Mugen CR-Z RR from TAS 2012…
Man, I’ve just been scouring the net the last night or so in anticipation of finding new photos from Tokyo Auto Salon 2012. This year’s even looks amazing from the photos I have seen so far and it really makes me wish that I was out there with the hoard of other Americans that seem to have gone out to Japan this year. I have Yasutaka Shimomukai from Tactical Art over there helping me take photos but in the mean time, here is one of the Honda highlights from TAS 2012 so far. I’m sure there is more to come but this is just what I have been able to squander from looking through Flickr from my bookmarked pages. This photos are from “Tnoma” and he did a great job of getting the newly introduced Mugen CR-Z RR in detail… I’ve attached a link to Mayday Garage because David Do and Danh Phan are over there covering the event right now and their style of coverage is a lot like how I do mine…meaning that they are very indepth and cover everything that is going on, including some stuff that’s outside of the event. Japan is a really cool place, if you haven’t been there before, you should definitely try to make it out there one of these days. For now, luckily, we have a couple of friends over there doing a great job of covering the event for us here in the states…
The photos are pretty self-explanatory but if you are wondering, this is the Mugen CR-Z RR Concept that has a motor equipped with a Mugen-designed supercharger…There is a shot of the motor but off the car. Who knows if this thing even runs at this point or if it was like the NSX RR where it didn’t even have an engine inside of it…
Photos aren’t the best but let’s face it, even if I was there the photos would not be all that great, haha…
Good to know that Mugen’s wheels are starting to look more modern and appropriate with the times…While I get the new Mugen stripe on the side of the car and how it flows with the natural line of the door, I don’t get why they put the stripe on the hood… Looks like a contemporary artsy version of a Drumstick ice cream cone…
What’s up fancy and elaborate interior?….
Love the front fenders and the lines of entire kit…
Center-exit exhaust flowing seamlessly with the bumper…
The money shot… Mugen supercharged with carbon air box and all…
Meanwhile, Mayday Garage is killing it and doing way more shit than me! Peep the two links below for the best coverage so far… The first link will take you to day one of their coverage, second one is a super cool behind-the-scenes look of them having dinner and partying inside the Rauh Welt facility with Akira Nakai from RWB….
Click here for Mayday Garage’s Preview of Tokyo Auto Salon 2012…
Got damn I’m missing out!!
The Top 10 Hondas of 2010…A retrospective…Part 2…
Back now with the second half of the Top 10 Hondas of 2010 retrospective…Yesterday we took a look back at spots 10-6 of the Top Ten and today we will be looking at the other 5 spots on the list. One interesting note to consider when I was putting yesterdays and today’s list is that there seems to be less change with the 2010 group in comparison to the Top Ten Hondas of year’s past. I don’t know what it is, maybe because these builds are in more of a completed state than the others but either way, as a whole, you don’t see very much of a difference. There are minor changes here and there but the guys on the 2010 list seem to be the types that hold onto their cars and aren’t in any rush to build something completely new. Of the guys from 2010, there’s just one person who has sold their car and moved on. You can maybe consider RC Chacon’s new project as him moving on, but he actually still has his white EG and I’m sure he’s planning on rebuilding it…
Moving on…
5. JDMYard/Yonas Liu’s “EGK24A”…
What he’s up to now: You’ll be very happier to hear that Yonas is still very active with his Civic build. While he probably has one of the most recognizable Civics in all of the world today, Yonas tends to keep to himself mostly and only posts occasionally on forums like NWP4Life. Thankfully, we have social media outlets that allow us to keep in contact with people like Yonas Liu who are on the other half of the world. I’ve been chatting with Yonas recently on Facebook and he’s been updating me on all the new things he’s been doing to his Civic. It’s good to know that after all these years of him owning his car and all the abuse that he puts it through that he is still excited to try new things with it and making his build better than ever…
He sent me a photo the other day actually of his latest major modification. It was a decent photo from his Blackberry or something and I was going to post it, but I promised him that I would hold off until next week to show everyone, since he’s planning on some major unveiling some time around the 10th of October. It’s a very drastic change from what he’s been running in the last couple years and I think you guys will be just as surprised as I am when you see it. For now, take a look at Speedhunters’ feature on Yonas’ EG which actually dropped today…
“GOLIATH, MEET DAVID” – via Speedhunters.com
4. Chris Sakai’s Civic/Angel Ramos’ S2000 (Tie)
What he’s up to now: Chris Sakai has taken a more subtle approach with the aesthetics of his Civic in 2011. After his cover feature in Honda Tuning and landing on the Top 10 Hondas list, he kicked off 2011 by ditching his wing, hood, and mirrors. OEM Civic Type R pieces make their way back onto Chris’ car now and he also went with a different set of wheels…
