Beer Baron

actually the tomei dumps are quite a bit bigger than the stock 34 ones. both the bell mouth and the pipe and the outlet size.

my advice would be the 3 inch dump needs to go and so does the china cooler. going to a 3.5 or 4inch dump is a good idea.

for the fuel pump I would strongly advise you go with a ECR33 nismo one. don't use a GTR nismo one. get the one to suit your car. otherwise it's a waste having a 'bolt on' pump that wont fit your car without modification. the fuel pump is the heart of your car. it pumps the life blood around. without a good one you're doomed. spend the money and buy a NEW nismo pump. are you talking about cam gears or cams? you keep saying cams but I think you mean cam gears. I would stay away from the cheap ones. they are well known to slip. the best ones are Trust or Tomei. they both have 5 bolts holding them in position. The other option that is very good (if done properly) is a standard cam gear modified to be adjustable. Lots of places do this now and some are really good and still quite cheap.

yeah osaka castle is not bad. a bit lame in that it's not original. but they do have some awesome takoyaki outside. close to the best I've had. there is a cool place in osaka. I can't remember the name but it reminds me of the four floors of whores in singapore. it's a complex near a station that is just all bars. tiny bars. packed full of pissed cnts. very pissed cnts. that is absolutely no help at all is it?

ok, as far as what non-standard parts are acceptable for compliance strictly the answer is that the car should be presented completely standard in the same specification as the car that the complier used for their evidence package. so your car has to mimic what they have evidence for in it's specification. in practice some compliers are less strict than others about what exactly they will allow or not allow. generally non-standard wheels (within reason) are ok etc but the only persons opinion who really matters in your case is the compliance shop you choose. so the best idea is to call a compliance shop and talk to them about what they will or wont accept. after all it's no good me telling you it's ok to have aftermarket wheels and then they tell you that you can't. cause telling them that the Beer Baron said it's ok probably wont get you very far... the consignee on the BL does not have to be in the country at the time of import. you just need to sign a piece of paper authorising your customs agent to act on your behalf and to release the car to your chosen tow truck driver, or to the compliance workshop. you could even put your name, and the compliers name as the consignee if you don't think you'll be here.

if you don't like the D1 spec I'll grab it off you mate. I need another one soon. the sparco is good and sturdy but at triple the price I can't see myself buying one again. it's nice, and the splines look cool and do work, but the design the D1spec copies is sound too.

yeah pretty tough to go back a 'few years ago' and prove what was/was not on the car. I'm not sure having ABS removed makes a car un-roadworthy. particularly if it was say an R32 skyline which has variants that come with ABS and other variants that have no ABS. It's a bit of a foggy question. In short, I'd say yes it's illegal. But if you have plans of suing them, or getting some kind of compensation from them then I'd say the chances are slim. They will almost certainly argue that the car was complied with ABS installed and fully functioning and that someone else has removed it in the intervening years.

take my wife......... please. I take my wife everywhere.........but she finds her way home. thank you. you've been wonderful.

ok, so $7K for the car (which will be pretty poor at that price, good ones are closer to 1M than they are to 500K) 90,000-150,000yen FOB $2K in freight $300 in clearance, customs entry, AQIS attendance etc $200 in cleaning 5% duty 10% GST (includes car cost, FOB, freight, the whole shebang) $200 in towing $3K in compliance $1K in rego ok, well that's about $9500 so call it $10K to be safe. which is about right. Basically if you bought a car at auction in japan for $10 it would still cost you nearly $10K by the time it's complied, registered and on the road in aus. yeah that estimate is a bit conservative but most guys doing a one off import will encounter some un-expected costs somewhere along the line. maybe a new set of tyres adds $1,000, or it needs a small guard repair due to damage in transit. shit like that. plus the fact is a Spec R S15 for 500,000JPY is going to be fairly average. anyway, it's entirely up to you.

Dane I figured out what's wrong with your set-up. your stack dash is interfering with the quick release and making it sloppy. take the dash out and send it to me and I'll evaluate it for a while in my car just to make sure it's ok and that it's compatible with a ball type quick release. I'd hate for you to go out and buy one only to find that it's not compatible with the stack dash as well. it'll probably take me a while though, coupla years. beautiful.

the other good thing I forgot to add about the ball type ones is that you can put the wheel on any way you like and then spin it into position. it will only lock on once it's in the right orientation which is good. where as the sparco one you have to put it straight on the right way.

have used a sparco one for a few years and it was good but still not fool proof. a mate once didn't connect it properly and had the wheel come off in his hands (not cool in a GT3 cup car!). as the others said it's also a bit tricky to bang the wheel on if it's not straight (this was the problem the mate had). I've used about 5 of the just jap "D1 spec" branded ones and have no complaints. one of mine I've now used in 2 cars and it's been good for 3 years or more. another one went into a group N touring car (alfa) that gets lots of action and never a problem there either. the little locking pin shits me so I remove that as with the cuff being spring loaded there's little chance of you accidentally pulling the wheel off. to be honest I can't see how the works bell one would be any better as it's exactly the same design as the imitation ones. it may use better materials but I personally don't think so. the one you have looks odd? with those big drive surfaces I can see how it would easily have some play in it. I would try the china one. they are only about $80 or so. if you don't like it flog it for $50 (max of $30 spent in 'testing') and then buy the $300 sparco one.

