Monthly Archives: July 2016

The (Road)ster Trip – The REV9 2016 USA Tour

Recently, for some personal reasons, I really needed to go out of my place and see new things. I go to Japan quite often for business, and absolutely love it, but I have my absolute favorite car (2016 ND Roadster) sleeping in my garage all year long and wish I could drive it every time I’m travelling overseas. Before I wrote this blog post, the car had about 4000km or 2500 miles on the clock). I recently decided I’d do a ~8000km road trip in the USA to put some mileage on this car and also cool off from the recent stressful months we’ve had at REV9. For those wondering, I am still working while I’m on the road, it’s just on a different schedule.

I plan on doing some REV9 Night Meetings at different locations to meet customers and other people with nice Roadsters during my trip.

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I left straight from Quebec, Canada and drove through the Adirondacks:
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It was my first long drive with the REAL Japan Leather Steering Wheel and I gotta say that I absolutely loved it. The perforated leather really makes a difference in feeling and it’s just great. Looks awesome, too!

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The quality is like 10 times better than the stock steering wheel. The D-Shape is not so noticeable and it’s actually a very nice thing. Much thicker than stock. After that, I’ve caught a very bad storm (rain & thunder), but, luckily, I did not drive through the worst part of it and ended up seeing this awesome sunset: iphone1

I gotta say that the 2.0L is extremely efficient. With a full tank of 91 octane, I did an average of over 39mpg driving at around 65-70mph. Computer is also pretty accurate. DSC_0962DSC_0966

I really did push that “range” to the maximum, having to fill up the car a few miles after it hit the “0 miles left”. Not going to do it again… DSC_0964

570 miles later, I did my first stop in New Jersey! It was a long 10 hours drive and I really had to stop.

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Here is my schedule for the next month or so (which is pretty much not going to change):

July 26th-27th : Virginia Beach, VA

July 28th : Charlotte, NC

July 29th-31st: Deal’s Gap (Tennessee/North Carolina)

August 1st-2nd : Atlanta, GA

August 3rd : Birmingham, AL

August 4th-5th : Houston, TX

August 6th-7th : Austin, TX

August 8th-9th : New Orleans, LA

August 10th : Atlanta, GA

August 11th : Charleston, SC

August 12th : Virginia Beach,VA

August 13th-14th : Ocean City, MD

August 15th-17th : New York, NY (I’m probably not going to be using my car in this location)

August 18th-19th : Boston, MA

August 20th : Burlington, VT

This is mainly a trip for the East Coast of USA. I wish I could do the West Coast, but I’m really short on time and plan something MUCH bigger for 2017 (aka REV9 10th Anniversary). If you would like to meet up and see our shop car, or help us arrange a meeting at one of the location we’re doing, you’re more than welcome to send us an email or comment this post on Facebook! The main goal of the trip is to attend Miata At The Gap on July 29th to 31st.

Autoexe NC & ND Demo Cars at Karuizawa 2016

Autoexe came to Karuizawa this year with two very nice demo cars. A 2015 NC3 as well as a 2016 ND Roadster. Both were fully equipped with all their accessories and looked pretty nice.

Let’s start with the NC:

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The car was really neat. It had their NC Front Lip and was rolling on some very nice Rays Gram Lights 57XTREME 17” Wheels.

The engine bay was the biggest attraction for this car. It has their NC Induction Box, their NC Hood Struts, their NC Front Strut Bar as well as their NC Elbow Intake.

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Now, let’s take a look at their ND:

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It was rocking their ND Rear Spoiler as well as their combo of ND Rear Diffuser & ND Dual Center Exhaust. The car did not change much compared to what was shown at Tokyo Auto Salon 2016.

The engine bay was super clean, as usual. It had their ND Carbon Fiber Ram Air Intake, ND Elbow Intake, ND Strut Bar & ND Valve Cover Plate.

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Their only new product they could show us during that time was their ND Brake Master Cylinder Stopper:

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We hope you enjoyed the Autoexe coverage at Karuizawa Meeting 2016!

