Welcome back to Part 2 of The Chronicles’ 2012 Wekfest LA Coverage. The feedback so far from part 1 has been great so I’m excited to dive right back into the second portion of the coverage that takes place during the morning of the event. This year’s Socal-edition of Wekfest was way better than the first year, from my observations anyway. Foot traffic was much better than 2011 and the overall lay-out looked to be much better. I think the model lounge set-up by Tony and the It’s JDM Yo!! crew really helped to give the grass area a much different feel this year and provided a nice break in between the plethora of cars at the event. Last year our cars were parked on the back side of the show so it was cool to be placed on the opposite side this year and near the vendors area. I think the overall vibe this year was much better as well. Last year no one knew what to expect from this event so it was a much more stressful environment for not only the Wekfest staff, but also the participants. Everybody seemed to be getting along and there were no issues during roll-in either. The Fire Marshall presented some issues but that’s a regular occurrence whenever you have a large venue filled with a lot of vehicles. Oh, the show also ran a little passed schedule and the people that worked the venue were kind of rushing the people out at the end but it wasn’t too big of a deal. The Wekfest staff, along with the help of Big Mike, was able to get control of things and managed to coerce them into allowing the awards ceremony to finish up before making everyone leave.  At one point they wanted Junior to just stop in the middle of the awards and wanted to kick everyone out. Luckily that didn’t happen, otherwise there would have been a giant shit storm of people complaining about it online after the event…

In any case, I had a great time. I think the LA Wekfest event just needed some momentum to get stronger and now it is moving in the right direction. Will it ever be as big as the SF Wekfest event? No, definitely not. It’ll be close but the foot traffic and excitement for the Norcal event will always top any other event anywhere in the U.S. People down here in Socal are just different and not willing to camp out days before just to get into a car show. Up there, it is probably the only major car show up there for imports so it makes sense that people get excited about it. Down here, we have more than enough events to keep us busy. If someone misses a show, chances are there will be another one a week or two after. Things just move much faster down here so you won’t see the type of turn-out you would for the Norcal show. I’m pretty sure the Wekfest guys realize that as well and they should be proud of what they accomplished this past weekend. Just from talking to everyone during the show and after, the general consensus was that it was a successful event. I didn’t hear anyone say anything bad about the show and it seemed as if everyone enjoyed it…

For today’s coverage, we will kick off the actual show coverage with photos from that morning of the event. Tomorrow will cover the early afternoon, and the parts following will cover the later afternoon, when I did a bulk of the coverage. I honestly feel that the photos in the late afternoon were the best shots but I’m happy with everything I shot that day and I think you guys will enjoy how I present the coverage to you guys this week. If you could, please just be patient and wait for all the photos to load so that you can read the captions and see the photos in the order that I present them to you. I work really hard on these event coverage posts and I hope you stick around to read them in their entirety. I understand it is a lot of text at times but I’d rather be able to describe what was going on in the photos than just showing you some pictures and speeding through everything. If you’re just here to see photos, that’s fine too, but try to read the stuff that I write. Anyways, let’s get it rolling….

If you missed Part 1, CLICK HERE to check it out and to see the stuff that happened before the show…

The greatest thing about being a part of Wekfest LA this year was not having to wake up at an ungodly hour. Usually I am up early taking care of stuff for my booth but since I didn’t have to worry about that for this show, I had some more time to get some rest. I was cutting stickers for some of the guys so I still  ended up sleeping late but 4 hours was still more than my usual 30min to an hour. Another reason why I didn’t have to get up all that early was because my car was going to be in the Super Street booth. Their roll-in time wasn’t until 9am so I actually got ready and made it down there on time, which is a very rare thing for me and May….

The first person I ran into that day when I pulled-up to the roll-in section was Hiro Ueda from Japan. He is good friends with the Weksos guys and usually spends a lot of time with them whenever they go to Japan. I finally had a chance to meet him this year at the Norcal Wekfest show and it was cool to see him once again in the U.S. for the LA event… He loves taking pictures and started snapping away the moment I saw him… Some of you may have heard his name pop-up more than once here on The Chronicles. That’s due to him being very active in the Japanese car community as he often shows up to events in his RA1 Honda Odyssey on BBS RS wheels… Here’s a photo of it if you guys aren’t familiar… 

We had to get our cars searched before they would allow us to park at our designated area but it wasn’t too long of a process. After security looked through our stuff, the Wekfest staff guided us to our spots… I had to do some cleaning on my car and also stopped to chat with some people so I didn’t take too many photos during this time. My hands got dirty from wiping down my wheels so I didn’t pick-up the camera until I was finished…

Here is a shot of the Super Street booth where my Q45 was parked. I knew I should have asked for the giant magazine cover cut-outs at the end of the show. I saw the Osaka JDM guys had signed some of them at the end of the show and people were taking them so I was kinda bummed. It would have been cool to have that Honda Issue cut-out with Taku Kusugami’s Civic for my home office aka m bedroom….

