EVENT: S30.world Japan tour pt. 2 – Test drives & Honda Dealership visit

Day 3: Fairlady Z test drives & Honda Dealership visit
After the incredible turnout at our S30.world meet and rollout, with some of the best S30’s in Japan, day 3 was planned to be a bit more relaxed.

Our Japanese S30.world team member Endo-san brought out his private collection of stunning cars, but after a healthy Japanese breakfast in the Hotel, we went to pick up the last one from one of his garages – An absolute mint and unmolested Nissan 180SX S13 in all its original glory:

I was given the honor to drive the car through Nara back to the Hotel in Kyoto, which was a great joy in the morning:

Once the set of cars was complete, each of us was allowed to test drive and have a real-life comparison of all the cars during the day, in various groupings.
We had the following cars:
– Nissan 180SX / S13 / Red
– Nissan Fairlady ZG / HS30-H / Maroon
– Nissan Fairlady Z432 / PS30 / Silver
– Datsun 240Z / HLS30 / Blue
The blue one is a 4-speed manual transmission US-import car with blue interior and of course a bit of a rarity in Japan.

We spent the day driving around the Kyoto Area with various coffee / tee and lunch stops and just enjoyed ourselves. The first test-drive of the day for me was as a passenger in the blue 240Z:

At one point, we discovered a strange ticking noise in the left rear, so our mechanic pulled out the toolkit and quickly localized and fixed the issue:

We also got to drive his beautifully restored Z432. Sensing and hearing the perfectly tuned S20 engine is something truly special. The quick-revving engine with its beautiful sound gives the Z a completely different feeling. The whole car feels like a completely different one, compared to your usual L6 Z’s. As you can see, everybody was grinning widely when returning from their turn:

Check out the gallery below for some more photos of the drives:

Honda dealership visit
During our test-drive we also stopped at a local Honda dealership (Honda Cars Kizu) in the Kyoto area. The owner took his time to show us around his beautiful collection of TypeR’s and other rare machinery.

As a Honda-fanboy, I was quite surprised to not only see one, but two NSX-R’s on site!

The white NSX-R was a complete chassis restoration, and he showed me photos and told me about 90% of the car was built using brand-new Honda parts. So it’s basically a completely new Car. It was not entirely completed yet, but would be done in the coming weeks and then go up for sale. He told me the cars are theoretically all for sale, but him being a true Honda fanboy, he actually just builds them for himself and drives them every now and then.
Check out their Instagram to see more photos of this and their other crazy restorations. The whole lot was basically a Honda dream Garage. EK9’s, DC2 with USDM-front end modification, Mugen Beat PP1, S2000, New Civic TypeR’s, Integra DC5, etc. All in top condition, many freshly restored with loads of Mugen parts installed. We even spotted a City Turbo II, which they plan to restore, too:

We had a good laugh looking at the N-Joy Kei-van with all its funky features.

The owner and his team were really nice and showed us around. His office was full of rare NOS parts, and he even gave us a bunch of stickers. Check out the Gallery below for some more photos. Thanks again to the lovely owner for the time to show us around during busy business-hours. Even my fellow Datsun-friends really enjoyed the stop!

After the Honda break, we made a quick stop to refuel at the local Starbucks and then headed back to the hotel in the 180SX, with a cassette tape playing funky 80ies music on full volume.

After we had returned the car and discussed some other great news of the day, we went to the local Katsu place for a delicious dinner:

Check out Part 3 coming soon on this very website, where we take the Shinkansen Bullet train to Yokohama, visit the Nissan HQ gallery and go for some toy shopping…