NOPRO Demo Cars at Karuizawa Meeting 2016

Nogami Project (NOPRO) has been very serious on NC tuning in the past years. They built some endurance racing cars and really focused on improving aerodynamics and power, all the time.

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Their NC Endurance Racing Demo Car was featuring their NC Fender Flares, NC Front Bumper, NC Front Diffuser, NC 2 Pieces Hood, NC Eyelids and NC Dry Carbon Fiber Hardtop.

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The silver car was also recently equipped with a Rotrex Supercharger combined to a 2.5L Engine Swap. It’s a wicked fast car producing over 300hp. We’ll show you the whole coverage of this car in another blog post, though.

NOPRO also brought a yellow NC Demo Car which is a street version of their silver one.

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As you can see, it’s not what everyone would consider a street car, considering the massive front diffuser, but it’s still what they consider as streetable. It’s rocking the 2.0L engine combined with a Rotrex Supercharger.

This is a very short coverage of NOPRO Demo Cars at Karuizawa 2016 Meeting, but I promise I’ll have a much better one soon as I visited their shop and took TONS of pictures.

Garage Hundred-One Demo Car at Karuizawa 2016

Garage Hundred One has always been showing some pretty eccentric vehicles at Karuizawa Meetings. This year is no different than the others, they really showed a special concept!

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The car is actually their mechanic’s personal car. He built it so it’s very efficient on gas and also easy to drive in the city and mountains/tarmac. It’s featuring a very unique front end with turn signals relocated into the front bumper.

It has some Rays CE28N Wheels in 15” and some very tall tires. The ride height was more 4×4 than what we’re usually seeing, but it was very nice to see, too. The car had a purpose and he made no compromise (except maybe on looks) so the car would perform to its tasks. You can also spot some REV9 1028 Mirrors installed on this car.

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To make the car even more unique, the owner took Garage Vary Fastback Hardtop and created a divided rear window (inspired by what we see on old school Corvettes).

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We hope you enjoyed this very unique feature of Garage Hundred-One Demo Car at Karuizawa 2016 Meeting!

 

ACRE Brakes Demo Car at Karuizawa Meeting 2016

ACRE Brakes is gaining popularity in Japan and showing everyone that a small company can compete with the big players in term of price and quality. They build an awesome ND Demo Car with their own parts and Garage Vary aerodynamics.

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The car has the Garage Vary Vented Hood as well as the Garage Vary Type-2 Front Lip installed.

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We can see that they also have their ND Brembo Big Brake Kit installed. This kit is made using Ferrari F360 Brembo Brakes for maximum power.

They also have a ND Garage Vary Carbon Fiber Trunk, combined with the Garage Vary Rear Spoiler and Garage Vary Rear Diffuser.

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There are many parts that I did not have the chance to take a picture including their Enkei RSM9 Wheels as well as their Oval Tip Fujitsubo Authorize R Exhaust (exclusive to them).

This is a very short Karuizawa Meeting blog post (sorry), but we hope you enjoyed it! There will be a full feature on the ACRE company as well as their ND Demo Car soon!

S2 Racing Demo Car at Karuizawa 2016

Here’s the coverage of S2-Racing NC3 Demo Car at Karuizawa 2016. They previously had a NC1 Demo Car shown at previous Karuizawa Meeting, but it was not as classy as this new one.

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The car is rocking their new NC Front Bumper that is based on the looks of the new Jaguar F-Type Sports Car. It’s a really nice fit to the NC3 Front End and gives it a nice racing and classy look.

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The car was really lovely with the Pearl White & Red Accents (as well as Red Soft Top)!

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The interior was pretty cool looking with the retrofitted ND OEM Seats and JoyFast Original Shift Knob!

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Hope you enjoyed this quick blog post about S2 Racing Demo Car at Karuizawa Meeting 2016!

Car Make Corn’s at Karuizawa 2016

Here is the latest NC Demo Car by Car Make Corn’s. It’s pretty nice that I’ve been able to see this car before and after. They completed the whole car in less than 1 week, it was hard work! Here’s a picture of what it looked like when I visited their shop :

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And here is the result at Karuizawa Meeting :

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The car is actually a NC1 rocking the RS Factory Stage NC1 to NC2/NC3 Conversion Kit. It is really clean and had some beautiful red touches on the lip.

