SHOP VISIT – The Autosport Company

2012 is kicking off and for me it is kicking off in a great way. This year I will finally get to build my own race car. After years of shooting the coolest cars behind the armco, I now have the opportunity to go racing myself. They say building the car already is half the fun and, as I was looking for parts to prepare my Miata, it showed. The fun has only just began!!!
While shooting for another upcoming report for 7TUNE and in need for some race parts, I went to visit The Autosport Company Read more

EVENT – FORZA MORTORSPORT 4 NIGHT AT ZEN GARAGE

With the release of the newly anticipated Forza Motorsport 4 on the Xbox 360 console Zen Garage hosted a Forza night at their new warehouse space in Sydney, Australia. It was an industry night and we at 7Tune were there to bring you coverage of the whole event.
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FEATURE – MITSUOKA OROCHI, A LESSON IN MODERN COACHBUILDING

  Yamata no Orochi. Orochi. The 8-Forked Serpent. The 8-tailed monstrosity. Fire bellied. Eyes red. It’s size dwarfing 8 valleys and hills. This mythical creature forms the basis of a study in modern coach building. It’s sole purpose to turn heads with it’s organic form and exemplify hand-made craftsmanship in a modern chassis.

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VIDEO – FASTCAR FESTIVAL 2011

Dutch based GT Events hosted the very first edition of the Fastcar Festival last weekend at the Zandvoort Racetrack. Featuring everything from time attack races to drifting and from show & go to trackday experiences for amateur drivers, the venue had a lot to offer. Read more

WTAC NEWS SCOOP – CYBER EVO LAUNCHES PROTEST

In the wake of Sierra Sierra’s stunning 1:29.024, the Cyber Evo team has launched a protest, claiming that the American team is running NOS; a claim the Sierra Sierra team deny.

Sierra Sierra has invited the Cyber Evo team to come and inspect the car but as of this moment no one has visited.

This news has come as a surprise to the paddock as the Sierra Evo has blasted out of the box to take the top time by a long way, leaving the Cyber Evo team to make up almost a second over the next 3 sessions.

Just to add a little more drama to the situation, the Sierra car is currently out of the running for sessions 2 and 3 with a blown head gasket but they expect to run for the final session which is sure to be a blockbuster ending to a fantastic event. Crucially, the weather has cleared here and the rain clouds that threatened the event have been blown upwind meaning there is plenty of action still to come.

7Tune is live on hand with the latest news and we’ll be back soon with more from a bright and sunny Eastern Creek raceway with more news, entertainment and information.

7TUNE – The Ultimate JDM Experience Since 2005

Words – Adam Zillin

Photos – Adam Zillin and Brendan Mok

WTAC 2011 – SATURDAY TIMES: PRO CLASS SESSION 1

There’s been a big upset in the first session for the Pro class with David Empringham taking the Sierra Sierra Lan-Evo to top spot with a commanding 1:29.024; some 7 tenths faster than the best Tarzan Yamada could muster with a 1:29.791. Empringham’s stunning time was made when everybody believed that the track would be at its best and with the threat of rain closing in for the afternoon, there is every chance that we already have our final result. Read more

WTAC 2011 – THE FRIDAY RESULTS

The 2011 WTAC has already heated up and the pace was frantic from the very minute the lights went out in all three classes. There were plenty of surprises today and none more dramatic than the way Tarzan Yamada clinched top spot in the dying moments of the final session with a 1:30.369 smack-down to his nearest rivals; the Revolution FD RX-7 and the Sierra Sierra Evo Lancer… Read more

WTAC 2011 – PREVIEW

Welcome to Eastern Creek Raceway, the home of World Time Attack 2011 for the next three days. Over the next three days we will be bringing you all the action straight from the track, pit and all the action behind the scenes. Be sure to check in regularly to keep up to date with what’s happening at Eastern Creek and watch the event unfold from the comfort of your own home. Read more