the R34 is the last skyline GTR. The R35 is just a Nissan GTR. it's very deliberately marketed without the skyline name.

yeah spend a day in Kyoto. go to kinkakuji (golden temple) and a few other shrines and temples in the area. also BOOK a ticket for the imperial palace. you must book in advance for it. if you can't book, go there anyway as the grounds alone are amazing and worth seeing. finish the day with dinner in Gion after dark, if you are lucky you'll spot some real deal old school Geisha with their entourages going to and from appointments. they are amazing to see in real life. also just south or hiroshima is miyajima. it's an island with a famous 'floating temple' which has it's torii out in the water. there are lots of deer there and monkeys too up the top. it's a lovely place to visit too. and in hiroshima you must go to okono-mura (okonomiyaki town). it's a building packed full of okonomiyaki restaurants (hiroshima style of course!). the best okonomiyaki I've had in japan was had in a shop in there. simply amazing. check out den den town in osaka, it's pretty cool. there is plenty of good stuff to see in osaka and some good shopping too.

buying an S15 for about $7K will cost around $18K landed complied and rego'd. just remember you can only import 1999 model Spec Rs, and early 2000 models (most people just play it safe and stick to 1999 models). if you are after a really clean S15 I have one at the moment. I imported it around 18 months ago. I bought it at auction in Kyushu japan and bought it to aus for my flat mate. He's now moving overseas and didn't have time to do anything about it so being the nice guy I am I bought it off him. It's white and completely stock apart from an Apexi pod filter (still have stock airbox).

I haven't really detected any difference between the GTST and GTR stock ABS. neither are super fast but thankfully they are quite lazy (ie quite a high threshold) so on the circuit you will almost never have it cut in at all. on uneven or broken surfaces though (which I'm sure you get plenty of in tarmac rally) they are shithouse. can't cope well at all with low grip tarmac and then you find the sampling rate/pulse speed etc become a problem. for tarmac rally I can see for sure a better unit is a good idea. I'm not sure how much is in the valve body or how much is in the programming and processor power of the ECU. I suspect most of the gain comes in smarter/faster ECUs.

looking good battered sav. I like the ABS new mounting. it'll be interesting to see what the pedal's like without the booster but with the new pedal ratio. it's certainly nice to get some space back in the engine bay and save a bit of weight too. very good idea.

I thought the R32 projectors are H3C? for my 32s I was able to get actual plug and play H3C HID kits. literally just remove old globes and plug in new stuff. no need to mod anything at all. maybe look into what exact kit is needed as I'm sure there are plug and play options available that save you having to cut up the standard gear.

I think getting lower grip rear tyres is a pretty bad idea. the only time you want to do that really is on a drift day/skidpan day for fun, but on the street or circuit it's not good. I would go with the 235 KU36s all round, that way you can rotate them as needed to extend their life and you'll have a well balanced car with plenty of front and rear grip. get a pair of 17s for dirft and put some cheaper tyres on those for when you want to go drifting at the track.

yes it was a good result. makes me proud to be a iinet customer. and it's not about allowing people to download pirated videos. it's about protecting peoples freedoms and privacy and not turning your ISP into another internet policeman.

yeah corner speed and braking grip will be the downfall of a GTR with 600hp on roadies. like you said they can still power out of corners pretty happily but the thing just wont have that high speed lateral grip that the lighter better balanced cars will have on the same type of tyres. track GTRs gain a lot from semis.

nice. I like the buddy clubs. what size and offset are they? and can you pm me where you got them from and how much if you don't mind. I'm looking at more wheels for the 32 myself.

dunno about that. he drove an RB26 powered silvia and then a 1.5JZ and a 2J powered one from memory... very fond of the 6s. with the 26

sorry to hear that. always sad to see a bloke go before he's due.

it would be pretty tough. the problem is tyres. (like LSX said). a 32/33/34 with 600hp really needs semis to get it down and run some good times. they are just too heavy and too powerful for high performance road tyres. The R35 has a bit of advantage as it has 500hp from the factory and it's factory tyres are chosen around that power figure. the 32/33/34 came with 280hp.... I think the key in clubsprint (apart from a nice R35) will be something fairly light, with decent but fairly humble power output (compared to the pro class guys) and getting the most out of it's chassis to work with whatever road tyres it's stuck on. look at cars like the S2000 that did well before. fairly light car, decent power, good chassis. GTRs on road tyres just do not have the corner speed to get the times down and no amount of power will help them. Any GTR with 600hp should just go in pro class where they can use tyres that suit. for clubsprint I reckon something like a well prepped S14 or S15 with around 300rwkw, very light body and lots of time spent setting up the suspension with the road tyres would be a good contender.