omg

I've ended up with a pair of nismo afms (part # 22680-RR580) which are pretty much useless to me so are sitting in their boxes doing nothing. I'm thinking $720 would be a bit more useful to me so if you could do something with the afms give me a yell. In nsw but happy to ship anywhere.

Within the power fc itself it won't do it however from what I've seen you might just see some cheap acessories for the power fc which will do this (among other things) hitting the market in the near future

Hmm, didn't realise it was this weekend, I think I might pop down for it

Hasegawa is the best of the secondhand places I've been to in tokyo, fair bit of stuff with decent prices sorta a bit similar to an australian wrecker, much cheaper than the "it's secondhand parts but we'll lay the shop out like it's new parts" upgarages. Excellant for turbos (especially big ones), good for brakes, fair bit of driveline stuff, lots of suspension bits (though the coilovers are almost all crap), fair few seats, exhausts etc, very very few electronic parts. soop, if you can't find aoto station you're going to be in bother Follow the Toei Asakusa/oshiage line out to where it hits the keisei, thats aoto. 22nd is a bit late for me unfortunately, I'm only really free for the next couple of weeks

I've actually got a map from mapfan with everything written in english which is a bit easier for non japanese speaking people to follow, means you can walk (about 15 mins, it's a short stroll) from the station. Kato will give you a lift back to Aoto after you've finished shopping as well. Hmm, actually, soop if you're going to be there in the next couple of weeks speak up and I can take you out there myself

True, border is a fair way out and we've only gone there when we've been going out to Jun. soop - they are discount performance parts shops which sell just about anything and generally have a better range than super autobacs (for the performance stuff). Personally I'd recommend nagano, I get almost all my parts through them, they give a good service and have very good prices. If you're there for only a few days try to get out there first as if there's anything you need ordered it will give you time, then you can either pick the parts up on the way to the airport or they'll send them to the hotel you're staying at. If you send me a pm with your email I can send you a map.

Of the cheaper places on your side of tokyo you've got Howars (about 20 mins on the seibu shinjuku line, bit under 1 km from the station) or Border (a bit further out, bit more of a hike from the station). Running around Tokyo (but staying in the 23 wards) you've got Hirano to the north (about 20 mins walk/short bus from nishiarai station on the hibiya line) and in the east carshop nagano which is about 15 mins walk from aoto station (take the yamanote round to nippori and take the keisei line from there). These places on average will be about 20% cheaper than super autobacs

We've used australian cb's in japan a bit - climbing fuji, at the jgtc etc - however I've no idea whether we were allowed to or not. There wasn't any traffic on the frequencies however that could simply mean there were a whole lot of confused ambo drivers. I guess the thing to keep in mind is that if you are going to get in trouble for using them it's not going to be hard for them to figure out who it is. re the phones, in japan it's w-cdma. The first phone I've seen available in aus (there are a few in japan) which can handle w-cdma and gsm is the nokia 6630 which is either just released or about to be released. Getting it to work in japan is the next challenge, vodaphone would probably be the best people to speak to.

Plucking a few places from my notes UpGarage Get the JR out to Chiba (airport line) or Chiba Minato .From here either catch the monorail or simply walk along underneath following where it goes. Once you get to the stop one from Chiba Minato station alight from the monorail and head north up R16. There is a Red stage Nissan dealer on the right and a couple of petrol stations on the left, Up garage is just after these on the left hand side Crystal The other option is to head into Chiba and take the monorail from there. Alight at the Sports Stadium, head down the escalators to your left (away from the stadium) then head north (turn right at the bottom of the escalators) up the R16. Crystal is 10-15mins walk on the left hand side of the road. Look for the McDonalds Golden Arches, and you should be able to see Crystal just after. See map for Super Autobacs Naganuma Top secret 45min walk up R16 from Crystal (there is a bus service running). Alternatively if you are coming from Katsutadai station on the Kansai line you can catch a bus from there. It's just on a side street but heading west from R16 however is pretty easy to spot (particularly if you're coming from the south). There will be a heap of modified cars, mostly GTR's, out front and if you go around the right hand side of the building past the multitude of shop cars there is a small office. See map for Super Autobacs Naganuma

The same sorts of places you'd go to in aus, the smaller (sometimes not "smaller" at all, just not a large chain) discount performance parts retailers. Oh, and I've never had huge problems with japanese addresses either. While it would be nice if they had a consistant way of numbering the buildings on a block but for the structure of the roads/alleys/narrow bits between buildings the japanese system works better than the western system. Oh, and some friggin consistancy in the maps wouldn't hurt, how hard is it to put north at the top!

mr craft is Tokyo-to Shibuya-ku Ebisu-nishi 1-7-4 Very easy to get to, the station shown in the map is the JR Ebisu station on the Yamanote line (not the subway station) and following that great japanese tradition they have randomly selected west to be at the top. Rotate the map 90 degrees to the left and it will make sense.

