By: Battling Seizure Robots
You can keep your car show trophies. And your drag race awards. You may think you know--but you have no idea. Don't get us wrong--Best of Show is nothing to scoff at and tearing up the quarter-mile with a blistering e.t. is an admirable achievement. While Jonny loves the terms "dress up" and "drag," to the Japanese they hold little meaning in terms of tuner prestige. Right now, in Japan, everything revolves around the Tsukuba circuit in the Ibaragi prefecture. To be more specific, everything revolves around how quickly a car can navigate its way around the 1.294-mile circuit. Magazines like Option2 and Rev Speed present time attack challenges at Tsukuba where they invite Japan's top tuners to battle it out against the clock. This circuit with its long fast straight and tight corners makes for a true test of both chassis balance and raw power and it is widely recognized as Japan's unofficial time attack track.
As much as we love the Big Mac attack and that hi-brow Fox special, When Animals Attack, we love the time attack even more. Shortly after the 2002 Tokyo Auto Salon, RE Amemiya's RE Super G RX-7 held the title of Japan's fastest street car with a 57.786-second lap time at Tsukuba. We featured the car on our August '02 cover. Our January '03 cover featured the HKS Lancer Evo VII, which obliterated Amemiya's time with a 56.814. As of this writing, an Evo holds the record at Tsukuba, but not the HKS car. On December 12, 2002, JGTC driver Mitsuhiro Kinoshita piloted the JUN Hyper Lemon Evo V to a new time attack record with a 55.976-second lap time.
The crew at JUN Auto Mechanic has created an impressive racing resume with successful forays into everything from drag racing to top speed contests and they are fully aware of how quickly the time attack crown can be lost. With that in mind, they created this JUN Super Lemon GDB (which is the chassis code for the WRX). This '00 Subaru Impreza WRX STi is meant to pick up where the Hyper Lemon Evo V left off. How do you top a 558hp Evo? This was easy enough for JUN as the Super Lemon GDB packs a whopping 582hp @ 7,600rpm with 495lb-ft of torque at 5,600rpm from its stroked flat four.
In its first shakedown at Tsukuba on December 5, 2002, Manabu Orido pushed the Super Lemon WRX to a 58.239-second lap time. In only its first outing, this WRX lays claim to the title of the fastest Impreza in Japan. Not bad at all, but we could have done way better. So what if Orido-san's day job is driving the number 39 Denso Sard Supra GT in the JGTC's GT 500 class? We've logged hundreds of hours on GT3. And who cares if he's one of only three official D1GP judges? We've seen Initial D. And our teachers told us that eating paste would damage our brains, but look at how well- adjusted we are now.
But the Super Lemon GDB is anything but well-adjusted as its been tuned, tweaked, and beaten to within an inch of its life. JUN released the hounds of hell on this EJ20. Since there's no replacement for displacement, JUN got the party started with one of its 2.5L stroker kits that includes a JUN crankshaft, 100mm pistons, rings, and connecting rods. In an effort to clean up our image, we'll try to refrain from any cheap stroked rod puns. The top end of what JUN now refers to as the EJ25--as a result of the increased displacement--was treated to the company's own racing valvesprings, titanium retainers, and high-lift cams complete with a set of Slide cam sprockets.
Take a look at the intricate network of pipes snaking through the engine bay. This motor features even more craftsmanship than Otto's shop project. First of all, the Trust TD06 25G SH turbocharger--mounted on a JUN prototype exhaust manifold--takes the intake charge from the custom piping on the left of the engine bay. From here, the charged air is sent through the centerpipe to the massive Trust Twin Core intercooler, which is canted forward and somehow wedged behind the grille. Each end tank feeds more hefty piping that leads to a pair of prototype surge-tank intake manifolds housing four individual throttle bodies. A Sard fuel regulator and Bosch fuel pump sends the juice in through a JUN fuel rail and 1,000cc injectors. Ouch. All of this engineering makes our heads hurt.
Excuse us for a moment while we eat some paste...aaah, now we feel better. Other trick items include the JUN aluminum V-mount radiator, set at an angle behind the big mouth of the JUN front bumper spoiler. The JUN original titanium exhaust is yet another prototype piece. JUN's approach to managing this beast is even freakier. A Trust e-01 e-Manage system is only used as a boost controller and an HKS F-Con V-Pro is employed for fuel management, while a hopped-up JUN Sports Computer ECU controls the entire package.
A weak point with every tuned WRX has always been the drivetrain's reluctance to handle too much power. This Hyper's 582 ponies could rightly be defined as too much power and JUN addressed this challenge with a prototype twin plate clutch, and a regular front and RS one-way rear limited-slip differntial--all from Cusco. Footwork consists of 18-inch Advan RGs with ultra sticky A048 rubbers suspended by Zeal Super Function SPL coilovers with Cusco pillow-ball mounts. Endless six-pot brakes help Orido-san shave some speed when he flies into Tsukuba's tight sections.
Inside, JUN stitch-welded every seam and added some serious cage work. All Orido-san gets is a Recaro saddle, Simpson harness, Personal wheel and one of Sard's Stack gauge clusters. We would have added at least five flip-top monitors all playing The Matrix--because the judges always give extra points for The Matrix.
Knowing JUN, it won't be too long before they extend the record they already own. Our aspirations aren't so lofty. We're trying to save up for a stint at The Betty Ford Center to help us kick this nasty paste habit. Mmmm, paste.