One More for the Collection! (Garage Series)

So I think it's obvious, but in addition to being OCD about my car, I DO collect other things R33 GT-R.  And the more unique and rare, the better.  Hope to highlight some of the better ones here on the blog. 

Anyway here is my latest... kind of.  Yahoo Auctions here in Japan can be a treasure trove of interesting stuff, if you know how to look.  So a few years ago, I stumbled upon and successfully bid on what seemed to be an official poster for the R33 GT-R - and more specifically, the poster that was issued by Nissan when the Kohki (Series 3) model came out. And "kind of" because I did nothing with it until just a few weeks ago.

Not having lived in Japan during that period (early 1997) I never saw how Nissan displayed the poster - I have to assume probably at dealerships - but I AM aware of this most awesome commercial:

The narration in summary states how we, in our country of Japan, should be proud to have the GT-R.　In addition, I know some people have located this poster and displayed in their homes (although this guy had to fold it in half to get it home...). Plus this same moon image can be found on the back of some of the Mooks, and I always thought it would be too cool to have this as a poster.

Flash forward a few years, and now I have a rebuilt house with a proper garage. And yeah, the walls are bare.  So why not start decorating.  But first I had to make sure that I spent the money for a proper frame, and not just tape it up (that would be... SACRILEGE!).  But it was so large I just couldn't find a universal frame that would work.

I found that a speciality art store called Sekaido was located in the Lumine shopping complex at Yokohama Station, about a 5 minute walk from Nissan Global Headquarters and Gallery.  So when I stopped by after work, luckily these guys were up to the challenge.

Turns out the guy at Sekaido loves GT-Rs as well! And was totally excited about this project. He started asking me about my car, and we engaged in some nerd car talk. Refreshing!  And then at the end, he said, "awesome to talk to an owner... I thought you might just be a Nissan employee or something." Of course I told him I was, which then got him even more excited.  

So I knew the poster was in good hands when I left it with him.

A few weeks later he calls and tells me it's ready, and that he will send it by courier.  So this past Thursday I get it delivered and it appears larger than I remembered:

So in between virtual meetings I go out and begin unwrapping.  One thing about Japan, people sure don't mess around with wrapping!

Felt like 10 minutes to get this all off... I gave up on trying to be orderly, I was too excited!

This was like one of those Christmas presents in multiple boxes... luckily this was the last box, with just another layer of bubble wrap on the framed poster.

Well actually, there was a layer of protective film on top of the clear acrylic (glass would have been too heavy).

And finally:

This is ENORMOUS. See how it basically covers the enter front end of my Lexus?

So now the challenge was to mount this somewhere.  The package came with these wall mounts...

But given how heavy this framed poster was, I wasn't placing my confidence in these mounts (10kg weight bearing each) and their skinny little nails.  Because the walls in my garage are ALC (aerated lightweight concrete)... and I have several of these specialty designed for ALC screws left over from my slatwall project, I decided to see I might be able to use these screws along with the mounts.

But first I had to figure out where to mount this poster.  I wanted it near the car but also visible from my home office.

Perfect! (But wow this is HEAVY!)

So I moved the car forward, got my drill and ladder to make sure it was all done safely.

And the final result...

Ok, you say - but how does it look when the car is parked in its spot?  Well actually I decided to go ahead and take advantage of the car not in its space, and installed another cool item.  I'll post on that one next, give me a couple of days... and sorry about the recent lack of posts, it has been VERY busy for me at work lately...

Check back later this week!

A Few More Days...

So a few more days to go until I pick up the car from Nismo OMORI Factory... unfortunately it won't be going straight back with me, I first need to drop it off at the specialist alarm shop that Ochiai-san found... and then some other stuff needs to be done... details in an upcoming post soon!

Second, Omori Factory isn't quite done with the car, as at the very least they still need to fix the cigarette lighter wiring and the front door speaker leads (they didn't have the parts in stock in time for the repair schedule)... but rest assured I have a few more things to be done (or at least, I'm getting estimates as we speak...) and so after getting the alarm wiring removed I will be making a return trip back.  Ochiai-san did confirm that the photos of the new headlight bulbs he sent last week was just to show the comparison between old and new, and that in fact both were replaced, and finally that in person the new ones look even whiter than the old ones.

On the other hand, they were able to get a new ashtray for the car:

Note the rough surface, consistent with Series 3 cars

And here is the parts number:

Remember, parts numbers change across the years...this is the late models only!

