As I walked past this red Nissan Silvia S15 while heading towards the inner paddock at Nikko Circuit during N-Style’s Black Mark Day, I caught something out of the corner of my eye.
Without even thinking about it I doubled back to have a closer look. Wait a second!
The surprise was more due to the fact that you don’t really see RB26 swaps into S-chassis cars in Japan anymore. I used to come across them quite often back in the day, but with the way SR20 tuning has been pushed of late, not to mention the way turbo technology has evolved in the last few years, you’re able to make serious power without needing to add quite so much weight to the front of the car.
But then again, it certainly doesn’t look as cool as this, right?!
Judging by the ferocity of this car out on track, the high-mounted KKK turbochargers are pushing decent amounts of boost, and the driver certainly knew how to use all the power they generate.
In no way did the car look front-heavy – the front wheels bit down hard with some good grip, and the driver was able to switch from left to right corners very smoothly.
The car was sitting on a set of Work VS-XX wheels with the rears pretty much changing at each outing. Go turbo and you eat through rubber!
The stock fenders have been cut and covered with flares to allow a more aggressive offset to be run on the rear wheels.
My favourite detail was the drag-type spoiler at the rear – an addition that gives a totally unique look to such a popular chassis.
Now here’s an interior totally geared towards drifting. Each of the three center ventilation outlets have been sacrificed to hold gauges, and the handbrake has been modified with what looks like a lever extension.
And then you have this, an Ikeya Formula sequential shifter – something I hadn’t seen in a very long time. It’s effectively a box of magic that turns every backwards pull of the lever into a corresponding H-pattern shift, and an upward click into a downshift. It’s a cheaper alternative to a sequential gearbox, but the drop in shift speeds is certainly there.
A nice final touch to what was the most unique S15 at Black Mark Day.