THE FRENCH & THE FURIOUS, LE MANS 2011, PT 1

As soon as I approached the city of Le Mans I flipped the car’s audiosystem to Radio Le Mans. It was early wednesday morning but the guys over at the station were in full swing. Immediately the whole endurance vibe was back with all the great stories flying through the air. The seven hour journey was instantly forgotten and the notorious Le Mans bug started to master my brain. The free practice sessions were scheduled later that day and it was the perfect time to see all the cars run for the first time. Read more

FEATURE – RACING ROADSTERS CONQUER EUROPE

7TUNE’s Dutch based European correspondent, Mathieu van den Oever presents this awesome look into a race series that’s really taken off with fans, sponsors and drivers alike; The Total Mazda MaX5 Cup… Read more

NEWS – MAZDA 787B RETURNING TO LE MANS!

The remarkable wankel powered Mazda 787B will be returning to Le Mans. It remains the first and only Japanese car manufacturer to win at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. And the only non-reciprocating engine to win. While not participating in the race itself, this restoration will be demonstrated on the Circuit de la Sarthe in Le Mans, France on Saturday, June 11, 2011, before the 24-hour race begins.

The Mazda 787B has been specially restored and tested in preparation for the demonstration at Le Mans

The Mazda 787B is the first and only Japanese car, and rotary-engine car, to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Jointly developed by Mazda and Mazdaspeed, the organization that managed Mazda’s racing program, the 787B has a chassis designed to meet Group C racing car technical regulations and is powered by a four-rotor rotary engine that produces 700 horsepower. Due to a change in the race regulations, 1991 was to become the last year that a rotary-engine car could participate in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Featuring a complex suspension arrangement, including double wishbone pullrod with Bilstein dampers at the front and double wishbone top rocker operated with Bilstein dampers at the rear. The car was even graced with a Kevlar and carbon composite monocoque chassis.

Since 1991, the winning Mazda 787B has mostly been on display at the Mazda Museum in Hiroshima, Japan. In preparation for the demonstration at Le Mans, Mazda has carefully restored the winning 787B racecar back to driving condition for the first time since its post-race overhaul in 1991. The work was carried out by current Mazda employees who participated in the company’s original Le Mans Challenge Project, along with engineers from Mazda’s subsidiary engineering company Mazda E&T. The restored 787B has been tested by one of Mazda’s in-house top gun drivers, and its performance has been confirmed by former Mazda factory drivers Yoshimi Katayama, Takashi Yorino and Yojiro Terada at Mazda’s Mine Proving Ground in western Japan.

ODD SPOT – THINGS THAT MAKE YOU GO GOO

I like to take a look around Japanese sites like Goo-net.com every now and then because they always turn up something really interesting in one form or another. You should too. Places like this are the store that contain all the car candy you could consume and no self respecting car nut could afford to ignore them! I have been thinking about Mazda RX-3′s recently and after discovering that an America only SP version of the RX-3 existed, I was determined to see what other rare rotaries may have been available in Japan at the time… Read more

Interview with Justin Fox, Founder of JDMST

Justin Fox, a name relatively well known amongst the Sydney import tuner/JDM scene, yet strangely mysterious hidden behind the walls of JDMST. He is an enigmatic and yet charming individual and is the founder of JDMstyletuning.com, a forum for JDM enthusiasts that now has a large following worldwide. The forum established in 2005, prides itself on quality tuning and quality JDM parts. Anyone can join and contribute. The regular End of Month Meets (EOMM) are a great way to socialise with other members of the forum and check out their rides. This busy man also founded Sex in Art, VWGolf.net.au (together with Christina Lock) and Bikes Move Us. We managed to catch up with him recently and asked him a few questions.

Benson Lau: What do you work as now?

