Table of contents for No 296 June - July 2022 in NZ Performance Car

I had never felt this trapped in my life. Stuck here, riddled with Covid-19, with the 2022 Yokohama World Time Attack Challenge just a couple of weeks away. With no way of attending, it was yet another year of missing out on one of the greatest motorsport spectacles of the modern JDM racing era. Road machines with technology commonly found on Formula 1 cars — it’s a sight to behold; with lap times that much quicker than V8 Supercars, you’d use them for pace cars. GPS-based nitrous oxide maps, aero coming one foot or more out each side of the vehicles, power in excess of 1000 horsepower, and — the most exciting part — treaded, road-legal tyres. Contributor Warren Sare commentates on this event each year, representing New Zealand and…

If you’ve been wondering what your Sunday arvos have been missing recently, the answer is your fix of Repco Muscle Garage. But never fear, on 29 May the show is making a return to its home on Three’s CRC Motorsport for its 10th season. As always, the show will also stream via YouTube, and will showcase the best cars, sheds, and events our great country has to offer, alongside some of the characters that are driving forces behind the scenes. Season 10 will air for 10 episodes, and is made possible with the support of Repco New Zealand, Meguiar’s, and Mount Shop Ltd. The season kicks off with a Repco Kumeu Classic Car and Hot Rod Festival special and a look at New Zealand’s newest nitro-burning nostalgia machine, NitroHoon, so…

We’re not sure what is going on at Toyota, but whatever special sauce they’re squirting on their sausages rolls come smoko time, we want in on the action. The past few years have seen the Gazoo Racing and Toyota team come up with some bangers, including, the redefined Supra, the GR Yaris and, most recently, the GR86. You have probably seen the latest news that Toyota will be adding yet another GR model to their range of performance fun-havers, and this time, it’s a continuation of the Corolla platform. The team has rammed the same running gear used in the GR Yaris under the bonnet of the Corolla and added a serious wide body kit, with flares, canards and bonnet vents, creating what looks to be the most aggressive Corolla…

About two months — that’s how long it took for my Nissan Silvia to travel across the Pacific Ocean. It was a bizarre process, to say the least. I delivered the S14 to the port in Osaka, Japan, and said goodbye. On a different bit of dirt, thousands of kilometres away, I welcomed it back into my life. The plan was simple: put it back to OEM spec and send it through compliance without LVV certification, then enjoy the roads New Zealand has to offer for a bit, before starting the modification journey. Oh boy, was I wrong in thinking my plan was simple! The arrival of my car in Auckland was a bag of mixed emotions. I had the S14 back in my possession, which was great, but it…

CLOSED-DECK, JE ULTRA SERIES PISTONS, CUSTOM I-BEAM BILLET RODS, AND A CUSTOM CRANKSHAFT, WITH 14MM HEAD STUDS HOLDING THE HEADS ON. THE MATTCHANICS-BUILT EJ25 IS A SOLID PIECE OF KIT AND NOW DISPLACES 2350CC! At first glance — much like when we first saw the photos of Mitchell Lowe’s 1995 Subaru WRX STi — you’d be thinking that some bloke had gone and done himself a bit of a period-correct restomod, with no inkling as to the pure savagery lurking beneath the lightweight, alloy bonnet. Sure, we’re used to the sleeper concept here in New Zealand, but not often are ’90s WRXs modified in the engine compartment to an extent at which only a Group B rally driver from the ’80s would be mad enough to jump behind the wheel.…

Autobacs Orange is the new John Player Black. Ask any Gen Y car fan and you can almost guarantee Autobacs Orange, Takata Green, and Calsonic Blue will be recognised faster than your dad can blurt out “Marlboro Red”. These companies and colour schemes are forever fondly etched into our memory bank not because of a love for Calsonic radiators or Raybrig lighting accessories, but because they are the poster heroes of our childhood and are known by a simple four-letter acronym: JGTC. The Japanese Grand Touring Championship that we lovingly know as ‘JGTC’ was born out of the Japan Sports Prototype Championship (JSPC), which was crammed full of Group C goodness. Due to soaring costs behind running the Group C machines, the JSPC was scrapped at the end of 1992.…

