It was an honour to be part of Paddy’s mission to rebuild the Yuasa AE86 and bring it to his wedding; the determination amongst a group of friends to achieve the dream was utterly infectious. Here are a few behind-the-scenes photos from the few months leading up to the wedding, both at the lad’s workshop and on the big day; as always with these, ill let the photos do most of the talking.
A couple of shots with the Accord Type R, quite possibly the best bargain we ever got! This car, unfortunately, has been sitting in the corner of Flip’s shed for over a year. As I write this, Im drowning in AE86 progress, which is a good thing. Hopefully, we can get it on track this year, as I bet this would be heaps of fun, it needs some small bits like suspension and a clutch, and we managed to get some nice wheels to suit matched with decent tyres.
How cool is this JZX81? Our friend Rob imported this last summer for a customer, and he called down once it was on the road. I was floored when I saw it in real life. The car is a time capsule from the millennium era of VIP culture.
A few photos from our little night drive in the summer of 2021; right after all the misery of covid had lifted, we decided to get together for a meet-up and appreciate the joy these rusty Japanese cars bring. A route was mapped to drive for some spirited driving, but we got some food beforehand. Far too many of our vehicles are sitting in sheds these days, never getting the use they deserve, so it was great to get them out for a blast. Finally, everyone went home smiling, reminding us why we got into these things in the first place. In Ireland, as the years progress, you tend to see fewer and fewer of these cars on the road; they live their lives in the shed as our climate isn’t the best for cheap steel Japanese machines.
Sometimes you have to drop everything when an invitation comes along. I got a message from Conor Browne a few months back, and he asked if I wanted to tour his stash of Toyotas and beyond. I had heard about the collection for years, but he was looking to downsize the load and asked if we could showcase the cars to shed some light on the stuff he had for sale. This worked perfectly for me as I wanted to see this stuff in person, showcase the unexpected treasure hiding in the unassuming Irish countryside and get some excellent content out of it all.
We visit a couple of die-hard AE86 brothers to check out their projects, drive a 3.5 gearbox 86 and talk about rusty Corollas.
A closer look at Josh’s E30 with an S50b30 M3 Swap + bonus shed shenanigans
The trip to Adam’s house was wild, from hanging out with Mike and the crew to driving LZ’s Porsche through the streets at night. I’ll let the photos do the talking here, as I said enough in the recap video. let’s just say, Adam is living everyone’s dream to pretty much complete Gran Turismo in real life.
I need to catch up on the updates. I took a stack of photos from our first day at the Freedom Factory with Dave from Driftgames. I’m sure you have seen the video, so ill keep the words to a minimum. This event was epic. I was impressed by the excellent weather in the middle of October, to be honest. Regardless I hope you enjoy this photo dump from that event.
Out in the frosty depths of an Irish winter. Our shed never gets sunlight this time of year, so the front is permanently frozen. This was such a massive milestone for the build; looking back, being able to roll the car out under its weight and just looking at something that sat as a shell for so long reminded me the misery was worth the wait. What I find hilarious is the trusty Prius in the background, a car I expected very little out of but it’s literally my lifeline to work, 1300k a week, and it just keeps chugging, yet it received very little love. Here is a Trueno, a car I obsess over, which gives me nothing but grief and misery, yet I keep plugging along. Im pretty sure most of you can relate to your daily driver and the more enormous money pits we “love”.
We partner with a local Cars and Coffee event and gather for a night cruise in this one. A somewhat raw collection of footage.
This is a photo of the absolute madness I ended up handing over cash last year. I had seen the post on Facebook for a job lot of old Japanese radios, and I knew id love to own them. Why I’m not sure, I love old head units. If you are a viewer of the youtube channel, you’ve probably seen the episode by now where we call up to MR X, and I come home with a tray full of gauges and about 30 head units, some of them still had mini discs, tapes and CDs in them.
You’d miss having Evan at the shed, he moved out to his home house a few months back, and there’s been an absence of his deep rural Irish humour. We shot these photos the weekend I was going to launch a video about his recently imported GX71 Cresta; I needed some B roll shots and decided to do a little shoot of the car out in our ring arena.
These are a few shots from our video we did not too long ago; this was a night when Jackie asked if I wanted to get a sneak peek of probably the coolest honda to ever end up in Ireland. This is J’s racing CRX EF8 car which was in hot version and options video, famous for lightening quick speeds around Tsukuba it ended up in Ireland during our incredible import boom of the late 2000s
An Update on the AE86 and other projects in the shed after some time away from it all.
We visit a couple of die-hard AE86 brothers to check out their projects, drive a 3.5 gearbox 86 and talk about rusty Corollas.