TAS 2003 - Part #1

Tokyo Auto Salon was always a legendary experience. My first show ws filled with oooooo and ahhhhhhs over some of the finest FD3s ever concieved. So lets start with Mazda. the AL. Aluminium concept is simply one of the finest from the factory.

Supported by the 2003 Mazdaspeed B-Spec support parts for the extinct FD3s.

And a little more support.

With such a large FD turnout, I can only go alphabetically and Apexi was up front. The legendary Immamura machine was nicely decorated.

rear fender roll was enough.

Border's effort was displaying the Biot Brembo brake upgrades.

Shiny purple behind pure gold.

I always liked the clean lines of early border kits.

Smooth and functional.

The purple roll cage is taking the theme a little too far.

Bomex updated their FD with Rotora Brakes and created some meaty front splitter things to create advertising space. hehe.

They created a super agressive look though.

But the sweet looks from their model was much more to my liking...

Orange FD with Fast and Furious supra style is interesting though.

Certainly a standout colour.

I think the point on the front of the bomex  bar is quite interesting design wise.

And it's amazing how similar the intakes are to the R-spec concept that oviously the influence for this came from.

BN Sports. I dreamed about this kit for soooooo long after TAS as it was sooo cheap. 250,000 yen for the whole thing. Oviously difficult to register a car like this and afford the wheels, the price was offered directly at the dedicatied drift guy.

The sheer width commands attention

Front and back. It is W I D E

The wing was specially made by carbon and CG experts NOZA.

They usually make EV bikes and aluminium tooling. Mazzive downforce.

The wing actually generated soo much downforce it was difficult for this car to keep grip low with soo much rubber and wing.

I never saw it able to hold long high speed drifts.

Even with big power.

Just look at the curves.

Now thats a sexy wide body.

KS-Auto goes next because it's the Burnout kit with a B. This was a unique square edge effort that seldom works with FD styling. 

Their TA race car was bold enough however to carry it off.

Cockpit Tattebayashi always makes lovely cars and this one is very nice.

Not tied to any one manufacturer they pick the best of the best to play mechanic with.

Tyres are a bit fat up front, but perfect for the rear. badgeless.

My camera at this time was terrible, I just took with one of the first digital compact cameras. you can tell the rubbish quality of this pic of the C-West Super Taikyu Champion.

DRFT drift car always lloks good nice and low on 18".

These were the days when style was still more important than handling for the drift guys.

Final connection also ran new aero. Slight front bumper deviations from Vertex but to the untrained eye. Basically the same.

super low and stretched tyres on this car looked pretty cool.

continue to part #2.