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It was running their Prototype Car Make Corn’s CMC 16×8 Wheels in 5×114.3 (NC fitment) and some universal Fender Trims. They also had their Car Make Corn’s Single Tip Exhaust installed in there.

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It also had a really nice interior featuring a Saito Roll Cage, Prototype Car Make Corn’s Leather Seats, Car Make Corn’s Shift Knob & MOMO Steering Wheel.

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It was one really beautiful result for the short period they had to build this car. It’s a pretty simple car, but also really nice looking.

DSC_0645We hope you enjoyed this feature of Car Make Corn’s at Karuizawa Meeting 2016! More to come~

 

RS Products at Karuizawa 2016

RS Products has build its name for a long time. It’s considered as the classiest parts available for the MX-5 Miatas and will bring a classic look to any car’s interior. This year, they brought some parts to enhance the ND Roadster’s interior!

Let’s start with an overview of their NA Demo Car, because they did not have any ND shop car in place:

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The car is really classic. It’s rocking some RS Watanabe Wheels (chrome color), Barchetta Clubman GT Front Bumper, RS Products Rear View Mirror and Runabout S800 Side Mirrors!

The interior of this car is also totally worth taking a look! It has the RS Products Center Console, RS Products Classic Switches, RS Products M2 Meter Panel and Nakamae Type-R Seats!

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Now, let’s take a quick look into their new ND part:

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As you can see, they released one of their regular product, the ND Gauge Faces. It’s available in both Black or White background. It’s very similar to their NC Gauge Faces, but a bit more modern to fit with the ND interior style.

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I couldn’t picture their other part, but they also released a ND Meter Color Changer which changes the factory white/blue lighting to red lighting! Price for this item is about $60 which is really affordable.

I hope you enjoyed this RS Products coverage at Karuizawa Meeting 2016 and will continue reading our future blog posts~

 

 

RS Factory Stage at Karuizawa 2016

RS Factory Stage was one of the most liked ND at Karuizawa Meeting last year, due to their very cool graphics as well as 18” wheels fitment. This year, they came back with a car that had much more of a racing look and nicer aerodynamics.

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They had their ND Front Underspoiler installed which fits between the OEM Front Canards to give a more aggressive look to the front end!

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They also were showing their ND Angled License Plate Holder, for those who wouldn’t want to block air going through the front grille.

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RS Factory Stage also showcased its original ND Ducktail Spoiler as well as its new ND Dual Exit Muffler which really suit the lines of the car!

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I hope you enjoyed this showcase of RS Factory Stage at Karuizawa Meeting 2016! Can’t wait to see what new products they’ll introduce in the coming months!

Garage Vary at Karuizawa Meeting 2016

Garage Vary really has stepped up their game in the previous year, especially with their ND (2016+) Roadster parts. They built a really nice car for Tokyo Auto Salon 2016, and it did not change by much for Karuizawa meeting, but, now, most of the parts are production ready!

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The demo car is running their ND Type-3 (Glide) Front Lip with integrated canards. The one on their demo car is actually unique for the fact that it’s made out of Carbon Fiber (will never be sold to the public).

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They introduced their new ND Ram Air Intake that will pick fresh air from the front grille as well as the small opening from the hood. It’s a really nice system that has A LOT of work behind it.

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The car was also rocking their ND Vented Front Fenders which really suit the vehicle nicely and improves aerodynamics.

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Their ND Emotional Low GT Wing was also installed directly on their ND Aero Vented Rear Bumper to give a really aggressive rear end to the car.

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Finally, they introduced me to a new line of ND Interior Products; the REAL Japan Carbon Fiber Steering Wheel and the REAL Japan Stainless Steel Shift Knob!

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Also, as usual, they brought the whole family of small cars with them : NC Go Kart & 2x NC Pedal Cars:

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Hope you enjoyed this feature on Garage Vary ND Demo Car at Karuizawa Meeting 2016!