Wednesday 13 October 2021

RWB 993 "Rotana" Matte Purple with Mr. Nakai (Ignition)

HKS R32 Skyline GT-R - 1/18 model

It's an R32 Skyline GT-R sporting the iconic HKS racing livery of the 1990s while having a slightly contemporary style to it.

Mid Night Club / Legendary Wangan runners...


 The Mid Night Club ( ミッド ナイト クラブ Middo Naito Kurabu ) was one of the most respected and well known illegal street racing clubs in the world during their run from 1987 – 1999.  With cars that were capable of reaching speeds over 200mph, it’s no surprise that almost twenty years later their stories are still being talked about.




The club gained widespread notoriety not only due to the combination of their dangerously high-speed races and aggressive driving styles but also for their secrecy and a strict code of ethics for members.  As odd as it may sound, the club put pedestrian and other motorists safety at the top of their priority list knowing they are driving speeds between 160 – 210 mph on public roads.



It’s one thing to engineer a car that can go 200mph, but it’s a whole another animal when we are talking about back ally tuner cars maintaining those speeds for 20 minutes at a time. To give you a better idea of the scope of these cars, a Lamborghini Diablo can only hold it’s top speed for about 3 minutes before it’s V-12 overheats, and the Bugatti Veyron can hold full open throttle for 12 minutes before it runs out of gas. We are talking about normal everyday vehicles outperforming today’s modern Hypercars. The club contained a wide variety of cars including Mazda RX7’s, Nissan Skyline’s, Toyota Supra’s, and even a Toyota Soarer that was rumored to go 350 km/h (217 mph) on the Wangan. The club would often test their vehicle’s top speeds on the famous and unfortunately now closed Yatabe Test Track. In 1994 and 1995 High Power Magazine was granted access to photograph one of these test sessions.










&G CORPORATION TIME ATTACK MR2 Turbo ( SW20 ) Spotlight

 


Located in central Kasai, in the heart of the Hyogo Prefecutre, there is a small tuning shop, &G Corporation.  Specializing in aftermarket tuning of Toyota and Nissan applications brand, this is its demo car - SW20.

KEIICHI TSUCHIYA'S AE86: THE PERFECT AE86

The engine is a 7A-G motor with 5 valves per cylinder built by TecArt's, with custom everything from top to bottom. Crankshaft, pistons, valves, valve springs, camshafts, the list goes on and on. A 230bhp motor from a 1.8L that revs to 8000rpm, with peak power coming in at 7200rpm.
The gearbox 5th gear was swapped to a 3.5 gear, so to drive the car at it's absolute max, you'd have to shift from 3 to 5, where the 3.5 gear was located, and then back to 4th as a sort of final gear.

TecArt's aim for this car is to help Keiichi Tsuchiya to beat R35 GT-Rs, S2000s and the likes on the Gunsai Touge. So a special set of dampers and springs were in order. 8k springs at the front, 9k at the rear, to keep the rear end slidey enough to entertain the driver, but not too slidey that would make the rear end all loose and not be able for time attacks. That gives the Drift King endless adjust-ability and he could use his special technique 'Zero counter' to help the car go around the course as fast as possible.

Diecast - Toyota sprinter Trueno (AE86) 1/18

1/18 scale model Keiichi Tsuchiya Early street ver collection