My First Visit to Trust Kikaku!

 So my friend Matt is a loyal customer of Trust Kikaku, and so of course when he announced a few months ago he was going to visit Japan, we agreed that we should drop in for a visit when he was here.

Flash forward a few months, along with a courtesy email to the staff at Trust Kikaku, and this past weekend I found myself driving up to TK - after having an interesting part installed at Nismo Omori Factory, which I will blog about in an upcoming post.

Pit stop for a quick lunch (for me!) on the way up!

This post will be photo heavy, since there is SO MUCH GOING at TK, rather than write about it, photos are way more efficient.  Thanks very much of course to Matt who kindly shared his photos with me and gave me free license to post the ones I liked!

Anyway, TK is located in Ibaraki Prefecture, away from the cities in the countryside and about an hour north of Tokyo, with nothing really except farms mostly so it was quite obvious when we had arrived:

Once we drove through the gates, and then parked in front what appeared to be the main building, we were immediately greeted by Hirano-san and of course Hannah! (famous from the TK YouTube videos, of course!) Unfortunately it was Abe-chan's (Hannah's side-kick in the videos) day off, so I guess we will have to meet him the next time we visit!

But yeah, from the outside it looks very factory. 
Note the USS auctions satellite antenna on the roof though!

THE Front Door...and they even have their own welcome mat...

Once ushered inside, we changed our shoes into guest slippers (Nismo brand, of course) and went to the second floor, which is their client/customer greeting area as well as their administrative operations area.

At the top of the staircase:

Hannah proudly pointed out they have GT-R emblems from EVERY generation of GT-R!

And:

And:

Once the formal introductions and courtesies were over, Hannah offered to take us for a tour. I said "sure" figuring we would be done in 10 minutes. How wrong I was...

That is a manual transmission Nissan X-Trail on sale for 980,000 yen!

And as we moved down the row, the first of many R33 GT-Rs I saw in various states of condition.

This one looked to be in good condition, but we were told the underside was rusted!

This one had been sold to a lucky buyer in the USA!

So while this blog is R33 centric, of course I saw some other interesting cars there too.

R31 Skyline, and 4 door R34, both sold

We then turned around back towards the main building...

And started to check out the row of cars parked along the side of the building. Apparently, these are in the process of being inspected to determine whether they will be parted out or sold as used cars.

Altia aero kit version, anyone?

The price reflects its relative rarity

And of course more R33 GT-Rs.

With the Type R Integra in front

Looking back towards where we started the tour, you can see at least ONE car that will be parted out...

Now here is the real hairdresser's car. Anyone who says the Roadster/Miata is a hairdresser's car is wrong. That is a man's car in my book, such a fun car to drive.  Sadly, this Z34 is not exactly what I would call fun...

After walking another 100 meters or so, we turned the corner to the back of the main building, where I found this:

Better hurry guys, THIS ONE is a beautiful MNP car with only 2000 kms! The stitching on the seats looked brand new, never mind the rest of the interior.  Even R34 and R32 owner Matt was impressed enough to take a photo!

We also found these 3 rarities - a dark blue BNR32 on BCNR33 wheels, this white R30, and yes that is a white BNR34 V-Spec II

Hannah and Matt were discussing how the pearl white BNR34s suffer from different rates of white paint fading - the lower plastic was a bit more yellow than the body.

260RS Stagea too!

We also found this completely stripped out Z32 that was filled up with "garbage" parts. Of course I couldn't resist taking a look, and found some pretty cool parts and accessories in the mess. If I had more time I think I could have taken home some useful things.

This is I think when Hannah realized that I'm not exactly a normal person...

It was at this point where Hannah decided to show us something which would end up blowing me away in the sheer scale of it all...

That's right, row upon row of cars. What kind of cars?

Mostly Nissans...

I guess TK think that the future is bright for demand in R34 sedans and non-GTR coupes...

