As usual, I had the car prepped, with some nice modifications before the trip, and a check over from MK Autos in Blackburn, plus some vinyl sticks from Gary at Stickers At Car Shows. Both always provide fantastic service.

Anyway! On to the night before, as usual we all congregated at the departure hotel in Lancaster. Friends old and new, all sitting and talking about life and the days ahead, whilst Rik, Dom, Imran and Dave all talked about the routes, the refinements, the plans for photos, etc. A couple of gins and many laughs later, we all retired ready to get up and ready for an early departure on Day 1 and the first destination of Kielder. A motorway run up the M6 and then across country, when the convoy starts you know you’re on a trip, my favourite bit!

The car was great, sounded as good as it looked, massive acceleration. Popping the odd little flame for those behind but most of all, surprising a lot of more modern machinery with the grip! 315 rear A052s will also help that, but it’s stuck to the road like a turd to a blanket. These old school JDM cars really are holding their own with the modern tyres and a good alignment on them.

When we arrived at Kielder, it was 3 things: coffee, ice cream and photos. It’s such a picturesque place, and we were so lucky to have the C5 Globemaster doing circuits that it just required patience to get the perfect picture of the Supra on the jetty with the monster flying in the background, kudos to Dave Rutter for getting this perfect shot.

Onwards to Scotland… the roads leading up towards Pitlochry as ever were stunning, amplified by this weather we had, the best of any Scotland trip in recent memory.

The rest of the trip followed this perfect recipe of slow and fast roads, scenery, wonderful hotels and fantastic people. Great food and a beer with like minded people after a day of blasting through the Scottish roads is literally just what the doctor ordered. I’m not going to go into to too much detail on the routes, as that’s specific to slap! but rest assured, it’s every bit as good for each year that passes.

Roll on slap! Scotland in 2026 – and until then, he’s a clip of the best bits.

The post Scotland with slap! Adventures first appeared on BlownByTwins.

I spoke with Peter Kop on Instagram about the supply and fit of the brakes from the Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT8. The reason I decided to go with these was that everything was OEM level quality, the calipers are Brembo, the discs are Lexus. Perfect.

These would be mated up with some Lexus IS-F brake discs, at 360mm front and 345mm rear. But there’s a problem, can you see it yet? Yes, they’re red. I don’t do red. So that needed to be remedied.

I had my friends at Auto Renew Customs in Liverpool powdercoat these for me, and my friends at Stickers at Car Shows provide replica Supra logos to make them look on point.

As you’ll see, the calipers have a notch in them to allow them to clearance a bolt on the hub. This isn’t a concern, and has been done a hundred times. Installation was rounded off with some Motul R660 fluid and stainless steel brake lines.

They look stunningly good on the car. The fitting is a little bit of a bind, but the stopping power and the look they give makes it worth it.

I am having Carbotech UK make me some pads for these, from their XP10 range which will be perfect for the projected 1000bhp the car will have in early 2026. I can’t wait!

LFG!

The post Mk4 Supra – Big Brake Kit (BBK!) first appeared on BlownByTwins.

I sent it off to get painted (along with the powder coating of the brake callipers), and the painter disputes if the legs are actually carbon, despite what’s said on the website. The paint appears to react in a way that is consistent with fibreglass, with small “pinholes” in there. It’s only really noticeable up-close, and the painter has said he will re-paint it if I’m not happy with it (when the car goes in for aerial and rear wiper removal).

The spoiler itself looks pretty good. The high-level is too high, so I moved it down to the medium level.

It’s easy enough to move the wing down to the medium level.

Now that it’s on, I’m relatively happy with how it looks.

Do I like it? Yes, I think I do. Was it worth £850 (on the Black Friday sale), probably not. The delay in the delivery really soured it for me. The lack of communication from the vendor didn’t help. It was me chasing them, not them informing me. I understand that things happen, but a quick message: Black Friday was amazing but it’s created a backlog, we are looking at 10-12 weeks now, if that’s ok? Would have been fine.

Anyway, it’s on and it’s time to research the next mods, which I think will be a Ridox front spoiler and Top Secret rear diffuser to balance it all out a bit. But what I’m most looking forward to is the OS Giken LSD and the new final drive from Neat Gearboxes!

The post Mk4 Supra – Rival Worx TRD Style spoiler first appeared on BlownByTwins.

The only real issue was the extended traffic jam and a solid hour of nose to tail traffic which saw the gearbox temperatures get close to the maximum.

On arriving at the JDM North pitch, we were placed in a pretty disappointing place, right at the back on row 3, and the end of the pitch. So we decided to make the most of it and reverse in to the pitch so at least we’d be pointing out to the passing crowd and I could get the Supra bonnet open to show off the Pulsar G40-900 and the SRD workmanship in the engine bay.

Comments were very complementary! Thank you to everyone I spoke to!

Mooching around the show was a real mix, some fantastic builds, with boundless time, energy and money put into them – right down to your ghost MOT examples, and there were a few…

Was great to meet up with Mark from Pulsar Turbos, and thank him for the endless support, and also with some old fellow R35 owners who were parked up quite close. It’s always great to see great people.

The drive home… TC set to 30% and power turned up to the max. Some controlled exits of roundabouts, power being deployed seamlessly. It’s just a joy. Then the cruise control on, via the M1 north to the M6, and settled in with some Chris Harris podcasts.

