Osaka Tuning Shop: Revolver, Kakimoto and Koms - Juiceboxforyou

Our next adventure was to tick a few places off the list. We had never been to Revolver, and the owners seemed hesitant with foreigners. However, we decided to take a look anyway. Thankfully, we had Alex with us, whose presence was instrumental in breaking the ice and making our introduction smoother.

Revolver, also known as Sergeant, is a unique gem in car culture. Their focus on kitting out Civics, 86s, and Skylines for racing is a sight to behold. It’s one of those shops that pique the interest of any automotive enthusiast who enjoys the AE86 chassis, and it was a joy to see it in person finally.

The owner was friendly enough to pop the bonnet on their iconic race machine, which I was delighted they still had. I remembered this from Hyper Rev magazines from years ago.

There are some choice stickers on the wings.

It’s hard to beat that simple race look of an EK9; if we ever built one, it would look like this. SO good.

The shop is littered with them, and they all have a purpose.

It used to be just known as Revolver, but the Sergeant side of it has become their big push over the years.

I bet this is an enjoyable machine on track.

This very USDM-styled Altezza was sitting out front.

As we were chatting, this absolutely superb-looking early-spec Trueno was being backed into the shop. We said our goodbyes and left them to get back to work after this, then moved on to the next location.

I still think about this Altzza wagon Gita, one of the hardest-looking cars on the entire trip with those Wedsports TC005n and rear light covers. I loved the first all over it, too; it looked well used.

As we were leaving the Revolver, we stumbled upon a Mini Workshop near Revolver on our way to Kakimoto. The absence of an owner didn’t deter us from taking some photos. The Guinness Mini, in particular, was a delightful surprise.

I love the little British-looking shop front.

The leading shop of the day we wanted to see was Kakimoto. It was a place that somehow always evaded us, and we wanted to see just how good this place was on the inside. I had seen some photos from various blogs and people over the years, but nothing prepared us for how good it was. If you are reading this, you have seen the video by now, so I’ll let many of these photos do the talking.

It was tough to know where to start in this place. Everything was worth photographing, or at least I thought it was!

Even the banners on the wall were excellent.

How good is this R33 GTR? I loved the fact all this stuff is still with Kakimoto.

I’m not apologising for the million photos at this place. I truly loved every inch of it, from the engine on exhaust display to the exhaust selection they had for all to enjoy.

It’s one of my all-time favourite logos from Japan.

You could spend hours here, which we did. I think we spent about two hours taking it all in.

What I loved about it was how the place looked frozen in 2005, right at the peak of the Japanese tuning scene.

Check out their old Z drag car; I love that this is in the shop’s front window.

SSR meshes with the most enormous tyres.

I love the old Kakimoto Super N-GT wheels. There were a few mega-size ones under the table on display.

It’s pretty much any exhaust you could think of making.

It is among the top five most excellent shops we’ve ever visited. Even going through all this has reminded me how insane it is that an exhaust shop like this can exist worldwide.

Josh’s eagerness to visit Feed was contagious, and we could not resist the excitement. Having someone new join our mission added a fresh perspective and shared excitement, making the experience even more enjoyable. Feed, with its magical charm and stunning FDs, was a place we all appreciated together.

This car is RX7 perfection, which is probably my favourite example ever.

I also loved this red beautt, wearing the same attire as the grey shop car.

You always see other machines around the workshop. On our way out, this Se3p RX8 caught our eye.

The shop is overloaded, especially if the RX7 is your thing.

As we were heading away from Feed, not too far down the road was this new shop called Koms. The RWB Porsche in the top window caught us off guard. We pulled in like tourists and decided to peep our heads in to say hello.

It was insane to be greeted by an RX7 restoration shop with multiple floors. The owners enjoyed our interest and took us on a full tour.

With various builds going on inside, this was an unexpected treat.

Imagine having a few floors like this to display the stuff you enjoy. Truly mindblowing.

This was the eye-catching piece that lured us in.

If you won the lotto, this would be the kind of place you’d want to build.

We rounded out our day at Global Auto. This was our third visit, but they had an Australian guy working there this time, so it was cool to ask the questions we always wanted to know.

It is out of reach forever for many of us now, but it is still very pleasurable to look at.

The next day, we hit the road back to Tokyo to catch up with Andrew Joyce. We made a quick stop at Meihan to show Josh the track.

An excellent viewing of MT fuji to keep us company on our trip back to Tokyo.

I hope you enjoyed this photo flashback to the most recent Japan series. There are lots more to come over the next couple of days and weeks.