I wasn’t sure how the white Regas would look when I found out about the switch but when I saw it, I honestly felt that it was probably one of his Civic’s best looks yet. Other than those aesthetic changes, not much else has changed. Chris has continued to participate in all the major Cali car show events and picked up a couple new sponsors here and there… The car looks so good in it’s current state that there isn’t really any reason for him to have to do anything else to it…
What he’s up to now: In 2011, Angel Ramos has gone with the old adage; “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. Other than a new set of brakes and a different set of Volks, Angel’s S2000 has remained exactly the same. There isn’t a whole lot he can do to it without having to tear down and start over. His S2000 has a very unique look and continues to stand out in the deep S2000 community…
I spoke to him for a while at this year’s Nisei Showoff and he does have one more major overhaul coming for his S2000. 2010 was the debut of Angel’s build and there was so much going on that I think he’s taken a step back this year so that he could breathe and just enjoy the fruits of his labor. There are definitely some big things that he plans to do to this thing but the ideas are still very premature. It’ll be interesting to see what actually happens to Angel’s S2000 but all we can do now is wait until next year…
3. ATS*Anh’s Acura Integra Type R…
What he’s up to now: Anh Truong has probably been the most active in the top 5 in terms of adding new stuff to his build… His ITR probably hasn’t even been in his possession much in 2011 because it’s spent a chunk of it’s time either down here in Southern California for events or over at ASC Speed Metal for custom fabrication…
Anh’s car has been down at ASC because they have been hard at work on fabricating some new catch cans and misc. things for his engine bay. They also added a custom roll bar/half cage to the ITR. I think as a whole in 2011, I probably have seen Anh’s ITR more than I have seen Anh himself… The exterior of the ITR has remained basically the same, with the exception of some brand new Almighty Grey Regamaster EVOs…
2. Bisimoto’s Honda Civic Wagon and Honda CR-Z…
What he’s up to now: Bisi currently is hard at work on a brand new 2012 Honda Civic coupe for SEMA. The wagon is exactly the same as it was last year and for the most part, so is the turbo CR-Z. Bisi is a mad man so he’s constantly hard at work on either his own projects or tuning customer vehicles but the spare moments that he’s had, he’s spent it cruising around in the CR-Z. I was just over at the Bisimoto facility last week and he was talking about how often he drives the CR-Z. If you’re wondering, the answer is “yes”, he does drive it around with the chute in the rear and everything, haha…
There are some minor kinks electronically here and there with the hybrid motor but he has taken the car out for test runs at the track. I doubt he really has any major changes planned for this thing because he’ll be busy finishing his 2012 Civic and campaigning it for 2012. Another thing that might prevent him for doing anything else to this CR-Z is all the different Porsche projects he’s working on. I haven’t had a chance to see his Porsche SEMA project but he promises that it’ll be one-of-a-kind. I don’t know how he has enough hours in the day to do as much as he does but I’m very interested to see the debuts of his new projects when the SEMA show rolls around in November…
1. Ryan Der’s Honda Civic and Big Mike’s Honda Prelude (Tie)…
What he’s up to now: Ryan surprised a lot of people in 2011 when he decided to take off his complete C-West aero kit. He usually takes it off to track the Civic anyways and with so many track events to go to this year, I guess it just made sense for him to remove it permanently and go back to a Mugen front lip and splitter. At the Wekfest event that occurred in early 2011, Ryan also debuted a new set of custom refinished Work Meister S1s..
There aren’t any other major changes. Under the hood he’s switched over to a C.O.P. ignition system and different valve cover but that’s mostly it. He spent much of the year attending car shows as well as beating up his Civic on the track at events such as Super Street’s annual FF Battle….
What he’s up to now: Big Mike is always busy running around all over the place but his Prelude is pretty much the same as it was in 2010. There aren’t very many builds that are as in-depth or as detailed as his and it showed in 2011 when he consistently continued to take home awards at shows all over Cali. His Prelude even appeared on the cover of Banzai magazine, which is a U.K.-based publication. There are many that are starting to think that he needs to switch things up because it’s remained the same for the last two years and Big Mike definitely has some cool new things coming for his Prelude.
While he’s busy working and collecting new parts for his Prelude, Big Mike has started on a Honda Accord side-project to keep him occupied for the rest of the year. 2012 looks to be another big year for Big Mike, so stay tuned…
That rounds out the list. Hopefully this has given you some insight as to what these guys are up to these days. All are very much deserving of being on the 2010 list and continue to be a force within the Honda community in 2011…
The only question that remains now is… who is going to make this year’s list?….
