T TypeOne

Japan Day Four: SEEKER

Sep 27, 2017

As the sun went down we headed into the outskirts of Tokyo. I didn’t attempt to take any pictures while driving because they would have all ended up useless anyway.

After driving for a few hours the DC5 was running low on fuel so we decided to stop off at another rest area to fill up and grab some dinner. We rolled in and parked next to this wicked looking Toyota Levin track car. This thing looked like something you’d see in an old Option video tearing up a mountain pass.

Throughout my stay in Japan, I had people asking me if I was going to eat at McDonald’s. I’m not a huge McDonald’s fan here in the USA so naturally I didn’t plan on eating it in Japan. However after a few days of eating only bowls of noodle soup, an American hamburger sounded great. We walked in and while there were other various places to eat we walked up and ordered some burgers… well… Tim did… I just pointed to what I wanted.

The menu looks similar to the one in America.

This lady was confused as to why I was taking pictures of people standing in line. Like always, I smiled and giggled and then she smiled and walked off.

We got simple quarter pounders with fries, and I got a small box of nuggets as everyone was curious if they were the same as well. The verdict is in… it tastes the same. It was just as good as the food over here, albeit constructed with more care. We also all agreed that the nuggets tasted exactly the same. There was an interested menu choice called the teriyaki burger, Tim advised me to stay away from it and like always, I took his word.

With our stomach’s filled with McDonald’s we walked out to the parking lot and there were some weird looking cars outside. I have no idea what this thing is… some sort of Toyota. There was also a gathering of drift cars but it was too sketchy to take pictures, I didn’t want to get shot… or… stabbed with a sword. Tim mentioned most of the drift cars were from Yokohama which was fairly far away so they had to be meeting up to go slide somewhere.

I did manage to snap a picture of this R33 Skyline which had a sticker on the back that said “troublemaker.”

We made it back to the car and stopped to fuel up and then headed into Tokyo.

A few hours later we made it to Chiba and to the Tokyo Bay Makuhari Hotel; if anyone has ever been to TAS (Tokyo Auto Salon) this is the hotel that is across the street from the convention center.

If I have any serious complaints about my stay in Japan is how HOT it is in every single building. I’m not joking when I say that the hotel hallways are at least 90*f. It was so extremely hot that just standing in the hallway would cause you to sweat. Will and I had to navigate through the hotel not knowing how to speak or read anything and for the most part it wasn’t difficult as most people at the hotel could speak and understand SOME English… however, when we arrived to our room it was a blistering 89*f inside. I turned the thermostat all the way down and nothing happened. It was like there was one single AC unit for the whole building cooling all of the rooms, the air was barely blowing out of the vent.

So I had to call down stairs to the front desk and talk to receptionist like a child to get them to understand that it wasn’t working. My Japanglish wasn’t cutting it and needless to say, we sweated our asses off that night.

The next morning we cleaned up and went downstairs to meet Tim as he was coming to pick us up. Before we left we sent a huge package to his house which had some of our parts, as well as stickers and Awesome Sauce to hand out.

… but it’s ok to smoke while standing?

2004-ish Honda Ediux.

Nissan Stagea perhaps?

A few minutes later we heard the rumble of Tim’s DC5 coming down the street, I love his car.

We packed in and headed to Tim’s house to grab the package that was to be delivered that morning.

Chiba was a nice place… somewhat crowded and cramped but a very nice, clean place.

JDM ambulances.

We got to Tim’s house, waiting a while for the package and then after it finally arrived we headed into Tokyo on our first stop which was SEEKER. Although it’s a small shop, you can’t miss a parking lot like this.

DC5, EK9, FD2, EG6, DC5 and a Mugen RR FD2… a parking lot full of JDM Honda superstars.

Blue on blue DC5 with Volk RE30s.

Super clean EK9 on staggered CE28′s and C-West front bumper.

The famous SEEKER demo Civic FD2. Unfortunately the engine had been pulled out so we didn’t have a change to go for a ride in this beast.

The SEEKER demo EG6. If anyone watches the Japanese Togue battle videos, but this is the car that Orido crashes into the tree. Check out that video here.

A customers Mugen Civic RR. This thing was here for a K-TECH engine which, if you don’t know what that is, you will shortly.

Cool looking wheels…? Nope. Curbed checked all the way around. >_< Not on a Mugen RR!!

SEEKER demo CR-Z. This is really one of the few CR-Z’s I actually like. Some of the body kits and aero parts out there for these cars just don’t look right… but SEEKER’s lip kit get’s it right.

I love the center exit exhaust setup.

Spoon calipers and Volk Racing G2 wheels.

Tim’s awesome DC5.

This is Ryo Teraoka’s, the founder and owner of SEEKER, daily driver… a new Honda Fit RS.

We walked around and I spotted Ko Omino doing some work on a customer EG6.

