So as of the last two weeks or so I have been hard at work preparing y engine bay for my swap. Being inspired by the car peace ae86 that was featured on speedhunters, I was going after something similar.
The first step of course was to get the engine pulled. That’s to he help of one of my 86 buddies, Joseph, we had it out in no time!
I was out of town last week visiting my home town of Elkhorn, Wisconsin. Because of this absence I missed Tuesday Video day and must not provide two!
First is an update. For those of you who haven’t found out yet I got in a motorcycle accident yesterday. Luckily I am okay and my bike will be fixed, but because of this I miss my bike and already miss riding. Here is a sweet video about an awesome honda motorcycle
This next video is just a little dream of mine
So every year, 86 day is celebrated around the time of August 6th. This year, 8/6 landed on a Monday, which makes it difficult for many people to attend an event on the actual day — bc of work, school, etc. So all of us local Texas 86 guys always celebrate 86 weekend, usually the weekend before 86 day. This year, we decided to celebrate August 3-5.
This year, we decided to all meet in Austin and enjoy 86 festivities in this beautiful city.
Day 1 — 8/3:
Mark & Jonas were the only out of towners that made it this year. Mark drove all the way down from Dallas. Jonas trailered his hatch all the way from Houston. They got in Friday afternoon and came down to the pho shop to meet up with Joseph and I. P.S. most of the pictures in this blog post are shot with a Minolta MAXXUM 7000 35mm camera. Circa 1985. What better way than to celebrate an 80’s car with a period correct camera! All images unedited.
here’s mark & his coupe
jonas & his hatch
Well, a little apologies to you all for not posting up CCM part 2 yet. It’s been a fast paced two weeks since I acquired a little something that requires some work. I’ll make sure to post on it later. This next video was one that really got me into the honda scene. This video was back before the stance movement when the main priority was having some awesome rare rims, and if you were into “looks” then you just slammed the poop out of your car. Flush wasn’t relevant yet, but sunk wheels were. I miss days like these, oh he nostalgia…..
On a side note this video is also what got me into blue scholars back in 08 and has changed my musical preference ever since. If you’ve never listened to Blue Scholars you need to because this duo is hands down one of the best in hip hop. Along with almost all other Seattle MC’s…. Common Market, Macklemore, etc.
I’m trying to make sure we have great content all the time, so now on Tuesdays I will try to post a video of mine that I absolutely love. Some may be old, some new. It’s a surprise every time.
p.s. I am still going to post part 2 of CCM14 so hold tight!
This video really got me interested into the EK body style. The fact that I could make this type of power and still have a car that clean was baffling to me. Traditionally, the though of turbo was seeded in my mind, and one day I plan to do my own turbo build on at least one of my Honda’s. Happy Tuesday peeps and shout out to Team Rice for the inspiration.
-BChaisorn
Here we are again. This time the Natsukashi crew decided to head out to CCM14 in Dallas which was hosted by Tiffany Troung and Ty Nguyen as usual. The trip was one that was to be full of great times and surprises and the creation of the first Natsukashi Games. Though we kept to our usual antics we did not forget the main reason why we came up there, for the meet. I love going to these things. The people you meet and friends you make last a life time and those are things I never want to change. The downside of this meet was the heat. It was a blistering 105+ on the pavement but, as the boys and girls of Natsukashi Garage will tell you, I sucked it up to get some shots of some great cars for you all. My apologies this round for not getting every car, but due to the heat and the amazing turnout that was there I had to limit my shots. Again these are unedited much because I still haven’t had time to learn much about photo editing, nor do I like highly edited photos much. On to the show!
Things started as usual when we travel north which resulted in us meeting at my place over in Round Rock. This time we had some other great friends of mine join us which made the trip all the more enjoyable. Please excuse my good friend David for being a creeper.
Continue reading
A little bit of a teaser till the full coverage. Big thanks to Josh Ubalde for putting this together.
Well its been awhile since I upgraded my GTI but Im getting older and my priorities are changing. Unfortunatly I cant spend as much money I would like to as i did before. So while browsing the internet I found a cool little $2 upgrade. With some tools, pb blaster and a $2hole plug I deleted my rear wiper. I don’t really use my rear wipers since it hardly rains in Texas. The upgrade made the rear hatch look more clean and flows better with the lines of the GTI. After deleting my rear wiper it got me thinking to debage the “GTI” on the truck on and front grill. That too was a simple do it yourself. Overall the car looks more simple and more OEM+.
Next I did was added LED taillights. For $50 I got the Ziza led lights. Its a simple bolt on upgrade but updates the look you are car. Also LEDs are brighter and uses less volts too. But I do believe not all cars should do this because Ive seen some other cars with LED license plate lights and it just looked rice. On this car it wasn’t the case. The LED really updated the look of the gti, and it reminded me of the newer BMWs that came stock with LEDs.
A couple months ago my left fog light got cracked. So while i bought the LED lights i also got OEM projector fog lights. Theses are brighter and shines more distance than my old fog lights for those adverse weather conditions.
I’m sure most people might not notice these upgrade buts that’s a good thing. Its not flashy like those cars with chrome rims with under glow and suicide doors. I would say my car is subtle with little tweaks here and there like those limited edition models that came out from the factory. Its all in the details.
There are a lot of things that can motivate or kill that motivation when it comes to doing a big car project. This 20v swap in my ae86 has proven to be a rollercoaster of that. Starting out with really strong motivation and drive to get my swap going, followed by a dry spell, back to motivation.
As of the last couple weeks, I hit a wall with my swap. The engine was in the chasis and was awaiting all the little things. But I simply just did not have any motivation to get it finished. I KNEW it was just a bunch of small things that were left to do…but I just couldn’t get myself to do it. My motivation was lacking. There were nights where Joseph was going to come over and help me finish the swap, but I told him I was too tired after work to do anything. Continue reading
So on my day off this past wednesday… I ran around picking up little parts I knew that I’d need to finish my motor. Sadly, I got called in to work around 5pm :[ Story of my life.
I worked a few hours and Joseph came to the shop and grabbed some sushi. Once business died down, I was free to go and it was homeward bound to drop my motor in!
After some Dreyer’s Dibs ice cream that joseph picked up from the gas station, it was time to get going on the motor.
ready!
I had to be really careful with the engine, so I don’t scratch the paint on the bay. But as careful as I was, once it was secure in the mounts, the engine leaned backwards and my fuel return barb gauged the back of the engine bay :[ Luckily it’s behind the engine, so it’s a bit more difficult to see.
After a couple tweaks here and there, I got the headers in just to see what it would look like! (in case you’re wondering about the headers, I got them used from club4ag. they’re old JSP Fab headers. Made by Formula Drift driver John Russakoff. I think he might have run them in his old 20v competition 86)
go pho it!
By this time it was like 2 or 3 in the morning. Joseph and I decided to call it a night. He had to get up early for work and we were hungry as heck. So we went inside the house, nommed on some eggrolls leftover from work — which wasn’t enough so I made some spring rolls to fill our bellies.
All that’s left to get the motor running is hooking up the radiator/oil cooler, finishing wiring up my coil on plugs, tucking the harness, then brake/clutch lines. Almost there! Everything that’s left is just super tedious.
in all its glory
Natsukashi Garage 