I am playing catchup on the blog side of things, but since going full-time, I’ve had the time now to try to get all these out; the dream would be to release the content right after the video so it pairs nicely; that is my plan in the future so we will see how that goes.
Anyway, this car is everything I love about the car community; someone took a mundane little nugget because they loved it, threw some incredible, rare parts on it and a really iconic liver and made it into such an exceptional little vehicle—pure creativity.
I’ll let the photos speak for themself here. The car has such a great character, and I love seeking stuff out like this. Ive thrown in a few collaboration images and the night we took the engine out of my little nugget as a bonus. Enjoy the images set.
Check out this really epic K11 Micra, a HKS-inspired Nismo-kitted nugget.
I never thought the day would come. I have a weird problem. I’ve always had it, but I’m not one to sell stuff. I’ve kept most things I held in high regard over my life, from bicycles to model cars, cameras to weird hats. Then, when it moved onto car stuff, it was the same, except it was a lot harder to hang onto things or try to preserve property that’s this size; unfortunately, the k11 sat outside the shed for a couple of years after having a pretty well driven three years previous, I did everything in this car, travel Ireland, commute to work, go on dates all the usual nonsense you do with a car except this thing had grown on me. Before we figured out there was an actual colonic march, I wanted to do this livery; I just thought it would be hilarious to take one of the most iconic liveries and throw it on the most mundane Nissan. Continue Reading
This stuff doesn’t happen enough anymore, not with my generation of friends. Back in 2010 ish, this was an every weekend occupancy; we were surrounded by the best of cars, which we 100% took for granted at the time. We were all parked up with the best chassis, and the country was flooded with high-quality imports; it wasn’t uncommon to see a sight like this in every town up and down Ireland. Unfortunately, the recession came, and so did the end of days like this; cars were broken for parts, most people emigrated, and whatever was left was locked away in sheds.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get a chance to make it to last year’s AE86 festival. A close friend was getting married, and there was no way out. Instead, our friend Adam Osborne was there to capture the day with Flip and Josh on the video camera. I wish I could’ve been, as it’s probably one of the best days out, and that’s not being biased toward my favourite chassis; it’s just a decent day filled with a very high percentage of good machines. I’ll let Adams Photo Gallery do much of the talking here, as there are plenty of really nice photos for the eyes. We are fortunate to have such a vibrant AE86 scene here in Ireland.
I am screaming at a few hundred people to let them know the burgers are ready. This was a lovely day out, the JUicebox BBQ, which is essentially a day of thanking everyone we have met over the years for keeping the Irish car scene going and all the friends and acquaintances we got to know through this car stuff. Our friend Adam Osborne was kind enough to shoot all these photos from the day, as we have a million things going on, so it’s hard to document and organise the event. I hope you enjoy his selection of snaps below; he has an excellent eye for capturing delicious images. I’ll let the rest of the photos do the talking.
For some reason, I didn’t take as many photos of the car in this state as expected. I was mainly shocked to see it look like this after so many years of looking the same. It felt like it wasn’t mine; the only indication was the dented eyelid covers with the original paint. I had waited years to see the car in this silhouette, and when it finally happened, it was like I wasn’t ready for it.
Jackie bolted all the panels on because he reckoned it the safest place for them; you can see the 1/4 looking a little crumpled in this picture, but looking past this, the beautiful silhouette of the car was finally revealed, the arches the simplistic look of the car, finally things were starting to take shape. I took the same photo four or five times from each angle, but I didn’t have much to say that night; I just stood back to admire one of my all-time favourite shapes. I love the trueno version of the hatch as I feel that’s the best balance for these cars. Don’t get me wrong, I love a Levin hatch, but something about that Trueno hatch does it for me.
It would appear that im a sucker for a bargain; somehow, Ills see past all the imperfections and think of the potential fun that can be had with something. I’ve done it with the 86, and I’ve done it with other cars over the years and items that I’ve wanted; when the opportunity presents itself, I’ll end up buying the item and justifying why I’ve needed it for years and time again to make myself feel better. I always had a thing for Jimny, at least for the last ten years. My friend Dave has always talked about his one and how it’s probably one of the most capable 4x4s out there. He’s also the guy who invited me that the Prus behind this Jimny is an excellent car, and he wasn’t wrong; I bought that from Dave at the start of Covid on a whim for work, and it turned out to be the best purchase ever.
As I’ve mentioned in previous blog posts, delaying this content slightly is excellent for the brain, even if it is a year later. Im always living in the moment with this resto, and it takes looking back at these photos to see how far we have come. These photos are from this time last year, November 2022, when Jackie was deep in trying to chase the straightest panels on this car.
I had every faith in him; we have been friends for many years, and he has been at this craft for 18-plus years since he was 16 years old. I was fascinated to see the techniques he had picked up since the last time I had seen him in action: a light skim of filler on the panel, followed by large sanding blocks to block the car essentially; the big block would find all the high and low spots to try to give the straightest panels possible, probably better than how this thing rolled out of the factory.
LZ Fest last year was a real eye-opener; we live in a bubble at the shed and rarely make it our thing to go to car events. The Drift games lads had organised LZ fest; it was the first time we had seen such a crowd. It shows how times have changed, and social media characters bring more of an experience than the usual drivers and professional car people.
Our weekend started with a bit of proper misery, with Josh blowing his gearbox at 5.40 in the morning after spending all his time getting the car ready for the event. Either way, LZ Fest was a real eye-opener; it made us realise what sort of following Juicebox has, putting faces to YouTube views and comments.
Here are a few quick photos I took when I went to collect the 4age 20valve from the unexpected shed visit last year. I had an inbox message asking If I wanted to buy a black top 20, but I didn’t expect Tom and the family to have such an exciting selection—a restaurant model on a Cortina with a K20 and a selection of Hillman Imps.
We uncover heavy rust on the Calsonic K11 March, leaving it at the point of diminishing returns.
It’s become an annual thing for us to throw cars and coffee, it’s basically a no-strings-attached free car show and if the weather lines up it turns out to be an incredible day. Here are a few photos from last year’s gathering, somehow we got lucky with the weather.
This was probably the most significant change in the ae86 build. The car had sat in that strange maroon colour for so long in various shades, paired with primer and glimpses of restoration work; the car was essentially a patchwork quilt of misery. After years of tackling this without seeing any significant visual change, sanding the entire body down to bare metal and seeing the whole car uniform in silver was a moral boost.