Thanks for looking…
Exclusive Content: Unpublished Shots of Bisimoto’s CR-Z from Super Street…
Last week, I brought you the unpublished shots of Kane Chan’s Civic coupe from this year’s Super Street Honda Issue. Today we will be taking a quick look at some shots from one of my other features in that issue, which is none other than Bisi Ezerioha’s Honda CR-Z. I was the first one to release shots of the car originally when it was debuted at last year’s SEMA event so I guess it was only fitting that I shoot the car for the mag as well. In feature, you saw more detail shots and more shots of the components in the engine bay because Super Street wanted to take a more technical approach at telling Bisi’s story. Everyone knows what the exterior of this CR-Z looks like but not too many people know exactly how the car functions and how it makes the power that it does. Bisi provided us with a great deal of information on the car and hopefully I did a good job of translating those words onto his feature. The photos today are mostly the exterior shots that weren’t used and random things here and there that either weren’t used, or were different angles. With the new layout of the site, I’m also able to post up larger photos now as well but the links to the 1400px photos will be provided below each shot as usual. Enjoy…
Oh before, I forget, here is the link to the online version of Bisimoto’s feature from the Super Street 2011 Honda Issue…
This was pretty cool and one of the shots I was hoping they would use in the story. It’s a photo of the tool that Bisi had to get from Honda so that he could remove the engine from the CR-Z at the onset of his build. If you read the story, then you will know how difficult and dangerous it was for him to remove what was essentially a gigantic magnet from the engine bay of this car…
Thanks for looking…
Yellow Factory Civic from TAS 2011…
Well I wasn’t able to attend Tokyo Auto Salon this year because it wasn’t monetarily feasible but I have been looking around on the internet for pics. In terms of Honda, there weren’t too many. Just the big dogs like J’s Racing and C-West and what not but there was a Civic from Yellow Factory that apparently created some buzz. If you guys have been following TAS 2011 like me then you probably have seen it already. The front aero is really aggressive and might be a bit too much for some but it all functions I guess because this EG is pretty quick. It doesn’t have a K or anything either, just a 1.8L B-series motor. At Tsukuba Circuit it was able to record a 1:01.38 lap time, just two seconds behind the 59 second FF N/A record recorded by the famed SS Work’s CR-X. Here’s some pics I was able to find that most of you may not have seen yet. I figured you guys would want to know what everyone is talking about lately…
Photo Credit goes to RHDJapan…
If you want a little more information on the Yellow Factory Civic, go here…
Oh here’s the C-West CR-Z with a different front bumper than the C-West add-on lip kit. This one resembles the design they usually use and is a complete replacement over the stock bumper…Looks a little too bulky for my tastes though and I’m a fan of the front lip on the previous kit…
Here’s the J’s Racing CR-Z with all the crazy graphics that they love to run…The kit is actually really clean and not too aggressive. The front grill is designed really well and I like that the opening on the bottom isn’t too big like some of the other kits I’ve seen…
Here’s another angle… Photo Credit: AutoGuide.com
You can also read more about the J’s Racing CR-Z here… Also has more pics of the Civic below as well…
…and here’s the J’s Racing Civic Type R with a more subdued graphical livery than the normal J’s graphics…
Oh this is complete un-related to Hondas but I just had to show it to you guys because this shit is unbelievable…I love it…
Junction Produce Rolls Royce Phantom…I don’t know if any Rolls Royce guys would ever cop this kit but damn, it looks perfect on there…Straight drug dealer status…haha.
That’s all for today, I’m still busy going through the pics from the weekend and going through some other stuff for the site. Back with more tomorrow…
This is what I’m working on today…
Just spent the majority of the night and early morning finishing up this story for a future issue of Honda Tuning in 2011. Keep an eye out, definitely a game changer and something worth looking at….I don’t recall seeing any pictures of this thing on the internet yet and the only content we have relating to this car is this video…Peep it…
Taking the rest of the day off and then back to work on another feature for Super Street magazine tonight… Loads of work lately to close out the year, I love it!
