This week I got an invitation to take a look at the Rising Sun Performance shop. They specialize in Hondas and had several vehicles in their shop. I was greeted by the DC5 Integra you see in the opening shot. For you US readers a familiar car but for us Europeans it's a bit more special. Because we never got them through the official route so all the DC5s you see in Europe are imported.
When I entered the building it looked a lot bigger than the outside led me to believe. The entrance is on the far side below the 5Zigen banner. First you enter the small office and then you enter this big garage with several cars in different stages of build.
The blue EG was a big surprise for me because it was a full on race car built in Japan by Impact! But more on that in a separate post.
This yellow S2000 belonged to one of the owners and was also imported from Japan. It has been built by Type One, the shop that acts as the Spoon Sports dealership. So you can imagine it is full of Spoon goodies. It starts with the Suspension kit, brake discs, pads, X brace under the car and Spoon LSD.
The engine is pretty much standard except for the ARC super induction kit. The power of the engine is being transferred towards the rear wheels with a Spoon prop-shaft.
The thing that attracted me the most was the ASM titanium GT front strut brace. The fit and finish of these products is amazing.
This K20 had a custom exhaust header fitted and ready to be installed in another customer's car.
What's a workshop without a tire changer and wheel balancer right? Can anybody identify the two wheels?
I saw this car run last year at the Dutch Time Attack series. Now it's in pieces and ready to be rebuilt. The owner told me he had some trouble last year with the handling. So for next season he will give extra attention to the handling of this car.
This is the office where Ian, one of the employees, is checking out all the orders that have been made through their webshop.
I myself am a big fan of the Hyperrev series and these books are a vital source of information. So I wasn't surprised seeing different editions scattered throughout the office.
Here is another one of the project cars the guys were working on. The exterior has been left mostly untouched except for the duckbill and the 15" 949Racing wheels. The real building goes on inside the engine bay.
What we are looking at is a complete custom engine with a capacity of 2.2 litres instead of the standard 2.0 litres the K series engine provides. Some of the parts that have found its way inside the engine are Darton sleeves, Crower cams, titanium springs & retainers and Cosworth 12.5:1 pistons. But there is so much more, so I've decided to make a car feature on this car once its ready.
But here is one thing I still wanted to show you. It's the Hybrid Racing billet K-swap mounts. These parts look awesome and are machined from one piece.
Once I got outside I spotted this JDM Type R Integra with some old school Sprinthart CP-F wheels in 15".
I will visit them again next month to see how far they have progressed with the EG and then I'll do a full feature. I also have a feature on that Japanese blue EG in the next few days, I'm just waiting for some more info.
-Jeroen Willemsen