Jonathan Wong, head editor of Super Street, rocking a white Osaka JDM tee talking to Supertwinz John…

Sunny from Franklin Autobody (with the blue hat on) brought his Honda Insight down from Norcal for the show and is pictured here talking to DPK David and Salem with the J’s Racing TSX…

The last time we saw Sam Ip’s Civic here on The Chronicles was last week when it was over at L-Con getting the custom canards and splitter installed. He didn’t have his wheels on at that time so it was interesting to see how his Volk RE30s looked after he had them refinished in this flat gunmetal color…

A shot of Sam’s engine bay, cleaner than it has ever been, rocking a CT Supercharger…. I don’t know if many of you know this but he actually daily drives this thing everyday to work…

This mint, and I mean MINT, EG belongs our buddy Mauricio aka Moreass. Other than suspension and wheels, this Civic is completely stock and in amazing condition. It’s never been modified and the stock motor only has 80K original miles. Yeah, you read that correctly, ORIGINAL miles. The only thing that Mauricio has done to it so far is install suspension and Mugen NR10R wheels, which were brand new still in their original boxes… Pretty rare to see a Civic like this in such great shape… I don’t know what future plans he has for it at the moment but with it being in such great shape, I would probably just leave it alone and drive it…

This right hand drive EF hatchback on 16-inch Mugen M7s is also Mauricio’s… The guys got money and good taste…

Abe Cruz’s EK9 R replica on mag blue Volk CE28s…

He recently tore his engine bay down and redid the whole thing. It’s looking really clean now with everything tucked away along with the Rywire engine harness….I guess he busted up his shock towers shortly after finishing his engine bay and had to go back and modify the shock towers so he could roll lower…

Downstar Frank’s engine bay on his new Integra project… Looks a little odd with the two shades of white but the cream colored bay is intentional…

As you read in Part 1, our friends David Do and Joy Abdalla flew out from Maryland to attend Wekfest LA. They apparently are very uncomfortable in front of the camera so here they are posing awkwardly with DPK David… David Do from Mayday Garage looks like he’s eating Sourpatch Kids….

The ATSxDPK line-up for Wekfest, along with a couple special guests…I was actually very surprised by how organized their line-up was. Usually somebody is doing their part to not line their cars up correctly but everything looks remarkably symmetrical. This has to be a first…

Wekfest LA also marked the re-emergence of Jay Powers’ EK Civic… this car has been down for quite some time now while he was busy working on his CR-X but this is now his current muse… Love how it looks on the Spoon SW388 wheels along with the J*Blood front bumper…

Jay’s K-swapped engine bay…

Chris Sakai’s Civic on Regamaster Evos and Chargespeed front lip…Kinda hard to spot in this pic but he also has a First Molding rear wing…

Chris’ bay is always clean… in terms of this chassis, that just isn’t a whole lot more you could do to it. He’s touched upon every aspect and it’s a pretty tough car to beat on a judging sheet…

Always been a big fan of his interior…

Remember Nick Caster’s one-day build from Part 1 of our coverage? Well this is the end result… Not too shabby for a car that was transported down to Socal with practically nothing on it… Somebody is bound to ask so to answer your question, that is a First Molding front lip…

Ryan Der’s EK of course… Unlike the last two years, Ryan won’t be competing in this year’s FF Battle competition…

Der’s engine bay…

DPK David’s EJ1 coupe…

I wanted to try something new this time around with his stickers so we used this matte translucent vinyl that is supposed to make it look like etched glass. It probably would have looked better if we had took some more time to apply it better but we were happy with it…