Black lines matter. It’s no secret. You don’t have to hide your love for the destruction of rubber via the sustained loss of traction method — arguably the most efficient and environmentally friendly way to dispose of old rubber. It’s a tradition as old as time itself, where men and women alike can express their feelings like adults by destroying property in spectacular fashion. What you do need to hide, however, is the godawful mess that ceremonial rubber sacrifice leaves on your car in the aftermath of such delightful acts. For some people, such as D1NZ driver Kurt Blackie, tyre rubber everywhere is an occupational hazard — and I can tell you for certain, even the pros hate the clean-up. So, we looked for, and discovered, the solution to cleaning…

When the ED asked me to jam together a few opening words for this issue, the first thought that came to mind was paying tribute to the unsung heroes who are the backbone of our industry, events and scene. For what feels like the longest time we’ve been disconnected, and while some of us aren’t always people persons (including yours truly), in some way, shape or form we generally like human connection. Who are these heroes? They are the event attendees; the fans, photographers and volunteers. The families who come out to sit in the stands, and the boys and girls who spend every last dollar building their version of a dream ride. Without these people it would just be an empty paddock or race track, some dead air space…

Queen’s Birthday weekend is always an event weekend in the import scene and this year is no different; Hampton Downs is set to come alive on both Saturday and Sunday, with events from the Downtime Entertainment stable. On Saturday, fans of the triple diamond will descend on the venue for Mitsubishi Owners Day, which will feature the always popular Andrew Simms Mitsubishi parade lap. The world record still stands at 280 Evolution models on track at one time. The New Zealand number has increased year on year and, if all those cars finally make it out of garages and up the island, a strong attempt on the record will be made. Either way, there’s always an abundance of smiles with the plentiful cruising laps and popular ‘heli’ contest featuring high-speed…

It’s times like these when you cannot be prouder to be a Kiwi: Darren Kelly, a 32-year-old from west Auckland, has cracked the world stage. And when we say cracked, we mean he’s smashed it. Packing a V12 with two Rotrex superchargers, The Heart of Racing and Darren will be contesting the upcoming rounds of Formula Drift in the US in a 2020 Aston Martin GT4, in classic Heart of Racing fashion. Blowing minds across the world, Darren debuted in his first round at Long Beach after pulling allnighters for two weeks with The Heart of Racing team. The photos posted on numerous high-profile influencer, photographer, and motorsport driver accounts caused a major stir: Who is this mad lad from New Zealand, and what is this screaming Aston he’s driving?…

"Yeah, bro, she’s pretty much finished now — well, apart from the dogbox that my lovely missus is going to say yes to after she reads this,” Pete Hoppings laughs. We guess, dear readers, that we’d better hope Mrs Hopping is as kind as Pete says — either that, or the only dogbox he will be getting is one to reside in. Let’s go back to the start of Pete’s journey with modified cars, so that this particular story starts to make a little more sense. It turns out that Pete has always been a fan of the E39A shape of the VR-4, despite the fact that they’re as aerodynamic as a brick and he has to jump on the brakes a little earlier than the Evo boys when attending…

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It’s alive! That’s right, the Torque Performance Developments (TPD) K-series Honda Fit is all up and running, with this update being somewhat of a milestone in the build process for what will be a damn cool prize for whoever takes it home. There’s something exciting about a first fire-up, and this was no different for the TPD team. With the engine now installed in between the strut towers; fab complete; and a host of other small, tedious jobs done, Jon-Paul (JP) and the team poured in the 5W40 Motul 8100 X-Cess oil and fresh coolant. After the axles were installed, fresh Honda manual transmission fluid (MTF) made its way into the gearbox, as well as Endless brake fluid, providing ample heat resistance and pressure with the Type R calipers and…

The name Steve Ellicot isn’t new to the readers of NZPC — there isn’t a burnout contest he hasn’t dominated or a rotary event he hasn’t popped eardrums at. Now, he’s turned his focus towards the quarter mile. Steve is not a man known for mechanical sympathy, and man and machine are being dialled in meet by meet. The former feature car still carries its slick paint and bodylines but is now shod with a set of 26x10.5-inch ET street tyres with the intention being to hook up as fast as possible. Steve and the team are still experimenting, and even had an auto box sitting behind the 13B bridgeport turbo, but have since gone back to manual on driver preference. The car has smashed out a PB of 9.56…