Lots of places really, Hiroshima, Himeji, Nara down around the kansai, nikko just north of tokyo, hakone/fuji just south etc It all depends on what sort of stuff you want to see. What I would say is don't try to see too many places/areas, pick a few that you're really interested in and see them well (if you get what I mean)

Definately get the JR pass, I wouldn't bother with the green pass though. The standard seats are too comfortable and the trips too short to justify the extra expense

Tell him to find it himself on goo and give you the details of where it's and then you'll see if you can get there. You've got a limited amount of time there and the trip is costing you a decent wedge of cash. If your mate isn't willing to spend a bit of time trying to find it himself (via websites like goo, forums etc) then you certainly shouldn't be expected to give up part of your trip on a wild goose chase.

Poida - they say they can/will but I'm yet to see them ever check a passport. So basically, yeah, I'd be sweet talking visitors to get them to leave the pass. I'd say that sweet talking would include their ticket on the NEX as well Ait - a trip down to Kyoto/osaka is definately not a waste of 2 days! It only takes about 2 3/4 hours to get to Kyoto (osaka is another 15 mins) so if you leave early in the morning and come back later at night you lose sod all time travelling. For classic touristy sort of stuff Kyoto is fantastic, quite a bit more interesting for this sort of stuff than Tokyo IMO (though Tokyo has it's own appeal) As for the hotel, I think ibuya is a better area to stay but it does depend on how close you actually are, do you have an address for the hotel? Ueno IMO is a bit of a hole (it's sorta like a rundown "downtown" area say like around central in sydney) and I don't think akihabara lives up to the hype. In terms of having fun places close to the hotel where you can go at night shibuya and shinjuku are my pick

If you've only got 4 days and travelling close to tokyo the cheaper 5 day jr east pass is also well worth considering. On my last trip we had a return trip up to utsunomiya (on the way to motegi but also applies for places like nikko) and another down to odawara (Hakone/mt fuji, not valid for shinkansen, only the expresses etc) and between those and the return trip to the airport it was definately cheaper getting the pass, especially if youre under 25 y/o. As mentioned if you're getting down to kyoto/osaka get the 7 day pass, you'll get your money back just on that trip and the airport transfers.

Google can be your friend for accom but I often use the welcome inn booking service (itcj I think, google welcome inn and you'll find it), sometimes tocoo (not great for hotels really) or a simple "accomodation *****" search. In Tokyo we generally stay in the same hotels anyway, new city in shinjuku if we want to stay that side of town, kayabacho pearl for the east side (breakfast included) and also sumisho on the east, these are generally around the 12000-14000 yen a night twin share though. If you have a JR pass remember that you can stay a bit out of town on one of the shinkansen lines to save on hotel costs. Last time I was there some mates stayed in a ryokan just north of ueno which they thought was excellant, I've just shot him a mail to ask for details. Oh, the other thing I'll add is if people want to go out at night they should remember that while Tokyo stays up the subway does not. When selecting a hotel I'd recommend that location should be your most important priority. The other thing is that I've found that while the cheap hotels are small and basic I'm yet to stay in one which I'd call a "dive" in the way a cheap hotel in say New York or London can be.` If you're choosing between a "nice" hotel in a crap area and a not as nice hotel in a good area I'd go for the latter. Oh, and the other thing (yeah, I know, there's been a few) is that most buildings in japan look pretty crappy from the outside, that is not necesarrily a reflection of what they're like inside. The average business hotel will be a ferro concrete and look like it's falling down but the rooms will likely be perfect.

Best thing to do IMO is get your JR pass and use that cover the distances then hire a car through tocoo to go exploring. If you're in a city the chances are you'll be better off on public transport, for somewhere like fuji you're better off in a car

Certainly rent is expensive (though to be fair you really should seperate out the key money, deposit etc from the rent) however for the traveller thats irrelevant. What matters is transport, food, hotels etc and in that regard Tokyo is not bad at all and cheaper than most of the other cities its size.