Justin Fox: I’m still doing graphic and web design for select clients but I spend most of my time running my own sites: Australian INfront, JDMST, VWGolf.net.au, Bikes Move Us, Sex in Art, my blog and now Modern Pet Shop. (Edit: Since this interview was conducted a new project, www.ordinaryextraordinary.com.au)

BL: When did you first get into cars and why did you get into cars?

JF: My Dad was super into cars, so too my cousin from Indonesia who came out to Australia to study in the mid 80′s. My Dad changed cars a lot in his time and every year, without fail, he’d take me to the Motor Show. My cousin, who lived with me at the time, was car obsessed in high school. He often drew cars with huge wheels, Indo style!

BL: What do you remember about your Dad’s passion of cars? What from that got you more keenly interested into cars?

JF: Lots of little things. He had a lot of car magazines which I always looked through. He was always changing cars every couple of years. I got to start them up before school as a little kid. He drove fast and cornered hard. I remembered often sitting in the car, eyes shut with a pen to a pad of paper, at the end of a drive I’d have a pretty dynamic artwork from all the times the pen left the pad when Dad was cornering hard!

He always liked to have the very latest models. He imported his own Honda Accord (flip light version) and got it landed months before Honda Australia started selling them. He also owned a white 4WS Honda Prelude way before anyone else owned one (before it became Wheels Car of the Year). I remember that he had the wheels powder coated white on that car. One afternoon I put a ding in his door when my skateboard went flying into it, he was pretty angry, that made me realise how much he loved his cars (that cars weren’t just cars to him!). Lots of little things.

BL: What was your first car?

JF: I’d ridden motorbikes for a couple of years and my parents offered to buy the car for me so long as I sold my bike. To be honest I’d had enough of bikes at the time. I never quite got confident on them and came close to falling off more than a few times. I remember not knowing what to look for in a car, but I wanted anything but a Honda as my Dad used to always complain about how he wanted more power from his Honda’s. I ended up buying a 2nd hand automatic Toyota Celica (T180).

BL: Why and what did you first modify? What got you started in the tuning scene?

JF: I often visited Hong Kong in those years as my family had business over there. I used to linger in the autmotive section of the Sogo department store. On one trip I ended up buying a gunmetal grey toyota badge for my bonnet, a clamp-on exhaust tip and also some Tom’s Racing Stickers, which I stuck on the doors. Later on I got a loud stero system, painted the rear tail lights and indicators black and bought a 2nd hand set of VW Golf VR6 BBS wheels, which happened to bolt straight on. The guys at Pedders (a chain of car suspension workshops in Australia)  cut my springs to lower the car and I got the guys at Midas mufflers (a chain of  general car servicing workshops in Australia) to make me a custom exhaust!

BL: Why did your parents want you to sell the bike?

JF: Yeah I regret wanting a bike so bad. I fought with my Dad a lot about the bike and put him and my Mum through a lot of worry. He refused to let me ride one but he taught me from an early age that if it’s food I want he’ll treat me to anything but if I wanted toys I had to go out and make my own money, so I did (Woolworths night packing FTW!). I got my riding license, sold my tricked out mountain bike for $3000 and bought myself my 1st bike despite my parents not wanting me to.

BL: What did you enjoy about the Celica?

JF: It was my first car so I very much enjoyed the freedom of driving more than the car itself. I didn’t have to wear a helmet, or protective clothing, or worry about bad weather. I could blast my heavy metal through the stereo and I could take friends places. I drove it every day, it was more about function than passion (but I secretly did really wish I had a GT4, or at least a hood scoop to make my car look like one!).

BL: What happened to the Celica?

JF: I ran it into the ground. Due to a slow leak from a small hole in the radiator I blew the head and after that it went through the Sydney hail storm which absolutely demolished it. That year of the hail storm I had stopped paying full comprehensive insurance on it too, really bad luck. A few months later I couldn’t stand the mouldy smell inside the car (every time it rained there were puddles of water under the carpet), the electrics were dying too so I traded it in for a new Alfa 147 for $4000 (which I thought was a deal considering the car was so dead).

