If there is one tuning shop in Japan that is well worth a look during this month's Misfits & Mavericks theme it has to be Weld. A lot of people make the mistake of classifying it as just a regular tuner, but I've always thought Johnny at Weld does things differently. He has vision and he's never afraid to push boundaries when it comes to building cars. I shot his JZX100 demonstration car before it got its updated 2009 D1 graphics so that is why it may look different in these pictures. This MarkII perfectly embodies Weld's school of thought with its clean yet aggressive lines coupled with true mechanical insight creating one, if not the best, JZX100 I have ever shot.
Koichi Yamashita managed to come 15th in the 2009 D1-GP championship with this car, which is not bad considering the well-established teams Weld/HPI were up against.
One look under the lightweight carbon hood and it's easy to understand why people refer to this as the cleanest car in D1. Just check out the attention to detail and the work that has gone into prepping the chassis for drift, not to mention shifting the 2JZ way back into the rebuilt firewall for better weight distribution.
Here is Yamashita in action at the first Round of D1 up in Ebisu last year.
Weld is only up the road from Ueno-san at T&E so it's not surprising that Johnny decided to use the full T&E Vertex Ridge body kit for his car. The kit also includes wider front and rear fenders that really pump up the stance. FRP doors were fitted along with acrylic glass for a substantial weight loss.
The front Work XSA02C are 9.5JX18" in size and shod in 255/35/ZR18 Bridgestone RE-11 rubber while the rears get bigger 10.5Jx19" rims and massive 275/35/ZR19 tires, pretty wild sizes for a drift car. Braking is taken care of by the Sessions 4-pot calipers front and rear, the same company that built the crazy widebody Celsior we saw back in November. Yamada-san at Sessions is about a five minute drive from Weld!
The rear silver carbon trunk lid is by Xanthic, located in the same premises as Weld and Garage HRS.
More carbon in the form of the obligatory Craft Square mirrors.
The rear 19-inch Works sport a red finish for a bit of a show-car feel.
The interior is nothing short of a masterpiece. This is where you can really appreciate all the work that has gone into the car. If you look carefully the area around the transmission tunnel and floor has been rebuilt to accommodate the new position of the 2JZ, shifted back as we saw in the engine bay. Johnny had to make space for the 6-speed Hollinger sequential transmission and as you can see the whole floor is stiffened up with an additional tubular structure which joins the custom roll-cage. The whole chassis is thoroughly stiffened in all high-stress areas. The comes the dashboard…
…which is a one-piece dry carbon affair of the highest quality. Notice the care that was taken to carefully fit all of the instrumentation and switchgear.
The MVI MXL is used as a main dash unit and logger system…
…while other modules from Trust are used to control the boost and the nitrous oxide system.
Here is a shot of the driver-side footwell.
Of course moving the motor rearward freed up some space up front and Johnny made sure he used it up wisely by creating a V-mount configuration between the radiator and the almost horizontally positioned custom intercooler. This means very short piping…
…which is a good thing to have when you are using a big Trust T88H-34D turbine. The 3.1 L 2JZ is fully built with Trust forged pistons and H-beam conrods, allowing it to take the savage boost the T88 supplies. The nitrous oxide system helps boost low and mid-rpm power and response giving a max of 900 HP at 7,200 rpm and a healthy 600 lb/ft of torque at 6,300 rpm. The Exedy triple plate carbon clutch is used to dose the drive to the Hollinger while the TRD LSD takes care of the rest.
Johnny is currently working on another of his crazy creations in collaboration with Sessions, based around a Celsior. You can expect it, like the D1 MarkII, to fuse many styles together for a unique look and feel. Weld is one shop that never fails to amaze for its attention to detail and innovative ideas!
Here are the full specs of the car:
Engine:
- Weld custom engine mounts
- 1mm bored out 2JZ block
- Trust forged pistons (for 3.1L)
- Trust H-section connecting rods
- Balanced stock crankshaft
- Fully ported and polished head
- HKS camshafts 264º IN, 272º EX
- GReddy EX slide cam pulley
- ARP head bolts
- GReddy lightweight pulley kit
- Trust stainless steel exhaust manifold
- Trust T88H-34D single turbo kit
- Trust external wastegate
- Weld custom dump pipe and titanium exhaust system
- Weld custom intercooler piping kit
- Weld custom V-mounted intercooler
- GReddy polished intake manifold
- Infiniti Q45 large diameter mechanical throttle body
- Tabata custom V-mounted radiator
- Twin Flex-a-lite extractor fans
- Custom air separator tank and piping
- Twin Trust oil coolers
- Custom power-steering tank
- GReddy oil catch tank with filtered breather
- Racing fuel tank
- Bosh Motorsport fuel pump x2
- Collector tank
- Earls braided fuel lines all round
- Sard adjustable FPR
- Sard billet fuel rail
- Sard 1000 cc/min injectors
- GReddy direct port nitrous system x6 foggers
- Weld custom cam & cam/pulley cover
- HKS F Con V Pro ECU
Transmission:
- Exedy triple plate carbon clutch
- Getrag 6-speed transmission
- TRD Giken LSD
Suspension & Brakes:
- Tein fully adjustable Mono Flex suspension kit
- Tein EDFC controller
- Ikeya Formula fully adjustable suspension arms (front & rear)
- Stiffer anti-roll bars
- Weld D1 spec custom front strut tower bar
- Weld custom master cylinder stopper
- Sessions 4-pot calipers front & rear with 2-piece slotted rotors
- Weld mesh brake lines
- Weld brake pads
Wheels & Tires:
- Work XSA02C 9.5JJx18” +3 (front), 10.5JJx19” -10 (rear)
- Bridgestone Potenza RE-11 255/35/18 (front), 275/35/19 (rear)
Exterior:
T&E Vertex Ridge wide body kit:
- Front bumper
- Front wider fenders (+50 mm)
- Side skirts
- Rear wider fenders
- Rear door wide inserts
- Rear bumper
- FRP doors
- Xantic Design carbon trunk lid
- Craft Square carbon side mirrors
- AeroCatch bonnet pins
- Weld/Xanthic front hinged silver carbon hood & grille
- Xanthic silver carbon trunk lid
- Xanthic silver carbon pillar panel
- Voltex carbon GT wing
- Acrylic windows (rear & sides)
- Red front & rear toe hooks
- Art Factory body graphics
- Weld Candy Blue paint
Interior:
- Fully stripped out and spot welded chassis
- Custom full racing roll-cage
- Custom front engine section with tubular frame
- Custom inner fenders and wheel arches to accommodate increased steering lock
- Custom transmission tunnel with tubular frame
- Custom driver and passenger foot wells with tubular frame
- Custom floor & trunk area
- Custom reinforced and plated off high-stress areas
- Custom dry carbon door panels
- Custom one-off dry carbon main dashboard
- Sparco Corsa bucket seats
- Sparco racing harnesses
- Custom elongated steering column
- Vertex racing steering wheel
- Vertex gear knob
- Custom hydraulic hand brake
- Custom pedals (AT to MT coversion)
- MVI MXL main LCD dash unit/data logger
- Nitrous Oxide gauge
- Nitrous Oxide tank
- GReddy dials (Oil Press., Oil Temp., Water Temp., Ex Temp., turbo boost, fuel press.)
- GReddy Profec B boost controller
- GReddy Multi Switching System
- Tein EDFC
- HKS F Con V Pro in-dash
- Custom switch gear and kill switch for electrics
-Dino Dalle Carbonare