Regular Car Reviews – More RHD
Regular car reviews (the best...) apparently has a lot of friends that are as quirky as me!
He keeps saying 'kei' wrong. It's not 'key', it's 'kay'. But.... man am I happy to see these things in the states. And, he's right. If you drive one of these, you WILL talk to people.
Thanks RCR!
Should I buy an R grade car
I've been watching Derek Weldon (of Pacific Coast Auto) has been making videos about Japanese auctions, culture, life in Japan and is answering random questions about anything. I've enjoyed them, but this one stuck out for me.
The question answered was "Should I buy an R grade car?"
The answer is 8 minutes long, which tells you the answer is not 'YES!' or 'NO!'.
The "I don't have time to watch this" version is that they can be a good deal, but you HAVE to read the sheet, and it does come with more risk. They _have_ been in an accident, but maybe not a big one, and it could have been fixed right. Finally, modifications can not make a car an R grade.
Give it a watch, and subscribe to the channel!
JDM CRX Walkaround
Most of you know I really like Regular Car Reviews on Youtube. They did a US-spec CRX earlier this week, and today did a "POV" video of a JDM version.
So, their POV videos are not full-blown reviews. Just driving and discussion with the owner. This owner seems to know his stuff, and I think it's a pretty good introduction to the CRX.
RHD in the states – reactions
To followers of Jalopnik, this will be old news, but it's still a fun story. Doug DeMuro, a writer for Jalopnik (or, I guess Kinja in general) bought an R32 GT-R. He lives in the states, so this is still a really big deal.
Waiver - I sometime like, and sometimes hate the same video. He's got a bit of a grating personality/sense of humour.
Anyway! He's really excited to have his GT-R and is documenting his story very well. It's funny, he keeps saying it's hard to get used to/drive. Now, I may be jaded since I've done this for years, but.... no... it's not hard. There is a give-and-take, and left turns across traffic can be tricky, but you also get other perks.
I hope you enjoy!
The classic RHD through a drive through. The server is REALLY REALLY funny - worth a watch for just that. I remember this shameless glee of having an RHD, and he really nailed that exuberance in this video.
This is probably my favourite - Reactions to the GT-R on the street. When I used to drive my Red Daihatsu Hijet, I got this all the time.
Rob
After a trip to the colonies
I was lucky enough to be able to get out the Bahamas this winter. It was pretty awesome. They're what I call "a proper colony", and drive on the left side of the road. So, needless to say, I was stoked to see all the RHD cars they'd have.
Well, it was a bit of a let-down in that sense. RHDs are the minorities on their roads. I'd estimate 1/6 are RHD. Most of their cars are old cars shipped in from the States.
There was one car that caught my eye that I was lucky enough to get a photo of. Now, I knew these existed, but never expected to see one.
The Toyota Cavilier!
So, Toyota and GM had a badge-engineering car swap - Toyota badged some GM cars as Toyotas to beef up their line up, and vice-versa. Needless to say, the Toyota Cavilier was a flop in Japan due to dismal build quality...
RCR does a true JDM
So, these are still quite rare in the states.... so this is a nice review from someone who isn't too jaded from seeing a lot of RHDs on the road.
If you don't already follow RCR, you should.
JDM Awesomeness
Digging through the auctions a while ago, I found this car. It was flagged as a 'Honda 360'... and apparently it was sold here as the Honda Z.
What I see? The JDM Gremlin.
I'm in love.
We produced with spartan air
My friend had these on the R32 GT-R he was driving. Had to share
The first time this post went up, a commenter mentioned that apparently Nissan tried to get all the air bubbles out of the metal in some kind of process.
Enrish and awesome.
My GT-B
So, I've had my GT-B for a bit. The best quirk yet...
GLOWING LICENCE PLATE HOLDER!
You can almost make out the numbers of the plate that were on there.
It's pretty tacky. I'll probably take them off - but I think it's awesome for now!
Nothing else is really of concern on the car. Whew.
Presents from Japan
When you have a car exported, you can ask your vendor to toss some stuff in the car.
I've had some Wakaba on my fridge for a while.... but I wanted to collect both. So, I asked Mark to toss 2 sets of wakaba and 2 sets of the Koreisha mark too.
The wakaba is well-known to Japanese culture enthusiasts. The Koreisha mark is slightly less known. It's the mark you use if you're an elderly driver. This is pretty agist, and pretty funny. In Japan, people with classic cars will put it on the car to mark the car as classic... which I think is actually pretty cool.
The second set I got for my carpool associate... who pretty much freaked out. It's the little things!