An evening at Evasive…
This is actually from a couple weeks back but because of the SEMA coverage, I haven’t been able to go through them until now. Rodrez had hit me up to help him out and give him a ride down to the auto transporter. The CR-Z had just returned from Las Vegas and he needed the car back to install the C-West aero. He wanted to get the kit on in time for Super Lap Battle where it would make it’s first official run in their new hybrid class. The Honda Tuning CR-Z ended up doing very well that day in fact, and actually placed first in the hybrid class. I’m pretty sure it didn’t have anything to do with whether or not the kit was on but it definitely made the car look a lot more aggressive. Evasive Motorsports had the time and space for us to install the kit since they were prepping for the event as well so we picked up the CR-Z from the transporter and got to work. The following pics are just kinda random. They’re just shots I took whenever I had free time on my hands because the majority of the night was spent on fitting and installing the kit. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be and was relatively simple, the only issue we had was the fitment of the rear lip. Anyways, on with the pics…
A shot of what was all going on at Evasive before we pulled the CR-Z in…
The DC Sports S2000 was there getting some minor things done to it as well…
Voltex aero on their shop Evo. I’m sure you guys are familiar with this car by now…
Our all-Japanese language instructions that proved to be no help at all…
I have actual step-by-step pictures of the install but I had to save them since they are being used for a write-up in HT that covers the CR-Z’s build progress…
Here’s one of the shots of Rodrez working on the car. He’s removing the OEM rear lip to make room for the C-West piece…
The rear lip ended-up needing some modification as the U.S. rear bumper turned out to be different from the JDM rear. Everything else had fit close to perfect up until that point…
The front makes a world of difference. We were wondering how it would look with the JDP front grille piece but it ended-up working out great…
Volk RE-30s that were getting balanced for their personal Civic 4-door Street Class race car….
Rodrez working on the kit and Mike from Evasive applying decals to his Civic…
…he didn’t do too bad of a job considering how quickly he threw them on there…
Their Evo getting prepped for battle…
Volk TE37SL wheels that would eventually go on the Evo…
The front bumper was removed so that more modifications to the front aero pieces could be performed…
The RE-30s getting balanced…
Rodrez and I were both a little lost as to why this dude showed up to the shop with a bird on his arm…the most random fucking thing ever….
Random shot of the Evo…
The final product after we installed the kit….
Oh and here are some pics of it at Super Lap Battle courtesy of Evasive Motorsports…
Tarzan Yamada checking out the CR-Z…
…and for anyone that was wondering, the CR-Z posted a time of 2:18 CW13 at Button Willow on Falken Azenis 615K tires.
That’s all for today, got a special treat for you guys tomorrow so stayed tuned…
Exclusive Content: Your first official look at the Bisimoto CR-Z…
With the SEMA 2010 event finally occurring this week, I can finally release these photos to the public. The car has been ready for some time now but due to contractual obligations, no photos could be released for it until this week. If you haven’t heard of the Bisimoto CR-Z before, be prepared, because it was quite a shock for myself to see it the first time. The graphics scheme alone is enough to dramatically pull your attention away but where this CR-Z truly shines is under the hood. Bisi has been hard at work trying to maximize the potential of the CR-Z and the dyno sheet below says it all…Enjoy. I didn’t take too many pictures that day but I must thank Bisi for giving me the first opportunity to photograph the car for the public. Specs will be released soon, for now, just enjoy the Bisimoto CR-Z in all of it’s glory….
Click on the links under the photos (when available) to get to the larger ones…
There’s a strong possibility that it is making even more power now that he’s had more time with it. At that time, which was probably the first time he had ever dyno’d it, the CR-Z made 464HP/327 lb-ft…
The engine bay of the Bisimoto CR-Z…
That’s all for today. There was more but I’ll save those for another time. I just wanted you guys to get a look at the CR-Z before everyone else got pictures of it at the SEMA show. I’m gonna check it out along with the other CR-Zs that have been built for the show after I get some much needed rest. I feel like a zombie that ate too much. More Vegas coverage tomorrow. Hopefully the internet connection improves…shit sucks here…
This…is…AMAZING…
The video below will change how many of you view the CR-Z and it’s potential to be a build-worthy Honda…It’s 16 seconds of awesome. I know the CR-Z looks like a woman’s shaver and is a bit quirky looking but with some many big companies involved in developing parts for it, the CR-Z market will definitely grow. It’s pretty popular in Japan and it should only be a matter of time before these things make waves stateside…
I would say the video is “pure sex” but I don’t like to use that term because I’ve watched too many adult videos to have any inclination to even know what “pure sex” is… You gotta watch the video though, it’s not sexy in any way but the sound of it is almost like a rhinocerous getting mounted by a mutant giraffe who only eats kimchee quesadillas from the Kogi truck…now imagine Diddy saying…”take that, take that…” with a toothpick in his mouth…yah picture that…
Enjoy…
Oh, remember to turn the speakers up…
