoring J Style Preview

Posted on July 29, 2007 by Ben Hsu

The inaugural Motoring J Style has come and gone. We’ll have a full gallery up in our Events section soon, but here’s a small preview.

Posted in events | 4 Comments

Random Pic: Supra By the Bay

Posted on July 27, 2007 by Ben Hsu

Spotted on the 101 just outside of San Francisco, the big brother of the random third-gen Celica from earlier today. Specimens like the Celica are rare enough on the east coast, but smooth, cleanly modded rides like this Supra – also rendered in beautiful, simple white – are like an Ogopogo sighting. The Mk II Supra has always been one of our favorites, for exuding just the right balance of 1980s rakish sportiness and angular Japanese boxiness, and for looking like nothing else on the road. And, rather than attempt to hide it’s bumpers and door guards in body-colored plastic, this one wears its black trim as proudly as Cindy Crawford’s mole.  Slam one on classic JDM rims and you’ve got a breathtaker.  We salute you, unidentified Supra driver.

Posted in toyota | 6 Comments

Random Pic: Celica By the Bay

Posted on July 27, 2007 by Ben Hsu

This is why we love Cali. We’re in San Francisco to attend Motoring J Style this weekend, and within seconds of picking up our rental car (alas, a Ford Focus), we exited the airport to see this mint beauty in the lot. If you do happen to see a one of these third-gen Celicas back east that’s not riddled with dings or participating in a weight loss program courtesy of rust. And they’re not even that old! If anyone from the east coast owns a similarly pristine third-gen Celica, we dare ya to post it up in our forum.

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Van’s Shot of the Week

Posted on July 27, 2007 by Van

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I forgot to post my shot of the week on Wednesday! So here you are, a beautiful example of a 240Z showing its little brother how it’s done. And before you ask, no I don’t have a bigger version of this image. Wish I did though, what a hell of a wallpaper that’d make!

Continue reading →

Posted in nissan, Shot of the Week | 1 Comment

The Greatest Film of Our Time?

Posted on July 27, 2007 by Van

JapaneseNostalgicCar have put together a short video made up of shots of achingly hot classic JDM doing not much more than just cruising around.  Might not sound amazing, but just you watch it and see for yourself.  Backed by a perfectly picked soundtrack, this is a top way to spend exactly two minutes.

Posted in Video | 1 Comment

Now Playing, JNC: The Movie

Posted on July 26, 2007 by Ben Hsu

In a distant land…

Strange machines prowl the streets…

But now, a dying breed, they are slowly disappearing…

Who will save them?

Critics are already hailing Japanese Nostalgic Car: The Movie as the defining film of the twentieth century. “Two fender mirrors up!” says Ebert and Roper. “Five out of five Star Sharks!” raves Variety.

See it now, on computer near you!

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Toyota Five-O

Posted on July 25, 2007 by Ben Hsu

Regular readers might know that we are pretty puzzled as to why Toyota hasn’t been making a bigger fuss about it’s 50 years in America. As the anniversary draws ever nearer, news on the company’s golden anniversary has gone from a cold drip to a full-blown media trickle.

Video and images are being slowly added to the Toyota 50th website, which comes with a countdown timer to the actual moment that the Big T will have been stateside for a half century. As of this writing, 97 days, 10 hours, 58 minutes, and 52 seconds remain until Toyota’s 50th Anniversary.

Then there’s this page at ToMoCo’s main web address, but only the smallest of text links from Toyota.com hints that there’s a 50th birthday coming up.

Don’t get us wrong. We love Toyotas. We’re just left completely baffled as to why they aren’t playing up their history more. Are you reading this, Toyota marketing department?

Posted in toyota | 4 Comments

Racing the Rotary (Part 2)

Posted on July 25, 2007 by Kevin San

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From 1969 to 1970, Mazda had a successful foray into European touring car racing, where their Euro counterparts had been caught off guard. The screaming little Familia Coupes were not short of power and if it weren’t for a lack of reliability, Mazda would have returned to Japan in triumph with a lot of prestigious silverware too.

Continue reading →

Posted in mazda, racing | 1 Comment

Bring us Your Tired and Huddled Zeds

Posted on July 24, 2007 by Van

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Every now and then, a thought comes to me.  If there were X amounts of a certain car sold in a particular country 30 years ago… Where are they all now?  In the case of the 240Z, it’s not a difficult guess – they’re sitting on someone’s farm, or in someone’s back yard, rusted and virtually unrecognisable or unrecoverable.  If not that, they’ve been bought up as parts cars.  It’s not unusual these days for it to take three beatup Zeds to make one  good example.  Sure, there’s quite a few still on the roads, in varying states of care, but that’s definitely a fraction of the original amount.

So when I stumbled across this old article this morning about a farmer in rural Victoria (Australia) with nearly 20 examples – mostly in need of a lot of work, but not remotely beyond saving – sitting in a few sheds on his property, my heart skipped a beat.  It’s a great read, so check it out!