This was a fairly clean EG6… Spoon SW388′s and a Mugen exhaust. I don’t care for the clear corner lights and projector headlights, but hey… it’s Japan. ;-)

Boxes of awesome parts waiting to be installed on a customer’s car.

You can see how close the garage is to the street… I literally almost got ran over by a dozen people on bicycles after taking this picture.

With one garage bay and one small office full of parts, SEEKER is the quintessential Japanese Tuner.

With parts, books and magazines stacked up, you can tell that the guys from SEEKER do work.

Who says parts can’t be art? I have never seen a nicer header in my years of being in this business. These headers are hand built by a guy that has been making headers for most of his life. With a combined effort from K-TECH and SEEKER these are not only some of the highest quality parts I’ve ever seen, they are also some of the most expensive. In some cases, these headers can cost upwards of $3000 each.Think it just looks like any other hand made header? We will get into more detail in next weeks blog when we visit one of the worlds top Honda engine builder and tuner, K-TECH.

Another exhaust manifold made by SEEKER and K-TECH. The craftsmanship on these parts are just amazing…

Spoon Rigid Collars were found on the lower shelf. Teraoka San said these were really good parts and recommends them to his customers.

More SEEKER parts and Takata belts…

SEEKER parts as well as various other bits.

SEEKER Clutch kits.

SEEKER oil caps, seat belt clips and badges… we will have all of these bits in stock soon, so if you, or anyone you know wants SEEKER goods… email us Sales@hybrid-racing.com. We offer the full line of SEEKER goods.

Team SEEKER shirt with all of their affiliates listed. We got a few. ;-)

This is the K-TECH built engine out of the SEEKER FD2. I believe this motor was going into the Mugen RR that was parked outside.

Omino San was finished up with the EG6 and it was time to pull Tim’s DC5 in for a fluid change. In two days we would go to Tsukuba 1000 circuit so it was time Tim put fresh oils in his car before he hammered the shit out of it.

We also installed our newest shifter for the DC5, which Tim used during our stay in Japan.

The man himself, Ryo Teraoka testing out the shifter for himself. He liked it and was impressed by the feel. It was called something similar to what Suzuki San at BYS said, “maniac.” He did suggest that we make the springs slightly softer for the Japanese market as their arms would get tired from shifting. ^_^ I guess our American arms are too big… haha

Motul and Omega oils are found in this place… not much else.

All of the tools you need and nothing you don’t. Because of the limited space these guys have to be very picky about the stuff they keep inside.

We had Teraoka San and Omino San sign some of their catalogs for us. Sadly this is where my coverage gets spotty because I was using two different cameras and I left some of the pictures on a card in Japan… SO… until I have that card back, this will be about it. I will post another update on SEEKER’s shop when I get more images.

The guys offered to show us the EG6 so we went outside to check it out. I loved the front fenders on this car… you can tell they are widened a bit but it doesn’t look over the top.

The 17×9 inch front wheels certainly don’t look out of place when combined with the C-WEST bumper and widen fenders. It’s hard to tell in this picture, but the door skin was raised up as well to help with the lines of the wide front fenders. I have more pictures of it on my other camera card.

The inside of the car is all business.

Like I mentioned before, I have more pictures of SEEKER, but none that are in my possession. I’ll post more up once I can, and I want to thank Ryo and Ko for being so cool and open to us coming in and hanging out. We also had a chance to talk with them a lot about their company and where they feel like Honda is going. Once I get more interesting things to look at, I’ll post it all up.

It was time to head back to the hotel as we had to get up early the next morning to visit K-TECH as well as stop by for a visit at Spoon. On the way our we drove by TypeOne which is the installer and tuner garage for Spoon. Sadly they had been doing renovations to the facility for the last few weeks and were closed while we were there so we didn’t have a chance to stop in.

Across the street was another garage with a nice STi poking out of the bay door.

These guys reminded me of Initial D. haha

A nice Supra Turbo that I saw sitting in traffic.

Another huge Honda Dream motorcycle dealership.

He spotted me as I was snapping away. I could be paparazzi, but too bad most of the pictures would blurry. -__-

Further down the street I spotted Spoon headquarters. We will visit here the following morning and didn’t know we would be in for an unexpected surprise.

JDM scooter gang!

Skyline R33 GT-R.

We pulled up to eat dinner and I spotted this in the back of the parking lot. WTF! A suburban! Check out the cool JDM sidemarkers and notice how it almost doesn’t fit into the parking spot.I couldn’t imagine driving this thing around on the streets… you’d run into everything.

We are at Saizeriya… I have no idea how to say it, but it was like JDM-Italian-ish food.

While we were eating it started pouring outside and I thought that it was interesting, but practical, that there was a specific bicycle parking area.

More Japanese animation on signs… I love it.

That is it for this week… we headed back to the room to sweat more. Tim and I ended up doing some street tuning on his car and I drove the DC5 around Tokyo bay a bit. It was totally illegal but worth it!!

For more information regarding SEEKER parts, shoot us an email: Sales@hybrid-racing.com

-David

 

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