We didn't even bother walking around much here. Why should we? I guess the R34 fan could walk around and find some cool things - for example, I found a few manual transmission R34 sedans, and spoiler-less coupes (which confirmed my thinking that the R34 coupe looks weird without a wing of ANY type). So after about 5 minutes we headed back and this time walked through their factory/warehouse.

The warehouse has everything car related you can think of. First we saw a lot of parts stripped from cars that were going to be thrown away.

Yes, I am looking for ANYTHING I can take back with me... sadly nothing R33 related here

Sure this is R33 related but kind of hard to walk out the door with this.

On the other hand....

Look closer and it's not for a BCNR33

Those are crates of engines! Not just RBs but also an SR20!

And yes, even some special customer cars before they get shipped out - those that they will NOT leave outside... this Z-tune fendered BNR34, this R35 GT-R Nismo, and an Evo X.

This is their "studio" where they take photos of all the stuff they put on Yahoo Auctions:

With the tour done, they kindly invited us back upstairs for a short break and some tea.

At this point, I was content to say our goodbyes, however there was one more thing Hannah and Hirano-san wanted to show us - their new PR office!

In the employee parking lot right outside their PR office, I found this - 

Someone has great taste, obviously...and strangely the employees do not buy cars from the company.

And actually, it wasn't just the office they wanted to show us, but their silver YouTube placque!!

Can't remember if it was for 100,000 viewers or 1M views, but...impressive nonetheless! Well done guys!

As we were about to drive away, Hannah was kind enough to pretend to be interested in my car.

Hannah laughing at me for spending so much money on the car...

Admiring Cesar's handcrafted interior

It was then that TK's video editor, Suzuki-san, another car-crazy guy, came out to check out my car as well. And he REALLY knew his stuff about the R33, even though he drives a slammed out 86! He knew, for example, where to check for rust spots, and asked about what clutch the car had, etc. 

Here, the young ones get excited about the classic Skyline afterburners. Maybe I will make it 
onto TK's Facebook page?

Anyway, thank you very much to Hannah, Hirano-san, Suzuki-san and the rest of the TK staff who welcomed us and took so much time out of their day to entertain us.  Great people, an interesting business, and a lifeline for many of us looking for that rare or hard to find part.  

Thank you again! I look forward to seeing you guys again sometime soon!

Minor Electrical Issue Was Worth Fixing!

So you all will remember the nightmare that happened a few years ago when a rogue stereo /alarm installer decided he would use my car as his experimental test bed and not apologize for all the goofs? Well, one consequence of that was that a lot of the wiring harness got chopped and so many connectors on the harness were lost.

One of these was the connector to the cigarette lighter.  It's only 3 leads, but... And I recall it was because he had relocated the HVAC controls to this lower area, obliviating the need for a cigarette socket. Sure, I guess you then don't need the connector to the cigarette lighter but what if I changed my mind later?

Anyway, recently I realized I was having problems with this compact cigarette socket USB charger.  I would plug cables into it that I knew were not defective, but my phone would not charge.

Excuse the dust! Also, this unit is supposed to light up when power is flowing to it...

I would tinker with the backside wiring, and sometimes end up with the cigarette socket surround lit up (not the unit itself - it needs acc power) when the lights were off, and vice versa. Or no power at all, even when the engine was on.  Finally it dawned on me that this USB power thing might be broken. So...

24 hours later - Amazon to the rescue... yeah the box got crushed

But the unit inside was fine.

Bright red so I wouldn't get confused with the current one. Plus, anodized red is always nice

Obligatory comparison photo.

So what happened then? Obviously, a simple successful swap would not result in a blog post. 

Well both good news and bad. Good, in that as the red unit lit up, I knew the black unit had failed.

But bad, because it STILL wouldn't charge my phone.  The phone would recognize power being sent but the current seemed to fluctuate on/off/on/off/on/off... and then nothing. So annoying...

So it was removing the shift surround panel to access the wiring once again and...

And yes, the tape deck is working perfectly, and sounds awesome too!

I finally figured out that the wiring being inserted into the cigarette socket circuit was wrong, even though it was lighting up properly.  Actually, without the ignition on, turning the lights on gave a "buzz" sound so I knew something was off.  So I swapped some wires around and...