David’s bay… Still clean as ever even thoouh he daily drive his coupe now  work…

Jared’s S2000 was last seen at the Wekfest LA event last year when Ryan had just finished completing his tuck. We haven’t seen much of it since then but Jared and Sheepey were able to put the car back together in time for this year’s Wekfest LA show with some new goodies under the hood…

Everything is starting to come together now and with some changes here and there, his engine bay should finally be completed…

Haven’t seen DAve’s DA Integra in a long ass time so I was pleasantly surprised to see it at Wekfest… His DA is one of those timeless builds that people from any generation will appreciate… Love the color-matched spokes on his SSR EXC Neos…

Another timeless DA that I haven’t seen in ages is J. aka Jason Haradon’s Integra… I love how mint this thing is and how it still has the original white paint from the factory…

Rywire NSX on black NSX-spec Regamaster Evos…

Sunny from Franklin Autobody’s Honda Insight on Airrex suspension and Blitz 01 wheels…

ICB Matt, Rywire Ryan, Takeshi, and Nick talking in front of the cars. Takeshi was snapping a photo of me at the same moment…

Though it was gloomy in the morning, we started to feel the heat from the sun so Anh busted out the spray-on sunblock to prevent our burns… I want to say it helps but I just looked in the mirror and skin is literally peeling off of my face…Hopefully it worked for David because Anh was laying on the coats thick…

A couple of the ATS x DPK guys got together for a photo…(from left to right) ATS Mike Jones, Fred Chapman, Sunny Wong, Phil Sison, DPK J.P., Jay Powers, DPK David, ATS Ferd and Lowfat Pie…

After the group photo, we rallied up a bunch of us and set out to check out some of the other cars at the show before the gates officially opened…

3GS from BP VIP on custom rebarreled step-lip Leon Hardiritt Waffes…

Chrysler 300C on Auto Couture Agress wheels…

Lexus LS430 on Work Schwert SC3 wheels…

Lexus 2GS slammed on AME Shallen AXs…

Really liked this LS430 on Leon Hardiritt Ordens… Ordens are like the VIP equivalent of TE37s, they just look great on anything…

Z33 350Z from Royal Flush sitting on some VIP-themed Work Euroline wheels…

Another car on Eurolines, this one a 2GS also from Royal Flush….

Once we passed the flood of VIP-style builds, we stumbled upon the area where the Bandits crew was parked…

Bandits’ member Nisa Duarte’s legit JDM EK9 Civic Type R on Honda Edition Volk CE28s…

Can’t remember why I didn’t get a shot of the outside of Mike’s Ferio but here is the engine bay… I love the new stuff but I honestly liked this build more back when it was all black…

Jimmy Neitte’s EG hatch…

Jimmy’s K-ITB set-up…

Jeremy Duarte’s DB8 Type R Integra… a placeholder on last year’s Chronicles Top Ten Hondas of 2011 list… Good to finally see this car out in the day time…

A couple shots of the turbo B-motor… I guess he recently blew up his other motor and got this engine in just in time for Wekfest LA…

Rear quarter shot of the 4-door R…

Loved this KB-chassis Acura RL with Rotora big brakes and Rennen Forged RM7 wheels…

Honda S2000 with J’s Racing front half lip, rear wing, rear over fender, and Enkei NT03s…

Really clean early 80’s model Corolla on Watanabe wheels… Love the straight body and the clean bay… Great execution…Color kind of throws me off but the car as a whole is very well done…

David aka DeviousCTR’s coupe… Congrats by the way on being the newest member of the It’s JDM Yo!! Vanguard Collective crew…

Michael Mao’s NSX needs no introduction. This photo came out really crappy in hindsight but don’t worry, I snapped a couple more later on in the day… I must have been falling asleep or some shit when I was going through this photo…

Mike’s custom step-lip gold Mugen MF10 wheels…

ATS Anh’s ITR with the Go-Pro mounted. He did a time-lapse video after the Wekfest SF event that came out pretty cool so it’ll be interesting to see how the LA version comes out…

Passed by Big Mike’s Prelude and saw him cleaning up…

DPK David and ICB Matt talking rare parts…

Junior from Wekfest on the mic going over instructions for the car show competition at Wekfest…

Gonna close it out for today with this shot of Anh’s R…back tomorrow with Part 3, which covers the show after the gates opened to the public and stuff that happened during the afternoon…Also, video from Honda Tuning editor Rodrez! Stay tuned, so much more to come!!…