That is the three day rate actually, tocoo's weekend mazda deals are killer Tokyo isn't that expensive either, it's just that I think you're trying to go unreasonably cheap. If this is the pricerange you're looking at you really need to be looking at backpacker hostels, not hotels

I took my daughter there and that is the _only_ reason I went. I'm not trying to sound like an arsehole but if you're in japan only for a few days and one of those days is spent at disneyland you're nuts. There's so much else you can see and do which is uniquely japanese without wasting your time at a bit of transplanted american culture. As for the details, it's not that far from the city, about 25 minutes on the train (iirc) from tokyo station (keiyo line) in maihama, in the same direction as tas but not as far. I'm sure you can buy tickets ahead of time but it's just as easy at the gate. Then again, maybe see if there's a deal or something which gives you transport and a ticket, dunno if there is but there might be.

This will be well worth the visit for you. If you're a granturismo fan once you've visited it go outside, face southwest and have a careful look - you're just before the braking area for turn one of R242 If you look in the game the building is perfectly rendered with lots of hondas parked on the forecourt. Motegi is a little way, easiest way to get there is to catch the train up to utsunomiya and get the bus from there. Even with the shinkansen you're looking at around 3 hours each way though. Hire a car, drive up, and spend the night at nikko

A few comments Car rentals are very cheap in japan as long as you go through the right sources. In partcular look for the mazda weekend deals on tocoo, as an example on my next trip we're getting an mx5 for 3 days for ~150 aus total. On our last trip we hired a van (go the El Grande!) and car hire/fuel/insurance etc was less than $50 each for the two days. For most of the cars you can specify sat nav, yes, it's in japanese but it's not hard to figure out so if you have some maps in english (easy top get before you go) and half a clue you can match the sat nav telling you where you are to where you want to go and get there easily. We've never had a problem getting around. That said, I prepare before my trips, a bit of effort before you head to japan makes the trip a million times easier For the places you mentioned - Mugen - haven't been there, can't comment - Toda - worth a visit and only about 800kms from tokyo - Jun - well worth a vist, pretty easy on public transport and a lot to see - HKS - the saitama workshop is pretty close - Autobacs - waste of time IMO (though in tokyo the shinonome store has a great bookshop upstairs) - Cusco - about an hour on a bullet north of tokyo, hire a car and go from there to haruna and akagi which are very close - ZERO1000 - dunno them - Apexi - not really a place you can "visit" There are a stack of places in around tokyo so it's a case of picking a group which are in the same sorta area (you've only got a day). To give you an example of the workshops which are in the area Nismo omori top secret (close to an autobacs and crystal) central 20 impul garage saurus e-sr tomei re amemiya spoon yashio factory pan speed visit top secret the day you go out to auto salon, do some shopping in pallette town in daiba and you can visit the historic garage/museum while the gf shops, likewise with nissan gallery in ginza, if you tell me which workshops you'd _really_ like to see I could probably send you a map with directions

The "museum circuit" around Mt Fuji is worth a go - Kawaguchiko motor museum (general japanese cars going waaaaaaay back up to the present), Takamura Museum (a lot of american, boo, upstairs some rollers, ferraris etc), Gallery Arbath (Italian goodies, ferraris, alfas, lancias), Racing Palace (All racing cars including prince and nissan skylines through the years, f1 cars, jgtc cars, rally cars, all sorts of stuff really, well worth a vist), Gotemba sports car garden (predominantly ferraris). You do need to hire a car (quite cheap through tocco) and it's a nice spot to visit with great roads and some fun and games at night. In tokyo the toyota historic garage/museum is good and central to other stuff you'll likely be visiting in daiba. Honda have a good museum up at twin ring but that can be a bit of a pita to visit, you can "hire" a teg type r for a few laps though. Don't forget the nissan galleries in ginza as well, often they have some interesting exhibitions (sometimes they're pretty dull as well )

Yep, metal forks, glass bottles and plastic knives With the cash the biggest concern is explaining to Customs/Immigration in Japan just why we have 1.5mill yen for a two day holiday in Tokyo. The first time I left one mate unsupervised going through customs he ended up in the little sideroom trying to explain just why he was flying from australia to spend 24 hours in Tokyo on a holiday and the only reason he had for his trip was to visit Shinjuku It didn't quite click that the japanese don't care what you're buying/bringing home, they care about what's coming in. He also managed to put valveguides in his carry-on luggage for the trip home, that created some interesting moments when I tried to use sign language demonstrating what they do to the lovely japanese girl at the x ray machine (hint, demonstrate the action of a valve and valve guide with your hands, you'll understand )