Proper wiring positions - for my records, just in case!

Success! Power to finally charge my phone.  I celebrated by buying a USB-C charging cable with both Lightning and USB-C ends to allow for charging of both of my phones (and anyone riding with me with an older iPhone).

So really just minor stuff. What's next? That reminds me I need to talk to Ochiai-san at Omori Factory...

Making Sure I'm Not Left Behind

I am talking about car cleaning and detailing techniques, of course.  Since I admittedly rarely drive the GT-R these days, I don't really get a chance to keep my skills up. 

On the other hand, my Lexus... 

So I found this interesting product, originally designed to be applied to cell phone screens to supposedly harden the glass to 9H. Thus obliviating the need for those thin plastic or glass screen savers. Not sure about that, but I recently was reviewing Minkara Parts Review and found several owners saying that this spray on product was helping protect those piano black finishes that are now popular in cars these days.

Of course, the GT-R doesn't have any piano black finish, but apparently this works on plastic in general, so if it doesn't make everything shiny, I might see how I could use this in the R33, at least on non-leather surfaces.

You can check out my impressions of this over at my other blog, at www.lexus-isf.com 

Don't tell the Lexus fans, but I am going to, in my spare time, start researching the latest on car detailing techniques and products, and practice on the IS-F.  Being a blue car with a clearcoat, I think this will be a good learning experience.   Interior-wise, it has leather and plastic, meaning I can practice on those materials too!

Stay tuned... yes I have some fun GT-R stuff coming up soon, just need to make a few phone calls...

Torque Wrenches JUST for Car Wheels

 Check this out...

Thanks to Amazon its algorithm which knows that I own a Nissan, I found out that KTC (Kyoto Tool Company) makes and sells torque wrenches that are pre-set to the wheel lug nut torques for various JDM car manufacturers.

From Amazon

For example, the blue one torques at 85N-m for Suzukis and Nissan kei-cars; the black one at 103N-m for Toyota and Daihatsu cars, and the red one at 108N-m for Nissans and Hondas.

Naturally I sprang for the  Nissan specific one as it was heavily marked down during the recent Amazon Prime day sale. Thanks Amazon!

Made In Japan, of course!

Truth be told, I already have an old Husky brand adjustable torque wrench I think I borrowed from my father many years ago, and never returned.  I found out however that with such manually adjustable torque wrenches you are always supposed to return the setting to zero after every use, otherwise the internal springs start to stretch and this can throw off the accuracy of the wrench.  And to be honest, I think I never did that, preferring to leave it on the last used setting (which was usually for the GT-R's wheel nuts anyway...)  But if the wrench is NOT adjustable, then this is not an issue. 

I wasn't expecting a case but this is a nice touch!

For something that retails at around $100 USD, it goes without saying that it better be accurate! But yes there is this Certificate of Calibration showing within 0.5%.

Love how there is a Certificate of Calibration

Of course I finally broke out my Ko-ken plastic sleeved car lug nut sockets, which I had bought a couple of years ago.  Why the plastic sleeves? To prevent the accidental scratch of course! 

Blue band is 17mm for Nissan, Yellow is 21mm for the Lexus

Love how Ko-ken has these knurled extension bars.

So of course once this wrench arrived I had to go and "check" all the wheels. 

Everything was tight, except for one nut on the front right wheel. Nice! As for removal, I had previously bought a Ko-Ken ZEAL series cross series lug nut wrench. 

From https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/Ko-ken-4711XZ-Free-Turn-Wrench-12-7mm/dp/B08GL5PY49

I have a breaker bar somewhere too. So in summary, now I have all the specific tools to perfectly remove and re-mount my wheels.  If I ever have a need to do so (with carbon ceramics, the wheels don't get brake dust dirty anymore...)

Anyway, yes it is sad that I am so busy these days that I can only post this kind of stuff. I actually have a few things that have accumulated in my garage I need to get done soon. Hmm...