Where to begin? With so many top cars on display at the Nagoya Exciting Car Showdown I think the best way to start the coverage is to dive right in. Abflug, together with Revolfe, had an amazing line up of cars with this little red MR-X doing a great job of showing everyone just how high their level of craftsmanship is. Every detail from the custom headlights to the beautifully sculpted body is top notch, doing a great job converting the looks of the little Toyota into a mini-Carrera GT.
Not too far from Abflug and Revolfe was R-Magic, which had this white FD wearing the same body kit as their D1 car. I thought it looked pretty damn hot, especially painted in pearl white. Under the bonnet the 13B has been rebuild and slightly modified to develop 380 HP, making it a great car for both street and circuit.
The Garage Clear AE86 really grabbed a lot of attention, not sure if it was due to its looks or for that crazy puppet behind the wheel!
The Option 2 area had some very nice cars on display like this drag S13 from DyU VAN. Under the hood the CA18DET has been highly modified with tons of Tomei parts and an HKS T04R Ka blower, enough to develop 600 HP. The nitrous oxide system delivers an additional 100 HP. Would be cool to see how fast this thing can go down the 1/4 mile as there were no times indicated on the specs.
The rear reveals a true drag racer stance with the long trunk spoiler and massive 15" Hoosier rubber.
This is one car I have been seeing very often at events. You really cannot beat an RPS13 full aero conversion, even if it costs more than double what an actual 180SX would go for at auction.
That rear spoiler is beyond wild! Too bad I couldn't grab a shot of the engine, I was told the bonnet could not be opened, a polite way of saying the motor is stock!
Before the show opened to the public on Sunday morning I though I'd try to get a kind of panorama shot of the hall but this is all I could manage from the top of my ladder. Anyway you get the idea, this is one fourth of the show floor.
Back at Abflug I was drooling over their recently revamped 911 Pink Spider, which resembled more a race car than a street car. The air-cooled boxer-6 has been tuned to develop 680 HP at 6,800 rpm with a mighty 650 lb/ft punch of torque at 4,800 rpm.
More of the TE37V as fitted to the Impulse GC110 Skyline.
This is what the Roadster World Sileighty looked like early on Saturday morning. The matte green body was used like a canvas throughout the weekend, with people writing messages all over it in chalk.
Bomber was one of the first few to get things started up front. I'll show you what the car was looking like on Sunday afternoon in Part 2.
Yes another car on Weds SA-55M! This carbon wide body ZZW30 from Trial was fitted with an Apex turbo kit which boosts power of the 1ZZ to 220 HP.
The rear GT-wing makes it look like the Super GT MR-S of a few seasons ago.
LED lights were all the rage at this year's show with companies like Looking showcasing one for the AE86 on their Levin demonstrator.
But it wasn't so much the LEDs at the rear that grabbed my attention after I saw what was under the hood. The Toda tuned 4AG was sitting in one of the cleanest hachiroku engine bays I have ever seen, painted in semi-satin black after the wheel arches were tubbed and the whole area spot welded.
Remember the video of the rear wheel drive Civic Rod posted up a while back? Well finally I got to see it up close, displayed in the Drift Tengoku area. The S2000's F20C has been custom mounted along with the 6-speed transmission...
...and FR layout. The rear Tein dampers are from an R34 GT-R and the fronts Kei Office ones from an S13. I really need to go and see this drifting at Honjo circuit one time. Definitely a car worth of a feature!
URAS had one of the most surprising cars at the show, sporting a very curious engine transplant that had most people scratching their heads.
Under the modified hood was probably the biggest motor ever to be dropped into an S13 chassis...
...a 5L V12 from a Toyota Century! The idea was to give a Ferrari-like feel to the S13 and to have lots of low-rpm torque on tap for when Nomuken takes the car out drifting. This I have to see in action!
Spotted this VIP come show car Aristo from Cross Label on the far side of the Port Messe. It wasn't the intricate paint or vertical door conversion that grabbed my attention...
...but the stance...and most of all...
...the beautifully flared rear fenders just managing to contain the top part of the custom painted Work VSTS wheels.
This was one my favorite Soarers, built by Eau Rouge and wearing a full Origin Stream Line kit along with Eau Rouge aero fenders.
As I was walking through the hall I bumped into Ryo-san of R.Y.O. who told me he had made a new D1 car to replace the S14 that had a very short lived outing last year at Fuji with Miki Ryuji behind the wheel. I quickly made my way over to check it out.
The style is very similar to the S14 except they have gone even wilder with the spoilers and canards...
...which start at the front on the bumper, continue with a pair on the doors...
...and end up with these massive things at the rear! Inada-san made fun of the car saying it could be used in a parade, where girls could sit on the rear spoilers.
The idea of course is to channel tire smoke up into the air. Can't wait to see this car out drifting.
Kazama's Lexus IS350 with 2JZ conversion is now up for sale as it cannot be entered in the D1-SL class as the engine/transmission is not stock. The car has hardly ever been used! What a pity!
New style for 2010. Everyone with Skylines will be doing thins to their rear lights. Or maybe not!
Final Motion brought their latest Stagea project featuring lots of carbon. You can see last year's carbon-Kevlar demo car next to it.
Another Pink Spider from Abflug, this time their recently rebuilt original mid-nineties demo car.
There is much more to come in Part 2, including a look at some smaller cars from Provile like this Autozam AZ-1. Check back soon!
-Dino Dalle Carbonare
Nagoya Exciting Car Showdown