Posted in nissan | 2 Comments

The SR5 Club Speaks

Posted on July 23, 2007 by Ben Hsu

It’s a retrospective bonanza! Hot off the heels of our profile on Mike McGinnis about his days working at a Datsun dealership in th 1970s, Automotive News has published an article about Toyota’s early years and the many hardships that almost caused them to fail miserably in the US market.

Accompanying the piece is a video interview with several members of the SR5 Club, a group of Toyota retirees who hold their meetings at the Toyota Museum in Torrance, CA. It’s interesting to note that although companies like Toyota and Nissan now seem impossibly massive, in their heyday it was still easy to catch the ear of upper management, as both McGinnis and these retirees can attest to. The stories they recount are entertaining to hear, and the one in which the former employees asks where the “bay of pigs” is located illustrates a lot about why Japanese automakers have come as far as they have.

Posted in toyota | 3 Comments

More Z-car Love

Posted on July 23, 2007 by Ben Hsu

Autoblog has returned with their “Reader Ride of the Day” feature after a brief hiatus, and are kicking it off with a 1972 Datsun 240Z. With only 40,000 miles and some funky pinstripes, the car was undergoing a restoration when the owner, Victor Vazquez, sadly passed away. Now the car is in the care of his brother, who carries on the torch in Victor’s spirit.

In the past, Autoblog has asked readers to vote for their favorite ride at the end of the week. We know we don’t even need to see the rest to know which one we’ll be punching a chad for.

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Racing the Rotary (Part 1)

Posted on July 23, 2007 by Kevin San

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Mazda was one of the many car companies that paid Dr Felix Wankel and the NSU car company to buy a license to produce the rotary engine. And while many other licensees (including Citroen and GM…and eventually NSU itself) struggled to make the rotary a viable engine for a production car, Mazda saw it as the key to a glorious future, and is the only car company to remain loyal to the design after so many decades. Mazda was so bullish about the prospects of the rotary that it once said that “the rotary engine is a young 24 year old man with great promise, whereas the piston engine is an old man”.

History would later prove the folly of those words as keeping the rotary viable was a burden that nearly bankrupted Mazda itself.

Continue reading →

Posted in mazda, racing | 1 Comment

Profiles: 1978 Datsun 280Z

Posted on July 22, 2007 by Ben Hsu

Our latest Profile has been posted. I’m sure those in the Z Car community have heard of Mike McGinnis, Z-car restorer and guru extraordinaire. He’s a great guy who has witnessed a lot of interesting stuff in his lifetime, including the humble beginnings of Nissan’s dealerships.

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Long Beach USA JDM Classic Car Slideshow

Posted on July 22, 2007 by Kevin San

The japanese hold some awesome classic car meets (gotta go to one one-day) but the JDM events in the USA run them pretty close in terms of quality, if not quite quantity.

Here’s a sublime slideshow of an event in 2006, at Long Beach, California. Feel the Nissan love! The site for the event is here and the next one is scheduled for October 07.

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Initial Publica Offering

Posted on July 22, 2007 by Ben Hsu

One of the rarest cars in the US is going up for auction on eBay: a 1965 UP10 Toyota Publica Deluxe. Only four are known to exist here, and according to its current owner, Steve Kopito of TORC, the other two were in junkyards and the third was sold for parts to restore a Sports 800 with.

The Publica came into existence when Toyota conceived a car to comply with the Ministry of International Trade and Industry decree for a People’s Car and named it by combining the words “public” and “car”. In stock form, its 697cc two-cylinder boxer engine produced 28hp, and came in a variety of body styles, including a convertible, wagon, and El Camino-esque pickup. The racier Sports 800 was derived from this platform.

Thanks to the Classic Toyota Town group for the tip!

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Minkara – Japan’s CarDomain

Posted on July 22, 2007 by Van

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It’s one thing to search all the western websites for classic JDM cars, but that usually only leads you to cars that are in the west.  Minkara is basically Japan’s version of CarDomain, so it’s a great place to jump over to and do a bit of a search for your favourite oldskool J-spec.  Using the search box at the top-right, just enter the model number of your choice – C110 for example – and you’re away.

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Import Bible – JDM Inspired Apparel

Posted on July 21, 2007 by Van

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As much as we live and breathe classic Japanese cars here at grandJDM, we’ve definitely got no shortage of love for the newer stock.  We try not to let it take over the site, but every now and then we just have to indulge ourselves.

Our friends over at Import Bible have been making massive headway with their range of t-shirts inspired by the more popular JDM cars running around the western world, but we thought a link here might help them get a little more exposure.

Kyoru assures me that he’s thinking about doing one or two classic JDM inspired tees, but he’s a little worried about the marketability – so if you reckon you’d sport a tee emblazoned with a slick 240Z or something similar, shoot them an email and tell ’em what you think!

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