There aren’t many events on the Rotary schedule with a more loyal following than REUnion, and the postponement of the February event, due to Covid, was a huge disappointment to fans. The Choice Events and Promotions team has been working hard with venues and owners and has managed to secure a new date of 2–4 September. The team believes the new date might just give those owners who want to put finishing touches to their cars the extra hours they need. The team is promising the usual solid diet of rotary enthusiast heaven. There will be cruise sessions, drags, drift, and, of course, eardrumpopping skids as only a rotary event can have. For further updates, follow the event page: rotaryreunion.co.nz…

"I’ve always loved the idea of a street legal drift car,” says Logan, as he takes NZPC on a tour of what was once was a stock-standard Bimmer and could now perhaps be called a Kiwi version of the infamous Eurofighters that terrorise the international drift scene. Logan always knew what he liked, and had taken a keen interest in all things circuit oriented from the age of five years. However, once he became friends with a group of fans of the subtle art of sideways slide — a fancy way of saying drift — that direction changed, and the goal became to build something perfectly suited to both baking tyres and getting to the day job in style. He may have put it off for a few years to…

For many Kiwis, the past couple of years have been rather sedate, couch based, and lacking that infusion of automotive goodness that we all know and love so well. As we all kicked back and cracked open a bag of chips on the couch and gave Netflix a good thrashing, Hayden Paddon was busier than ever. During the past couple of years, busy would have been an understatement for Hayden and his dedicated team, as, while lockdowns took hold, he and his team have been busy carving out their future in the fast-paced world of rallying. After Hayden’s rise on to the World Rally Championship’s (WRC’s) biggest stage, he comfortably settled in among the world’s best, notching up rally wins and cementing his name in WRC history. For Kiwi rally…

Let me be the first to say, this was an odd experience for me. Normally each year finds me trying to hustle a Koru Club pass to get the first drink in before heading across the Tasman for Ian Baker’s annual festival of what I believe anchor and commentator Diggs now calls ‘mototainment’. Both the editor and I are part of the sizable media circus this event attracts, and unfortunately this year travel access, and probably more importantly getting back home, just wasn’t certain enough to make it viable. For those who are unfamiliar with it, the ingredients for World Time Attack are simple. You take a world-class and awardwinning event that has been refined over a decade, get yourself a field of truly cutting-edge and boundary-pushing machines, sell out…

AGE: 22 //LOCATION: AUCKLAND //OCCUPATION: STUDENT NZPC: Hey, Daniel — what is your background with cars? Daniel: I used to pretend my dad’s manual ’04 1.3-litre Mazda Demio was an RX-7 and I’d drive through mountain roads looking at the Mazda steering wheel thinking I’m Keisuke from Initial D. A lot of my friends with JDM cars have also influenced me by letting me drive their cars and educating me about mods and parts, which I am very thankful for. My first car, which I still drive daily, is an Audi TT Mk2 making about 230kW at four wheels — the RX-7 is my second car and the first manual car I’ve owned. Why did you build/buy this car; what’s its history? When I was in primary school my neighbours…

AGE: 28 LOCATION: AUCKLAND OCCUPATION: DIRECTOR AT AUTOSTANCE NZPC: Hey Matt! Tell us about your background with cars — where did it all start? What is it about European cars that tickles your fancy? The build quality is the best way to sum it up. They are years ahead of Japanese and American vehicles and [it’s] actually easier to get big power from them. AN ABSOLUTE DREAM; LINEAR POWER FROM IDLE ALL THE WAY TO 8800 RPM How did you end up with the R8? I saw it listed for sale and began selling my cars to buy this one. What have you done with it? I have done everything you see here in the photos, apart from the full turbo system! What’s it like to drive with that engine…

GT DREAMS It’s not often we see a station-wagon build as staunch as this one that Josh Elmiger is embarking on currently. After owning his 2003 Subaru Legacy GT for around four-and-a-half years, Josh was bitten by the modifying bug and decided that one day he would have a 400kW engine set-up in this very car. Inside one of the tidiest EJ engine bays we’ve seen in a while is a closed-deck EJ20 bored out to 2200cc, with JE pistons, Argo con rods, and an EJ257 crankshaft. Kelford beehive valve springs and 272-degree cams complete the combo and will be stout enough to handle the boost from the single-scroll Precision 6062 turbo. Not wanting to blow the factory five-speed into several thousand pieces, Josh managed to track down a six-speed…