BL: And how did you move from purely modifying to tuning your car?

JF: When I owned the Alfa, Alfa Romeo Australia invited me out to a track day at Eastern Creek. One of the instructors said I had some potential and I did well out there, that one comment and time behind the wheel on a race track got me pretty excited. A few weeks later I was in the city when a guy in a suit approached me (whilst I was in the car). He liked what I had done to the Alfa and invited me out to a Burrows Drive Day at Eastern Creek. I mustered the courage to attended and I was hooked. I did a lot of track days in the Alfa, when the Alfa wasn’t enough (to overtake the fast guys in their Ferrari’s and Porsche’s) I sold the Alfa and bought the GT-R.

BL: What made you start JDMstyletuning.com?

JF: In 1999 I founded a successfull online design community (Australian INfront) and I was itching to use the skills I had developed in creating that community on my new passion (cars).
I realised from joining various forums that the Nissan guys hated the Honda guys. Subaru, Mitsubishi, Toyota…I saw a lot of tension out there. Being an outsider at the time I thought it was ridiculous as all these guys hated each other but they were all into the same thing. Japanese cars and modifying them. My mission was to unite them all. To get all these guys to see the bigger picture which suggests that we are a group of like minded individuals who share a passion for Japanese cars be it Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Subaru, Suzuki or Toyota.
Friends at the time were important too.

I was hanging out with Zi (JDMyard, a tuner workshop in Sydney) a lot and I’m sure we talked about JDMST. Amir Parsinejad (RaceBorn) was around, so too Howard Lim, Christina Lock, Andrew Price, Garth Ivers, Alan Li, Lilian Truong and Nico Tjen. I roped all these guys in. It was February 2005, Speed magazine was still around and was an inspiration to me at the time. I approached photographers Easton Chang and Dean Summers to help me with contributing photos for the JDMST front page (I actually used one of Mark Pakula’s photos in the mock-up, long story short but he found it and some people at Auto Salon magazine, a now defunct Australian tuning and modifying magazine, were quite mad with me!). We had our first meet at Krispy Kreme’s Mascot, it was a killer turnout, there was a buzz in the air and for me, that night really solidified JDMST and it’s potential.

BL: Do you feel like the mission has been accomplished with the uniting of the JDM scene? Or is it still some ways off?

JF: I think so. JDMST goes through ups and downs but it’s largely organic and so far in regards to statistics (currently over 8000 unique visitors daily), it’s gone from strength to strength.

BL: What do you think is the JDM tuner’s mindset?

JF: It depends on the tuner, and the project. There’s so many scenes within the scene and so many ways to tune the same car. Personally I’ve always done the same thing with every single car I’ve owned. Instead of focusing on power I like to lighten the car to make it feel better in corners. I spend the most time sorting out the handling and I try my best to use Japanese parts because I love them. When I bought the Golf I had intentions to bag it. I thought of rocking up to meets and letting the car drop until the skirts touch the ground, sure it would look crazy but in the end it just isn’t me. I’m still upset I didn’t do it as now I find myself doing the same thing I do to all my cars on the Golf. Ripping weight out, semi-slicks and track work. It’s been fun, but it’s all getting a little safe and maybe a little boring.

BL: What do you think is the direction of the tuning scene in Australia?

JF: I think JDM Style and Tuning in Australia peaked a few years ago and right now it’s transforming almost into 2 different levels/classes. At some stage a lot of people lost the ability to spend more than they earned on quality JDM parts (in my opinion, trial and error and going for broke was what it was all about!). A lot of opportunistic brands came from nowhere, selling much more affordable performance and styling gear. People started buying this gear and giving it rave reviews (viral) which in turn inspired more people into seeing value in buying cheaper gear (in some cases replica/counterfeit products).

