100% Street Legal Godzilla
TP: So Chad, tell us your story. What were you driving before this car? What made you decide to get an R33 out of all the other Skylines?
CF: I was driving a built twin turbo g35 coupe. I was at ZCarGarage getting my car worked on back in 2004 when I first saw a Nissan Skyline R34 GTR in person. I instantly fell in love with the R34 (which belonged to Rob at ZCarGarage). Ever since then, I told myself I would get one. However, after some considerable research, I found that street legal R34's were going for $100,000 or more, which was out of the question for me! Then, not long ago, my friend who owned a Federal and State legal R33 decided to let his go. So I jumped at it in a heartbeat!
TP: Can you tell us a little bit about the process from when you set your sights on the car until you were behind the wheel of it?
CF: The process was actually very easy for me. Rob handled all the logistics and paperwork for me. The first step in getting the R33 was to sell the twin turbo motor out of my G35. We got the motor sold, which wound up being just enough to make up the remaining balance on my loan. The rest was history and soon after, the R33 was in my garage!
TP: Is this your daily driver? What else do you have in your garage?
CF: Although I can daily drive this, I choose not to. Some parts are pretty hard to get, expensive, and take forever on the slow boat from Japan. Don't worry, it does see the streets fairly often, and I do love to drive it, however, I still have my G35 as my daily (only with a stock motor now). I also have a GMC truck for my playing and towing needs.
TP: What was the first modification that you made? Tell us about your build process.
CF: I installed an ARC cooling plate as well as a GReddy/Trust front lip. I haven't really decided on a build process yet. But I will let you guys know first thing!
TP: Have you ever dyno'd your car? What kind of power to the wheels are you putting down with your current setup?
CF: ZCarGarage did a "very safe and drivable" tune after some upgrades a while back and it put down 450AWHP. I hope to have ZCAR actually tune it for real in the near future. I've found that set ups similar to mine are well into the 600AWHP range.
TP: Do you do any sort of racing with this car?
CF: I would love to track the car someday. I'm just not all that great shifting with my left hand yet. Haha!
TP: So we noticed you have a JDM head-unit. Why doesn't it receive stations past 90 MHZ? Do you just end up listening to CD's for the most part?
CF: The head unit was never changed when the car came over to the US. In Japan, Radio frequencies are 70-90 and 90 to 108 frequencies are reserved for Television. I can't really listen to CD's...the suspension is too stiff most of the time or the head unit won't like our CD formats. Thank god for satellite radio.
TP: We've been dying to ask you this ever since we first saw your car in person. What the hell does your alarm say??
CF: I wish I knew! It's a pretty intelligent alarm. It has a few different sayings. It tells me when its armed and disarmed. It will also tell me that either the door, trunk, or hood are open. Since I don't speak Japanese, I just end up checking everything to be on the safe side.
TP: Haha. We should find a fluent Japanese speaker to help you translate then! So, what do you have planned next? What is your philosophy behind driving and modifying this car? Do you see yourself keeping it for a long time?
CF: I have the OEM lip being shipped to me as we speak. This will replace the over-sized lip on there now and allow me to lower the car a little more. My plan is to keep the car somewhat simple looking, but make it a true Godzilla under the hood. Since there are only a hand full of these legal cars, I hope to keep it for a long time! I mean, its a JDM RHD GTR, what else can I upgrade to, right?
TP: No arguments from us here. Well Chad, we'd like to thank you for sitting down with us. Are there any shout-outs you'd like to make?
CF: I'd like to thank the great guys at TunerPlayground, Photoshootmycar.com, ZCargarage, CP, ZDi[R]ty3, Williams Autobody, Team Yuu[E]Suu, and last but not least, my bank, haha!
Car Year: 1996
Car Make: Nissan
Car Model: Skyline GTR V-Spec
Car Color: Sonic Silver
Modifications
Engine & Drivetrain:
Twin Garrett GT-2860-R5 Turbos
660cc injectors
Apex'i Power Intakes
HKS I/C Hard Piping
Z32 80mm MAFs
Apex'i 264 Intake and Exhaust Cams
Apex'i Adjustable Fuel Pressure Regulator
HKS Adjustable Cam Gears
Electronics:
Apex'i Power FC with Commander Unit and Boost Controller
Apex'i Boost Gauge
Kenwood JDM Head Unit(Does not receive stations past 90.3 MHZ)
Suspension:
Buddy Club Racing Spec Dampers
Exhaust:
Blitz Nur-Spec II 3-inch Exhaust
Wheels & Tires:
Prodrive GC-01 18x9.5
Toyo Proxies 265/35/18
Exterior & Interior:
Carbon Fiber Spoiler Accents
Carbon Fiber Door Accents
NISMO Rear Bumper Corner Caps and Side Skirts
NISMO Carbon Fiber Shift Knob
HID Headlights
Japanese Speaking Alarm
Photo credits belong to Official TunerPlayground Featured Car Photographers: Jeff Cabacungan and Chad Freeman from Photoshootmycar.com
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