It's a cold Sunday afternoon in the midst of a California winter. That means a light sweater from the Gap and a cup of hot tea to keep us warm. No big, puffy Starter jackets, scarves, or mittens-it's only 68 degrees out. Yes, 68 degrees. The sun usually sets at about 4:45 in the afternoon, and on that particular day my watch read 4:02 p.m. I hadn't even started shooting photos yet! You see, when you've used up just about every photo shoot location at least twice, the ease of finding another spot without a lot of overpowering shadows decreases with each passing moment. And you know, for us Super Street writers, finding that back alley with plenty of trash in the background can be a challenging feat. But not on that day. I was determined to find something anything. And, oh yes, I found it.
I'm not going to give the exact location where I shot Deanne Suwa's Accord. I mean, I wouldn't want other competing magazines fighting for the same spot of background garbage as I, nor do I think they could handle the stench that often comes with the territory. But if you really need a clue, just drive yourself no further than a mile from the center of Little Tokyo in beautiful downtown Los Angeles. Here, you'll find the greatest back streets that Southern California has to offer-including one of the best backdrops that I've ever shot against. But you don't really care about SoCal or our weather, do you? Of course not-on with the car!
With little sunlight remaining, I finally chose an area that had two blind stop signs, and where did I decide to shoot? Smack dab in the middle. When you have a haircut that's as bad as mine, you actually grow a pair of balls when you decide to step into the public eye and do these sort of things. The first couple of rolls that I shot off (I said "shot off."-JW) took care of the exterior. The bodywork is actually really clean and well executed, unlike other Import Showoff-esque type of offerings, which sometimes look like rolling piles of dung. AutoNetwork installed all the body parts, including a Trust front chin spoiler, Wings West sides and mid-wing, and not only resprayed the chassis with a Lexus tri-metal metallic pearl hue but also custom modified a rear lip from a '94 Accord to fit and shaved off a few unnecessary pieces (hood squirters, moldings, and emblems). Whoa, that's certainly a mouthful! And to give it that JDM-approved thumbs up, Deanne installed a set of JDM headlights and corner lights.
Inching our way towards nightfall, we fiddle around in the engine bay. Only a few notables here, but damn, it's spotless (Are you noticing a pattern yet?-JW). No T3/T4 turbo kit in here, no Prelude H22 conversion, either-just a GReddy Airinx intake, HP Racing header, and a Tanabe Racing Medallion exhaust to increase performance. Everything else is purely cosmetic: a chrome valve cover from Matrix, silicone hosing from Hose Techniques, two caps (oil and radiator) from GReddy, and spark plug wires from Vitek do small wonders for the stock Accord motor.
On the way over, I noticed how rough, but stable, the ride was. Every dip was approached with caution, and at every bump, we cringed. Still, the ride was smooth. This is where the Konig shameless plug comes in. The company's 24-way adjustable coilovers provide the ability to raise or lower the car upon demand. Usually, the car sits a couple inches higher, but for this shoot, it was dumped to the ground. For further handling improvement, Deanne also placed a Tanabe strut bar on top of the front struts, a proven weakpoint for most Honda chassis. To complement the drop, a set of bronze 18x7.5 Volk SE37s were bolted on to fill in the wheelwell gap. And to improve stopping power all around, cross-drilled rotors from Power Stop were installed.
Deanne's most proud of her interior-not because it's filled with a rollcage that has 23 different twists and configurations and that oh-so-original two-tone pleather reskin. Nope, it doesn't have any kind of crap. From your point of view it's mostly stock, but dig through it with a fine-tooth comb. The door panel inserts were reupholstered with white kimono silk by Apollo Interiors, something I've never seen before. Of course, you have a variable cornucopia of trinkets in here, too-a Legend 5 carbon-fiber dash kit, APC gauges, a shift knob and pedal set from Räzo, custom black lighting underneath the dash, an Ignited push-start button, and a Fizz voltmeter. The stereo system in this car is also very worthy of mention.
Through Greg Sound, of Alhambra, California, a complete setup was installed using a Pioneer DEH-P6300 CD head unit with the rest of the components coming straight from the Lightning Audio warehouse, including two 300-watt and one 600-watt digital amplifier, two 12-inch subwoofers, a pair of 6x9s, 5.25 convertibles, all related wiring/cables, bass controller, platinum fuse holders and battery terminals, and three capacitors. Even though there's quite a bit of equipment here, it's all well hidden and out of plain sight.
So by the time we finished, it was well past dark, and neither the sight nor smell of garbage bothered us any longer. The temperature dropped to a brisk 63 degrees, and we decided that this was just plain freezing. Darn us, Southern Californians-such babies.