Today our topic is about Japanese nostalgic car. Nostalgic means cars in Shōwa period (25/12/1926 - 07/01/1989) Hope all of you will like the article of vintage car ^^
With his nickname derived from his jones for enormous burnouts, Smoky Nagata is best known for two things. As founder and owner of Top Secret Performance Engineering Service, his mega-horsepower creations have graced the covers of countless tuner mags the world over, decked out in his resplendent trademark gold. Legend has it that before establishing his own shop, Nagata worked for another tuner but surreptitiously concocted his own projects during his off hours. Hence the name.
Behind the ballsy superhero bravura of Smoky the monster-maker hides Kazuhiko Nagata, a mild-mannered gentleman with a penchant for vintage Japanese steel. Downstairs and around back, out of sight from the massive centerpiece garage and warehouse lies a small covered parking area that houses some of his prized possessions. The path leading to the stairs of this alcove have classics in varying stages of restoration, neglect and hidden potential scattered about as well. Overshadowed by their horsepower-heavy modern descendants that made Top Secret famous, the nostalgics in Nagata-san's collection include a C10 Skyline sedan, a Datsun 410 Bluebird, a pair of Mitsubishi Galant GTOs and of course, the subject of this article, a 1975 Toyota Celica 2000GT liftback.
Found in a junkyard as a rusty heap, this RA25 Celica underwent an intensive six-month restoration process that would make Boyd Coddington weep. Upon retrieval from its deathbed, Nagata immediately whisked the well-oxidized body and frame off to Top Secret II: The Body Shop to reverse the severe weathering that had occurred over the years. Many of the original bits were too far gone, giving the Top Secret crew the perfect opportunity to replace them with trick custom touches.
While the car may appear stock, aside from its mean crouch and bestickered body, numerous clever yet subtle nuances endow this resto-modded Celica with the amenities of your typical daily driver. For instance, Bellof Spec Le Mans GT HID throw more lumens from the quad headlights than 1975 could have ever dreamed of. Likewise, one-off LED taillights have been matched perfecly to the genki five-bar rear treatment.
For a squad with enough talent to jam a V12 into the bay of a straight-six, an epic swap would have been pound cake, but beneath the custom fiberglass hood lies a chassis-correct twin-cam 18RG engine. Never one to leave well enough alone, Nagata and his crew have installed fuel-injection with an HKS F-CON V Pro management system fed by four individual throttle bodies with custom machined velocity stacks. The rest of the drivetrain remains stock, albeit rebuilt, save for an ORC single-plate clutch.
The pugnacious stance comes courtesy of Top Secret's own Super Dampers. Brilliant white 15-inch Rays Gram Light 57Cs wrapped in Bridgestone Potenza RE-01s harmonize flawlessly with the equally bright white paint job. Inside, an LED dome light reflects yet another unobtrusive modern upgrade. BRIDE racing seats hold asses in place while the driver grips a Top Secret steering wheel, but those matching rear cushions were custom-made by the company for Nagata's nostalgic ride. You can be sure Nagata gripped the Top Secret steering wheel tightly when he went on a recent 210-kph blast on Japan's renowned Wangan. In the English system, that's the same speed that got him arrested in the land that originated the measurement standard.
At its debut in this year's Tokyo Auto Salon, Top Secret gave this Celica top billing at its booth in the annual Japanese tunerfest, a space usually reserved for the sort of high-performance rigs the shop built its name on. It may be the first nostalgic called in for duty to represent Top Secret, but Nagata, in his humble demeanor utterly devoid of the brash arrogance one would expect of a speed demon felon, indicates that it won't be the last. We can only hope, Smoky
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