Ochiai-san also told me that they lowered the car as low as "legally possible"... which I understand is 8cm from the road to the lowest part of the car.

Very interesting device here...

In my car's case, the lowest part is the Mine's front pipe... and looking at how it looks compared to the rest of the underfloor, which has been completely refreshed, it doesn't look that pretty anymore, huh.　Maybe I need to make a trip to Mine's in the near future...??

So 9.5 cm from the road?

So I guess the front pipe is costing me 1.5cm... well I guess so long as it looks better than this:

On the other hand, in the past I found it was quite easy to change the heights of the Ohlins myself, so once it's back if it still looks odd we can lower it even more quite easily.  Although then yes we have to be careful about scrapes on not-so-smooth roads, and then I also wonder if the tires will rub against the inner fenders.

Finally, when I first dropped off the car they asked me if I wanted the car ceramic ("glass") coated. When I asked what happened to that option, turns out their supplier had checked out my car and said it was already "too clean" and that any work he would do to prep the car for the ceramic coating wouldn't really be noticeable. Win! It means very little prep next time the car goes in for a ceramic coat!

Anyway, while the car isn't as perfect as I wanted, it's come along way and we will keep fixing things one step at a time...

Problem Getting Car Ready for Shaken (Quickly Resolved)

Now this was unexpected...

A few days after I dropped the car off, and a couple of days before Nismo was getting ready to send my car to get shaken'd I got the following photos sent to me from Ochiai-san.

Hmm looks a bit dark on one side...

Interesting. Didn't know light was measured not in Lumens but in Hecto Candela for Shaken purposes

Yep, all that work to try to modernize the headlights and the right side bulb (showing a brightness of 71 hecto candela in the above photo) dies on me. Great.

Since I wasn't going to bother scrambling to find the exact replacement (Philips D2S/R bulb, 6200K, 3300lms - and no longer made!) nor was I going to pay an excessive amount of money for OEM (you know, I still have those bulbs somewhere...), I asked them to get something nearly equivalent in the aftermarket.

So they went ahead and got these.

From: SphereLight Website

So that's one problem (cheaply) solved. Hopefully.

What else?

Well, the HKS catalyzer. When taking your car in for Shaken, if you are running a non OEM catalytic converter, you need to have the paperwork from the parts manufacturer demonstrating that this part passes regulations. As I forgot to include this in the paperwork I left at Nismo, I had to scramble at home when I got the call and PDF it to them.

Looks like this - as you can see it has all the gas readings to show it actually reduces hydrocarbons...

This is actually for my old Apex'i one.

And then photos of how it's to look when properly installed.

The good news I got however is that the car passed Shaken and the guy didn't even bother to ask for this paperwork... oh well...

One more thing - I realized that I am getting a LOT of things done this time - but each item I have decided to do after lots of research and thinking (and budgeting, of course). So going forward, instead of showing everyone what I did when I picked up the car (which would be a very long post), I will be posting on the blog for each item I am getting done, and then when I pick up the car hopefully showing with photographs of the items on the car.

That should allow me to post more often, and in more detail! Next post coming soon!

Some Increased Publicity... Plus Photos From the Cutting Room Floor

As most of you probably noticed, during the last couple of weeks I did a Speedhunters post where I described my multi-month "clean-up" of the engine bay.  Also, my friend Alessandro did a very nice post on the car as he had come over to help during the light bulb replacement project.

But there were several photos that didn't make the cut. So, I decided to post them here.

First, in preparation for the Speedhunters article, I actually had considered re-wrapping the HKS oil cooler hoses in black plastic spiral wrap.

First, I had to cut this zip tie away.
You can also see the SAMCO radiator hose on the bottom and the weird white spots on it that eventually convinced me to replace it!

It's too bad I couldn't use this in the end. Cheap and easy!

Here's how it looked after I finished the re-wrap. Looks OK, but a bit odd at the same time...

So what do you think? Should I have stuck with the black wrap or did I do the right thing with the clamps?

Speaking of clamps:

Mysterious package from China. And yes, Japan Customs opened to inspect it!

Since I wasn't sure if I should go for anodized silver or black, I ordered both!

 Did I make the right choice by going with the black clamps in the end?

Yes, that is probably 20 years of accumulated gunk!

 As mentioned earlier, when I had Alessandro come over to help, the first thing we decided to do was to replace the silicon SAMCO radiator hose with a new one.

