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GTRBlog: Road Trip and Update
Sorry for the lack of updates over the past 3 or 4 days, I’ve actually been on vacation in the USA leading up to SEMA which kicks off in just a few days. I took some time in San Francisco to check out the sites and had no internet access for a while as I visited Yosemite National Park.
I then met up with Chuck from NAGTROC and headed down California Highway 1 (Pacific Coast Highway) for a scenic drive to LA.
Since then I’ve been visiting some workshops and GT-R owners in the Los Angeles area to check out their SEMA entries and am happy to say you guys are going to love whats coming.
So I finally have internet access as I’ve just done the last leg of the road trip from LA to Vegas and checked in so expect another update later tonight when I get the chance to properly nerd out.
Thanks to all who emailed me over the past week and I expect to return emails soon.
Another GT-R Mashup: The R34 Coupe Widebody R35 Makeover
Didn’t expect to see one of these really. This Skyline has donated it’s entire soul to be a R35 mashup of some description. The work looks unfinished but presents a whole new category of front end swaps. Will you be seeing a Bee-R R35 R32 front end soon? Maybe. Who makes this one? I don’t know. This photo raises more questions than it answers.
Source: Mindlessoath via NAGTROC
Friday Laughs: Camaro Tuner to Take on GT-R With Turbo V6
East Texas Muscle Cars is where you can point and begin laughing as they reckon they’ve got the know how to slap together a GT-R killing Camaro based on the cooking variety V6. Edmunds Inside Line is reporting that the V6 will be upgraded with forged internals and a remote mount turbo kit. Add to that a few other off the shelf tuning parts and they think they can tweak it to 500hp and slay the GT-R at the Nurburgring.
Their answer to improving the Camaro’s handling … ?
Other changes include a Baer big brake kit, lightweight 20-inch iForged wheels and Pedders coil-overs and bushings to address “the stock Camaro’s tremendous understeer and cradle walk.”
I really gotta hand it to these guys in Texas, they brightened up my Friday with this. Whatever they’re smoking get me some.
Link: Edmunds Inside Line – Read the full story
Image: Autoblog – Click to see their gallery
Stroll Down Deviant Art Lane – GT-R Art
I’m a frequent reader of many other blogs and probably have 200 RSS feeds in my reader so when I spotted this post on The Real JDM it ended up with me browsing Deviant Art for other gems. I’ve included a few I liked in this gallery below but hit up Deviant Art for more and spend a few hours browsing the random car images you might find.
These images are owned and copyright by the artists. Check with them at the links after the jump if you want to use their images in any way.
Nissan GT-R at Paul Ricard HTTT Track Day Videos
Just a few videos submitted by a reader of a Nissan GT-R playing with some other nice cars at a recent track day in France at the Paul Ricard Circuit at La Castellet. It’s a three part series, find the second and third videos after the jump.
Thanks to Philippe, the GT-R driver in the videos, for the submission.
GTRBlog Now Available in More Languages in More Places
Isn’t social media great? Well if you enjoy the ‘blog you have to say yes even if you hate social media. There’s a load of people still on the fence as well and to those people I say, give it a try, you might like it. The worst that could happen is you end up with several crazy cyber-stalkers who break into your house to watch you while you sleep.
Anyways, GTRBlog has grown up a bit over the past two years and so has the Nissan GT-R. The GT-R is available in many more countries than any previous Skyline GT-R, which never really officially made it’s way properly out of Japan except in handfulls or grey imports. That means we have a potential audience greater than ever before and to capture this we’ve teamed up with Martin from Taipei, Taiwan to bring you GTRBlog in Traditional Chinese.
Let me introduce Martin to readers, although you may not read the Traditional Chinese version of the ‘blog, the story of how the Nissan GT-R legend has spread to Taiwan is interesting.
Martin is one of just 25 GT-R owners so far in Taiwan owning the white one pictured above. When Yulon Nissan began taking pre-orders in late 2008, Martin put his name down and took delivery in May 2009 from the Taipei Nissan High Performance Center (NHPC). From that day on he has been subject to much attention on the road as the GT-R is as much a rockstar in Taiwan as it is elsewhere. From camera flashes from passers-by to being filmed on his drive home.
As most people outside the US and Japan have come to realise, the GT-R is no cheap toy and Taiwan is no exception to that. Even at around $157,000 USD mark MSRP Martin still thinks it’s great value for money.
From experience with both GT-Rs and my own long road trips across Taiwan’s mountain and coastal roads I whole heartedly agree!
