Uhh...what's going on guys? We've received one piece of jail mail in the past, like, four months. Kelly is starting to feel a little left out, without her monthly love-letters. Send your regards to: 2NR, 2400 East Katella Ave., Anaheim, CA, 92806. Or if you just want to whine about Minis or Eric, hit-up postal@ImportTuner.com
Dear Import Tuner,
I am 100% impressed with your magazine. You feature fantastic cars that a new tuner shop [like mine] can not only afford, but can use as a platform for their own projects. You offer insightful technical help and product information, and your new "Fact or Fiction" section is a money-saver for the naive amongst us, who believe everything they read. But mainly, I like your magazine because you stress safety and the importance of "race on the track, not the street." I am a prime example of the dangers in street racing. I am doing forty-two months for killing a gentleman when I lost control, and hit his motorcycle head-on. One bad decision has changed my life. Thank you for reminding your readers to take it to your local track. Hopefully, my story will help.
I look forward to a continuous long relationship with import tuner, If I could, I'd subscribe to all your publications, but $5.00 a month as a tierman barely keeps this one active.
$5 a month?! Dayum holmes-we'd offer you a job, but that's better than anything we have at the moment; our latest trick is to farm out slave-labor to local university students under the guise of "internships"...unpaid, of course. But, in all seriousness, it's unfortunate how often we hear stories like yours. Feeling in control behind the wheel of a car comes so naturally that it's easy to take for granted the thousands of things that could go wrong at any given moment, but usually (thankfully) don't. We're all about our readers enjoying their rides at all times, but we agree; the streets are no place for carelessness. Anything can happen, and if you're caught actin' a fool when something does go wrong, you could end up facing life-altering consequences. Keep your head up and keep reading, Mark; we'll be around when your time is up.
Rally Kuwait
My name is Joel, and I'm currently living in Kuwait, and have a RHD '86 Corolla waiting for me back in the States. I also put up a site called ectoyotas.com (East Coast Toyota's) in hopes of bringing together more Toyota owners who reside outside the SoCal hub of automotive culture. Back home, I used to drive my car everyday and race whenever possible, but after living in Kuwait for a few months, I began to miss my Corolla and searched for a temporary fix for my racing addiction. There are no streets here, let alone drag strips, so building a typical car was out of the question. But, after I thought for a second, I remembered there is a killer racetrack surrounding my entire living quarters, for miles in all directions-the Kuwaiti desert! So, I purchased an '06 STI and am out in it constantly, trying to learn the tricks of rallying. I even ran over a huge lizard by accident. The Internet here is horribly slow, and most of the magazines talk about track cars and daily drivers, and so on, but I would love to see an article for the newbie rally enthusiast, such as myself: A run down on safety parts, basic upgrades, and suspension for off-road, maybe an interview with a rally driver, so on and so forth. Can you help?
--Joel, Kuwait
Oh boo-hoo, Joel! Poor you with a JDM Hatchi and '06 STI... Woe is you for having to shell out the equivalent of $0.86-per-gallon for gas to fill your new rally car everyday... Sucks to be you, with the killer job overseas, making more in a month than we'll see in two years of Import Tuner salaries. Our collective heart goes out to you! To ease your pain, we're actually going to grant your request. Well, part of it anyway. Turn to page 42.
Green Speed
OK, I know that you would probably rather give advice on a boosted 240SX or Supra...but, I have a plain-Jane, dime-a-dozen, '01 Civic EX coupe, and I could use your help. It has the five-speed, 1.7 VTEC-E making 127 hp. It's not very powerful, but in this day and age you need a car with good gas mileage; mine is fortunate enough to get 40 to 44 mpg. So, what bolt-on cheap parts do you recommend I put on this grocery-getter that will give it a little more pep in its step without killing my mileage? Also, I don't want to go all out on it, so I just need a few upgrades-I'll save going balls-out for my Z32 TT.
--Hayden Cook, Johnsonville, N.Y.
P.S. Don't let that dumb ass Jonathan Verna (Going Postal, July 2008) give you a bad image of teens or NY'ers. I'm also 17...but he is just an idiot.
Not only would we rather give you advice on badass Supras and 240s...we'd rather be driving them on a daily basis, too! But, sadly for us, fuel economy is a major concern, at least during the daily commute. There is only so much you can do to improve power without increasing demand for fuel. Bumping up compression via a head shave or high compression pistons will help, just like lightening up rotational mass (lightweight wheels, flywheel, pulleys), and freeing up aspiration (intake, header, exhaust). But, if big power is what you're after, you're best bet is through nitrous. Power when you need it, fuel economy when you don't...all at a relatively low cost. Check out NOS or Nitrous Express for guidance, and keep reading 2NR for the upcoming close of our Ultimate Efficiency tech series-our DC2 is making over 40 real-world mpg these days, and lookin' for 50.
Drag King
Whatever happened to the good old days when import drag racing was huge? I remember going to test and tune nights at the local track back in the day with, like, 300 other imports and tons of chicks! We'd get a couple runs in, then hit up the local spots for hours on end, staying out all night. Cops were cool-there was no such thing as tickets for loud exhausts, or for being too low. If you got caught street racing, you'd probably be let off with a ticket. Now the strips are closed, imports are profiled and their owners harassed...cars even crushed on occasion! WTF?! What are we supposed to do? Is it like this everywhere?
--Damon Mason, Chino, Calif.
Yes, Damon, it does seem to be like this everywhere. Things are getting tough for tuners...but not impossible. When you look a little closer at the grassroots of our scene, you'll actually find that it's starting to come back-strong. Battle of the Imports is hosting drag events at raceways all along the East and West coasts, Drift Day hosts drift exhibition and instruction demos every weekend at points in SoCal and the Southwest, and NASA and the SCCA sanction weekly autocross and road race events all across the country. Look to driver training programs like HPDE to get started, and learn the limits of your car in a safe environment, and then go racing. Learning how to properly mod and drive your car will help our scene shake its negative stigma, and help us all enjoy it more freely.