But, SAMCO pricing in Japan is ridiculous, so I went ahead with this one from SARD

Here is Alessandro helping with the clamps.
Incidentally, he later went crazy with metal polish on the Koyo radiator. Thanks Ale!

I was researching new clamps for the radiator hose and a friend told me about some good ones made by Mikalor. So, I went ahead and ordered some.

While nice Stainless Steel, the ones that arrived were scratched up.

They also seemed to not be as shiny as they should be.
Maybe I need to polish them in my free time?

So yes, I gave up on these and went ahead with the ones included in the SARD kit.  We then turned our attention to trying to remove the front bumper, for the headlamp bulb article I did recently.

Here is a close up, looking up from inside the turn signal space, one we removed it.
You can see the ballast for the Xenons.

And of course, having removed the undertray I had to clean it. Simple Green is the bomb!

Rusted license plate stay

 In removing the bumper I thought we might have to remove the license plate stay. So off it came, and we noticed it was quite rusty.

I've resprayed it with anti-rust paint, this will have to do until I get a new one.

So that is one more new part to have to reorder!  Anyway, I am now working on my next Speedhunters post, and will of course provide some more behind the scenes coverage to appear here on the blog. Stay tuned! And thanks everyone for the comments made on the Speedhunters post!

Modernizing the Front Lights (Part 2)

Happy New Year everyone! Hope 2017 is a better year for all.

Anyway, as you recall in my last post I swapped out a first generation T10 LED parking lamp, as well as the OEM D2S Xenon bulb on the left front headlamp, for new units from Philips - both rated at 6200K in color and supposedly brighter than the norm.   

The results were promising

So, next on the list was to access the hi-beams and replace those too.

Wouldn't it be nice if all three bulbs gave off the same color?

Unfortunately, in order to access the hi-beam bulbs, the front bumper had to come off (by design - as reader Sam T commented in the previous post) because each of the headlamp housings are secured on the side by a bolt that is located directed directly under the upper side part of the bumper.  My friend (and BNR34 owner - check out his excellent blog HERE) Alessandro kindly offered to come by and help - I know from past experience that this task, while relatively simple, goes by much faster with two people.

See how compact Japanese garages are? 

So after driving it up onto ramps, I jacked the car up.

Safety first! Placed jack stands under the car.

Then I crawled underneath to unbolt the 3 piece undertray.

Truth be told, this was AFTER I cleaned it up, there was a lot of grease and oil on it! (see next photo)

Meanwhile Alessandro was busy removing the front grill and the two turn signal assemblies. And while I was under the car, I went ahead and removed the front lip spoiler as well.

Note, only the right side air duct came off. A rusted bolt prevented me from removing the one on the left in similar fashion. Something to resolve in the future!

So after removing the front undertray and the front lip spoiler, we realized that we did not have to remove the entire front bumper cover. This was because I have small hands and fingers which allowed me to access each of the single bolts on the sides of the headlamp housings. So instead of removing the bumper cover entirely, we only had to undo the two bolts on the left side to loosen the bumper cover in that area.

Green points to where that single troublesome bolt resides for the left side headlamp assembly.
 Orange is where I reached into to access that same bolt on the right side.

Then, all we had to do was to remove the nuts and 1 bolt holding the assemblies onto the frame of the car.

Green arrows point to the bolts and nuts that were removed.

On the left side, all that was left to be done was to replace the high beam H1 bulb.

You can see the base of the H1 bulb.

The OEM H1 bulb.

And here are the OSRAMs. Compared to OEM they are blue tipped.

And so how did these compare? Given it was still dusk, it was a bit hard to tell initially, but the photos show the difference (which admittedly is not drastic):

With OSRAM

Without OSRAM

Being winter time, the light quickly faded soon after and I was able to get the following photos:

The left front (right on photo) has been changed out, and is whiter than the OEM on the right (left on photo)

In the dark, the difference is more distinct - whiter, and more crisp with less distortion.

So, while not really close to the white of the Xenons or the parking lamps, you can see there IS a difference between the bulbs. First, the OSRAMs appear to be slightly whiter; second, the glow of the light given off was crisper, if that makes sense.

At night, to be honest I could not really tell much of a difference - the biggest difference was how bright the parking lights are now - with the garage door closed there was hardly a difference between them and the Xenons!

In any case - there is still room for improvement. So, I will continue to monitor light bulbs in the hope that one day, I can get an H1 bulb that is whiter AND brighter...