Demon Dave

バニティミラー = vanity mirror

Not sure, but I guess that Chiba Naganuma's Super Autobacs would be the nearest to you: Dave

Rezz, I have to admit I felt the same as you - I didn't like them at first, especially when you've only seen them in pics. But after a while they kinda grow on you. I've spent a lot of time at my local Nissan dealer, and had the opportunity to check one out (no test drive mind). I think they're great, excellent build quality, lovely interior with some nice touches. If I had the money, I'd probably go for one myself. Get one with a nice kit, lowered and a nice set of rims and you'll be sorted!

They're an all round great package. Great performance, great looks, reliability, driveability. They're easily tuned, well respected and they don't cost a fortune to buy or maintain. and I also like the tail lights!

I think a lot depends on locality. A lot of people in the Tokyo area only use their cars on the weekend, so a lot of those cars can go 2 or 3 years without putting on any serious K's. Where I am, out in the mountains, there isn't much public transport, everything is spread out and owning/driving a car on a daily basis is just about unavoidable...

out of interst - what is considered "average mileage/km's per year" in Aus? I think the Japanese assume 10K a year, probably less... I average 6-8K KM/year.

Yep. Got 2 weeks off - one of the perks of working for oneself! Xmas though, as you rightly say is all about the money over here...

R34 is also 65 litres, but the most I've ever got it was around 48 litres or so, and that's letting it go down pretty low...

LOL As for the paint. I' wouldn't recommend using any kind of paint removal chemicals. You could try a little cutting compound, or perhaps some micro-clay. Maybe even try carefully scratching them off with a fingernail. Good luck Dave

I think I've been living in Japan too long - I thought my old GTS was well passed it's best when I sold it with 91,000KM on the clock...that's Japanese thinking for you. There was nothing wrong with the car either. Never missed a beat. Trouble is over here, once you start getting close to the 100K mark car lose all re-sale value...

You drove the car through a house? Bet the owner was pissed!

Nope!

Damn - that Yellow Stagea (above) looks good! If I ever have to sell my skyline and get a family-friendly car, I'd seriously consider a stagea as my first choice.

my R34. Got it almost a year ago with approx 19,000 on the clock. Now coming up to 23,000... No problems. My old GTS was upto 91,000 when I sold it. In 2 years of ownership the only thing that went wrong was a dodgy oil pressure sender unit.

sorry, but Rezz is right. It's really hard to find that kind of stuff (especially out in here the sticks where I am). There might be a couple of specilist shops still (most probably in the Tokyo area) producing kits, but unfortunately I don't personally know of any. I'll have a look round the net though, and see what I can dig up...

Me either. I've the literally thousands on stagea's I've probably seen in Japan I have seen only one in bayside blue. That's why I was thinking it was a ltd edition of something. Now it looks like it's a standard color.

Rezz, you wouldn't happen to know if Nissan did some kind of Limited edition stagea available in Bayside Blue? I've seen one in my local area a couple of times. It's a stagea, it looks completely standard and its definitely bayside blue. doesn't look like a respray either...(not that I can tell from just driving past)

Rezz, great info there.

Funky - great idea using the xbox as a headunit, it will certainly be a unique install and should sound great when it's all set up. Just curious though, does the xbox's CD/DVD drive have some kind of anti-skip mechanism? I was always led to believe a "normal" house stereo would not be useful in a car due to the vibrations causing it to skip tracks. I just wonder if you're gonna have similar problems using the std e-box drive...

Yeah, the interior seems a little smaller than my R33. Handling is hard to compare, my old R33 was stock, R34 has RS*R lowering springs, but (IMHO) the R34 seems to handle better. I remember reading the Nissan improved the chassis strength considerably on the R34, so I guess the extra weight is in the chassis itself... Having said that, I've heard some people saying the R34 uses a lot more lightweight parts - eg. Aluminium Bonnet. Is this true? To be honest I don't think the bonnet of my R34 weighs any less than that of my old R33!?!

Yeah, totally agree. The extra weight kinda takes the edge of any performance gains the Neo engines give. But that said, I've got the feeling that Nissan was primarily looking to make the car more eco friendly as opposed to giving the extra power... The strange thing is, I cant work out where the extra weight comes from. My R34 feels smaller/lighter than my old R33 ever did...

Parag0n - I'm sure the time will pass quickly. But hey, I've heard that cars waiting to be shipped are put in storage down in Yokohama. If that's true, then Yokohama isn't that far from Tokyo so if you're able to come to TAS, you might be able to organise a run down the coast to check out your car...

NEO = Nissan Ecology Orientated performance. I've been trying to figure out for some time exactly what Nissan changed on the NEO engines to get such a considerable power increase. The best info I've come across so far is this article by Nissan on the differences between a Neo and non neo RB engine. My Japanese aint that great, but it looks to me like there are numerous small changes in the head, fueling, pipework, exhaust, timing and ECU that combine together to produce the extra power and torque... Dave

Rezz - thanks for filling me in on that. Geez, you guys have it unlucky over there. That comliancing thing sounds like a right load of cr4p... But, there's a fair few awkward regulations to get around when sending a car back to England...like no xenons for start.. So you've got to wait 10 months or so to get the car. Still, the wait will be worth it I'm sure :)

here we go again... Another mines better than yours thread... R34 has the newer Neo Spec engines, more power and more torque. (280PS vs 250PS) ...but the R34 also weighs more... Not much in either way me thinks and in any case they're both damned fine cars. Be happy to own/drive either.