Remembering Japanese cars from the past

Month: February 2009 (Page 3 of 4)

Carina Sightings: jäärata Toyota Carina TA60

You must probably think “WTF? Jäärata?”. Well as I understand it Jäärata is almost the national sports in Finland. Jäärata can probably best be translated to “Ice road racing”, but might as well be translated to “Ice-lake racing”.

This nicely beaten up Carina TA60 is being used to practice the jäärata on:
IMO these drivers are very very brave. With drifting you try to find the limit to lose the grip on the surface. With ice road racing you have about no grip at all, so it requires a lot of skill to find grip hidden in the snow…

Here you can see the Carina fighting off a Mercedes W123 200D:

These videos really makes me jealous on those Fins: they are having all the fun in the world! Oh well, maybe just wait for that once in a 100 years the IJsselmeer is frozen and have that same fun here in Holland as well. ;)

People reusing my images?

Funny, within 15 minutes I encountered images made by me were reused by someone else. Of course I’m doing the same thing over and over, but never encountered this twice on two different sites within such a short period. ;)

First I noticed (thanks to HR blog!) the Czech website 86ers.org using the picture of my 15 inch Celica Supra MK2 rims in their wheel guide.
This is the original:
15 inch Celica Supra rims

Then within 15 minutes I encountered someone reusing my old avatar which I used on AEU86 when I still owned my Trueno. The picture contains the right taillight of my old Trueno 2 door coupe with the Sprinter Trueno sticker above it. The image originally was meant as a showcase for the OEM AE86 reproduction stickers but later on used as my avatar after I got bored by the AE86 vs R34 avatar.
This is the original:
My old Trueno coupe taillight and sticker

Even though it is coincidence, I still think it’s rather odd…
But don’t get me wrong here: please use and re-use my pictures, just like I would do with yours! ;)

Popular Bosozoku cars: Toyota Soarer

This is going to be a regular here: it would be nice to see some really mild to really wild examples of the Bosozoku style cars and then read how they came out of the factory. ;)

This week we’ll kick off with the Toyota Soarer:
Two Bosozoku styled Soarers resemble mobile suits from Gundam
Two Bosozoku styled Soarers

As you probably have read in the introduction an extremely lowered Soarer featured Shakotan Boogie. This most probably helped its popularity among Bosozoku stylers and most Toyota Soarers you see on Bosozoku car meetings are Shakotan Boogie look-a-likes.

Lengthened hood and overfenders on this Soarer
Lengthened hood and overfenders on this Soarer

This milder styled car is of course an exception: it has a lengthened hood and overfenders as well. But apart from that it looks quite stock.

Really gone wild on this Toyota Soarer
Someone has really gone wild on this Toyota Soarer

Big wing, deep dish wheels with huge overfenders and sideskirts wide enough to have somebody stand on!

The Z10 is the most popular Bosozoku styled Toyota Soarer, probably because of its boxy shape and because it is quite cheap to buy. Z20 Soarers are hardly seen and I’ve never seen any Bosozoku styled Z30 and Z40 Soarers, but never say never. ;)

How did it come out of the factory then?
Factory stock Toyota Soarer Z10
Factory stock Toyota Soarer Z10

The Soarer itself was a successor to the Toyota Crown Coupe, which was a 2 door version of the Crown with a bit more sporty suspension. The Soarer itself did just as well as the Crown Coupe. The Soarer shared the same engines as the Crown and the CelicaXX.

Factory stock Toyota Soarer Z10
Factory stock Toyota Soarer Z10

Because it shared the same engines as the CelicaXX it is often confused to be the same platform with a different bodyshape, like the Celica and the Carina have. However there is a Supra JZA70 with a Soarer Z20 frontend which makes the confusion even bigger.

Factory stock Toyota Soarer Z10 interior
Factory stock Toyota Soarer Z10 interior

To confuse it even more: a lot of the interior components of the Soarer look like the interior of the CelicaXX. True, but the CelicaXX also shared a lot of components with the Corolla AE86.

Tiptronic climate control
Tiptronic climate control

The Soarer was the most luxurious car in the Toyota lineup (apart from the Toyota Century of course!) and featured all the state of the art technology! In the picture above you can see the climate control of the Soarer is featuring tiptronic controls, other buttons were normal but about everything is electronically adjustable. The Soarer also featured a digital dashboard, state of the art 4 speed automatic (with sports setting!) and the passenger door had a seperate doorhandle for the passengers in the rear!

I hope you can see now why a Bosozoku styler would choose for the Soarer Z10: it is an incredible car with a lot of comfort which can’t even be found in cars from the 90s! Besides that: it is a very cool car itself.

This was posted earlier today on http://www.bosozokustyle.com.

More cabin spirit with the Nissan R88 at Le Mans

I found some more Cabin Spirit:
This time it is the Nissan R88 #85 which was driven by Kazuyoshi Hoshino, Takao Wada and Aguri Suzuki. You can see Takao Wada smoking Cabin Spirits in the advertisement, would this also mean he got an ashtray mounted in that Nissan R88?

The #85 did not finish. Officially due to engine and gearbox problems, but of course we know better now: Takao Wada was lighting a cigarette Bunta style during the race and missed his shift point. Result: wasted engine and gearbox. ;)

Hilarious: car usage in Tokusatsu

As I said yesterday: I was browsing Tokusatsu videos on Youtube to make my Hilarious posting this week. My idea was to see how cars were actually used through these series. Of course I mean recognizable cars and not the Bosozoku styled super-heroes cars.

First of all I found this intro of the 1988 Choujuu Sentai Liveman series:
At 0:30 the first hero drives a white Mazda FC convertible.
A poor student at Academia, but a strong leader and quick thinking under pressure. He is brave and a hardworker. Initially starts as hot-headed and sarcastic, but grows into the role of dependable leader as the series progresses.
Could this have been the inspiration for Shuichi Shigeno for Ryosuke Takahashi in Initial D? Only difference is that Ryosuke is not a poor student but rather a rich student taking a break during his study…

Then take the intro of the 1986 Choushinsei Flashman series:

The red Flashman is a professional racing driver. To be more precise: he drives the number 170 Mazda 757. It must somehow be true that he did was the driver because number 170 did not finish Le Mans 1986. Probably one of the villains must have wanted to sabotage Le Mans 1986 and in order to prevent this red Flashman must have abandoned the race. ;)

And in the last (but not least) example the 1984 Birth of the 10th! Kamen Riders All Together!! series:

The blue Kamen Rider drives a Mazda HB Cosmo (a.k.a. the Mazda 929 overseas) like he’s doing audition for the first movie of the the Shuto Kousoku series (a.k.a. Shuto Trial or Freeway Speedway).

Somehow I see a pattern in these intros: Toei and Mazda! Coincidence? No, I don’t think so…

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