I was even more impressed once I had seen the auction sheet. Like mine, this car was a genuine V-Spec, but this car was a 1995 in Super Clear Red AN0 - a genuine red R33, rather than my repainted car that was once silver. The car was given grade 4, which was very good - mine was a grade 4.5, but I'm not judging, especially since mine was owned by an older fellow who scarcely drove it.


Imagine my surprise when I heard that the car had a Nismo 2.8L bottom end, installed by the previous owner! Apparently, the car had been intended to be a sleeper of sorts - no body upgrades except the N1 vents and the oil cooler system (installed at the same time as the engine), and some upgraded suspension with stock ride height. Originally, the car rode on white 18" TE37s and some Bridgestone tires, but these were swapped back before the car was sold. The brakes, while upgraded with period-correct Nismo parts, weren't awesome; they were going to have to be one of the first things we replaced.

A few months later, the car had crossed the Pacific and was on US shores. The Japanese plates were gone, and the car had proper US paperwork [note: pretend this is 2020 and this R33 would be legal to import!].


I was a little envious: while GT-R ownership feels incredibly special on many levels, I had gotten used to it a little, while Jake had just taken ownership of his car.


He drove it around as it was for a while, then he ordered some parts when the tuning bug bit. He bought a single-turbo conversion before he really knew what he was dealing with, as well as 3.545 final drive ratio gears - which made the car fast, but really brought out that the brakes were feeling a little inadequate. It was when he was going to install the brake upgrade that he decided to call me - if only to take some pictures.

Jake's garage is very nice, but it's a little cramped - although the cramped setting took me back to older days, in any case.


Stock wheels and brakes before they were removed. The tires were new, so that was good news, but we were going to sell them regardless to fit the bigger brakes.


I must admit I'm made a little jealous by his final wheel selection, and nostalgic for the set of Advans I had on my R33 a long time ago. He bought a set of black Enkei RS05RR wheels - shout out to Boss' Crew again for sourcing these! Brakes were 355mm vented discs in front and 332mm in the rear, with Brembo six-pot calipers in the front and four-pots in the rear.

I had suggested that, as a bit of a different look, he go with blue accents to contrast the red; he got ahead of me considerably, and went and painted all of the parts he wanted installed while they were off of the car. In addition to more Wine Red paint, he got some powder coat matching an R33 blue from the same paint vendor.


We took the hood and front bumper off...


...and it wasn't too hard to get the valve and timing covers off, shortly after. (Here, I set the camera up on a tripod, to get a bit of a "time lapse" view of us refreshing the engine.)


The camshafts already in the car were fine as they were, but Jake decided to go with some HKS cam gears for durability. While we had everything apart, we replaced the ignition system and the cam angle sensor. (He had already gotten the engine taken apart and refreshed once, with the single-turbo conversion, but he wanted to go for some better electrical parts and I sure wasn't about to disagree.)


The valve covers were painted ahead of time, too; seemed wasteful to buy another set, paint them, and then sell the originals, but that's what he did - and it somehow seemed more cost-effective than painting the originals!


I couldn't keep my eyes off of the painted body kit parts! Apparently, Jake liked the Nismo front bumper and lip on my car enough to buy a replica set. (If it were me, I might have kept the original front bumper. He evidently decided otherwise. Maybe I'm just envious?)


Instead of the stock hood, he got a JUN Auto hood and matching hood pins. Also, I helped him source some clear indicators from the same place I got mine.


I remembered what it took to take the sideskirts off on my car; Jake told me he didn't want to try it himself, for fear of breaking some of the clips. Not exactly super easy, but it's doable.


And they're off!


JUN Auto side skirts. (Neither of us have Nismo side skirts; when I find a source, I've promised him first dibs.)


This was a genuine V-Spec, with the V-Spec rear spats and the rear garnish off of a contemporary GTS25t. Because of this, Jake decided to keep the V-Spec spats and go with a diffuser. While we were doing that, he asked me to help him fit the new muffler.


The diffuser was a lot harder to install than anything else - trying not to scratch the carbon fiber, even if I knew it'd get a little scratched later anyway, was tough. In addition to the diffuser, he got some carbon wing pieces from the same shop that made the custom carbon on my car.


The stock GT-R seats are nice - so nice that Nissan didn't see a reason to change them between the first BNR32 and the last BCNR33 - but they aren't perfect.


Jake got a set of Bride Zeta III reclining seats as replacements. While he was at it, somehow the lucky dude found a pair of genuine Ganador mirrors!


While we were only really putting together some cosmetic parts on the car, not overhauling anything major (other than the brakes, wheels, and diffuser), the car looked completely different after we were done!