What about the GT-R scene in Taiwan and where is it headed? With Japan being just a quick hop away, easy access to tuning parts is extremely useful. There’s already a Mine’s dealership and a couple of Mine’s tweaked 600hp R35’s in country. He’s also pretty confident we’ll be seeing a couple of big HP Trust-T6 turbo kit fitted GT-Rs on the streets of Taiwan just as soon as they become available.
Can’t wait to see them next time I’m in Taiwan.
In other news, GTRBlog can now be found on Facebook and followed on Twitter. Many of you prefer to get your news in Tweets and spend your afternoons on Facebook and why not eh. I’m also uploading unique content and some old favourite photo albums to Facebook as time goes by so don’t forget to add it as a favourite page and become a fan.
That’s it for this update. Thanks for sticking with us!
Link: GTRBlog Taiwan – GTRBlog in Traditional Chinese
Link: GTRBlog on Facebook – Become a Fan
Link: GTRBlog on Twitter – Follow us for Updates
For the Gadget Guy – Godzilla USB Hard Drive
A reader pointed this one out to me and I thought it’d make a great desktop accessory for any GT-R owner or fan. A one off for now but I’m sure it’ll catch on. Built by combining a Jada 1:18th scale Nissan GT-R model and a 500GB 2.5inch HDD it connects up to your PC by USB to store all your files.
Thanks to Dave for the tip.
Link: Ebay Auction – 2009 Nissan GT-R, 500gb External Hard Drive
Gran Turismo 5 E3 Movie Plus More Video Game Goodness
A couple of exciting new tidbits of information regarding the latest upcoming release in the long line of Grant Turismo games. While we’ve all been playing the hell out of GT5 Prologue, it’s feeling more and more limited these days.
GT5 promises to add a lot more for GT-R fans though including the GT500 cars from the SuperGT 2008 series. Unfortunately, exactly how long we have to wait is still unknown as GT5’s release date is not set yet.
Sony and Polyphony also announced a version of Gran Turismo you can put in your pocket with the PSP version, called GT Mobile, to be released later this year. This version will contain the tracks seen in GT4 plus the GT-R. This means you can be tearing up the Nurburgring Nordschleife in your R35 GT-R on your train ride to work.
In other video game GT-R related news, Need for Speed SHIFT promises to be the best NFS game yet. The trailer has quite a bit of footage of a stickered up GT-R SpecV on the track. Will be good to see how it turns out.
Link: Discuss this over @ NAGTROC
Link: You can download the GT5 HD Movie at Gran-Turismo.com
Screenshots: Courtesy of GTPlanet.net
The GT-R Color Nissan Should’ve Offered?
Across the world the amount of discussion generated about the lack of a blue option for the Nissan GT-R is alarming. My guess is that it stems from a love affair many had with the Bayside Blue found on Nissan’s legendary R34 Skyline GT-R.
Bayside Blue was the launch color for the R34 GT-R and, at launch in 1999, the first of only a handful of GT-R specific colors. Bayside Blue went on to prove one of the most successful colors available for the GT-R and subsequently Nissan made it available on special edition R34 Skylines that weren’t GT-Rs so everyone could share in the love.
When the R35 was launched without a single shade of blue in sight, many wondered if it would become a special edition as time went by. Personally I seriously doubt that will ever happen.
So for now, one US owner has decided to take it upon himself. While this is not exactly Bayside Blue it is very close and the color is known as “Royal T Blue”.
You can check out the painting process photos and more over at his blog linked below.
So what other colors should Nissan offer for the R35 GT-R? Add your choices in the comments below…
Update: The blue Nissan GT-R visited STILLEN’s office yesterday and they snapped a whole bunch more photos for their blog. Go check their photo gallery for the rest of the pics.
Source: Blue R35 Blog
Supercar Sensation – Drive Your Dream Cars – GT-R Included
Chris over at AutomoBlog has given me a heads up on a regular supercar meetup in North Carolina, USA. This is a meetup with a bit of a difference though because for $200 – $300, YOU could be in the drivers seat of three of the seven hottest machines on the street today – the Nissan GT-R included.
The cars in the lineup are impressive and include, the Ferrari F430, Lamborghini Gallardo, Porsche 911 Turbo, Aston Martin V8 Vantage, Nissan GT-R, BMW M3 and Mercedes C63 AMG. During one tour you’ll get to drive up to three of these on a one, two or four hour package.
AutomoBlog went along for a four hour package and wrote up their experiences, check the link below because if you’re nearby this may be right up your alley. Apparently the GT-R was banged up quite badly on the day they were there but has been replaced by now. Sounds like it doesn’t drive itself after all eh?
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