I can’t speak for the entire tuning scene, but in regards to JDMST; I don’t believe that we have our own unique style (nor are we desperately trying to find one). There’s always going to be JDMST members who hate on people for being too literally inspired by overseas movements but hey, trends are addictive (and for those who get caught up in it, fun). Personally I’ve always looked to Japan and the States and admired what they’re doing over there with both Japanese cars and Euro cars, both from a stylisting point as well as performance. For the moment I’m happy for our scene to continue to be inspired by what we’re seeing overseas.

BL: Do you see parallels between how the Japanese automobile manufacturers broke into the US car market and how the Taiwanese and Chinese brands are breaking into the aftermarket tuning scene? Or is it a completely different scenario?

JF: I’ve never thought of it that way but I think it’s pretty evident that the financial crisis has affected our hobby. People are placing much more value in cheaper goods despite knowing they’re not as good as more expensive quality goods. Where people perceive value, that’s what’s changing everything.

BL: What have you owned?

JF: Toyota T180 Celica, Alfa Romeo 147, Nissan Skyline R32 GT-R, Toyota AE86 Levin GTV, Honda EG Civic VTi, Honda EG Civic Si, Honda Integra DC5R, Honda Integra DC25R, Kia Spectra (! BL: verified), BMW 318i, Toyota MR2 Spyder, Mitsubish Evo 6.5 TME, Mazda MX5 NA Clubman, Honda S2000, Honda Jazz manual, Honda Jazz auto, Honda Jazz K20A, Honda ED Civic, Nissan Skyline V35 350GT, VW Golf MKV GTI.

BL: Out of all the cars you have owned, which let you down the most, taking into account reliability, driving feel and expectations?

JF: Somewhere in the middle I felt the need to stop the addiction. I was spending more money than I was earning and I just had to get out of the hobby. I bought a Kia Mentor for a daily. It was cheap, looked cheap and felt cheap (the car was designed so bad I couldn’t see out of the boot!). I now knew why people with Hyundai Excels drove so aggressively. When you own a car as shit as this you can’t help but drive the wheels off it. A week in the car was ticking loudly, it sounded like it was going to blow up any minute, also, I somehow found my way to a Kia forum, saw that there was a guy modifying his Kia and I even asked him about a few mods he did. I had an epiphany, thinking about modifying a ticking time bomb was not on and I sold the car the week after.

BL: What car do you miss the most?

JF: Hard one to answer. I miss the MX-5 a lot. I learned more about driving in that car than any other. I miss the EVO TME a lot too, dead stock, such an amazing car that I sold way too early. I miss the S2000 a lot, it’s perhaps the only car I’ve ever bothered to put a kit on. I miss the AE86 as it was a special edition and I regret not having the balls to put the $5k into it to make it amazing. The ED Civic was a lot of fun too and it’s another one of the cars I can still clearly see in my mind’s eye, with the new owner driving off up the my hill.

BL: What cars are you looking forward to driving/owning in the future?

JF: From people who have driven it I’ve heard the new GT-R is amazing. I’d love to own one but even selling all 3 cars (GT-R, GTI and Christina’s R32) won’t buy me one. I’m itching to try one though, it’ll be the fastest car I’ve ever driven, no doubt.

BL: Any advice for people just getting started into tuning?

JF: Finding a good mechanic is a great start. Once you find one you like and trust you’ll also pick up a crew of like minded tuners as well as knowledge. I met heaps of friends through hanging out at IS Motor Racing (a tuning workshop in Sydney) and Indy has always looked after me.

News – Mazda Releases Next Generation SKYACTIV Technology

In a press release today Mazda have announced a major overhaul of their power-train and chassis systems under their new SKYACTIV Technology banner… Read more

Driven: 2010 Mazda Roadster

What a fantastic little car this Mazda is. Dead and gone is the stigma of the Roadster being a hairdresser’s car. That place is now firmly reserved for the Porsche Boxster. People who cut hair make much more money these days…
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