This car is special – and it’s only getting better.

The post Mk4 Supra – JapFest at Silverstone 2025 first appeared on BlownByTwins.

Suffice to say, the rear tyres are HUGE, and look even wider than the 345 on the R35, given that they’re 18 rather than 20″.

I’ve also had the TPMS sensors fitted to the TE37 from RRRacing, these are CAN based and will be integrated with the Emtron on my next visit to SRD Tuning for the final drive and the OS Giken LSD upgrade around June time.

But, after all of the maths, the measuring, how did the TE37 work out?

I don’t know any other way of saying it, other than … PERFECT. Absolutely flush.

Massive thanks to the team at Coordsport for their help and contribution discount, and also to Willow Tyres for the supply and expert fitting of the Advan A052 tyres on the precious and expensive new wheels!

The car is really coming together now, ready for the slap! Adventures Highland Fling to Scotland, in May. I’m more confortable in it, the handling is great. Made huge gains in the low speed driveability with the latest update from CANformance for CAN TCU with the shift map editor. It’s all coming together nicely, and will only get better.

Next up it’s the SRT8 brakes, and the Rival Worx rear wing.

The post Mk4 Supra | TE37 Wheels first appeared on BlownByTwins.

Within a few minutes, Lee then sent a picture of the BMW Supra A90 Gearshifter in the OEM location. The lads really aren’t messing around. It’s great to see – and at this point it’s only been 2 days.

It’s now a couple of days later… and the work continues. Lee sent me some more photos of the less sexy elements. The fuel pump going in, the bumper coming off and the trial fitting of the SRD single turbo intake manifold, complete with T4 divided flange.

For giggles, I thought I’d throw in the picture of the stock side mount intercooler, which has done the car proud for 22 years, but now it’s time to say sayonara to it, as it makes way for a much, much larger replacement. And towards the end of the day, Mike sent me the first pictures of the custom engine wiring loom. This is going to be mega.

Fast forward over the weekend and now some more pictures have dropped – at this point I’ve had some really nice messages on Social Media, saying how the build has been progressing!

The first updates were of the ZF 8HP70 gearbox being mounted up with the Garage Whifbitz installation kit, along with a fresh oil pan and fluids making sure the box is tip top.

Quickly followed by the pictures that everyone loves – the power adders! There was a miscommunication on my part with SRD, I thought we’d agree a VBand turbine housing, but we’d actually just said that it was an option as actually said T4 divided. Thankfully, Mark at Pulsar Turbos UK got me a T4 Divided Housing out in super-quick time, fantastic customer service. And as you can see, it looks the absolute bees-knees with the ETS 5″ intercooler. That’s plenty of cooling even for my lofty goals!!

Another item to add was the Zestek CAN Hub steering wheel, which not only looks MEGA, it also saves me from having to get a CAN Keypad, everything is at my fingertips. Literally. Mike did some really trick setup on this, which we’ll talk through:

• Top left: Horn
• Next across: Rolling Anti Lag enable
• Second from top right: Cruise Up / Cruise Down
• Top Right: Anti lag
• Bottom Left: Gearbox mode
• Above that: Power Steering enable/disable
• Left Rotary: 8 position traction control
• Right Rotary: Boost and Torque Management
• Remaining two: Cruise Enable/Disable and Resume.

I asked SRD to fit the KW V3 suspension, to improve the handling but also to give space for the TE37 wheels (coming soon!). These give a wonderful ride, firm and compliant. These will be great for the slap! Adventures Highland Fling to Scotland in May.

One of the last jobs was for Simon from Arch Enemy to come and roll the rear arches, ready for the Advan 315/30/18s!

Fast forward to 8th March, and I’m making my way down in the R34 to bring the Supra home (how cool does that sound!?). Let’s cut to the chase. It’s incredible. Lee, Mike, Ash and the team have done a staggering job.

The drive home was initially slow, getting to the know the car and how it drives now. I quickly got up to speed though, and then I heard it. The noise. Oh, my god, the noise. It sounds so deep and the induction noise is a bit Darth Vader-like. I can’t get enough of it. The power delivery with the smoothness of the Emtron and the response of the Pulsar G40-900 combined with the quick shifts of the CAN TCU powered 8HP70 makes this a real weapon.

Power is 558whp, which is about 620bhp, but it’s the torque, 700Nm or 520lb/ft from 4200rpm makes this thing a riot on the road. The short ratios of the 8 speed make it feel a lot quicker than the numbers suggest. We have done some work on the Engine <-> Gearbox mapping to bring it more inline with my own tastes, but other than that, it’s absolutely bang on.

With the new final drive, OS Giken LSD and 3.4 build coming this year, it’s going to be a hell of street car.

SRD Tuning – you have been heroes. And here’s a video Ash did on my car.

The post Mk4 Supra – The Big Single and 8 Speed! first appeared on BlownByTwins.

After a drive out with the better half in November, I noticed on the return journey that the car temperature was sitting at 56 degrees. I thought was unusual. The following day, I went out again and it sat at 60 degrees. It was a warmer ambient. I came home and scanned the car for codes, nothing, and the only thing I could think of is that it was the thermostat. So on the Monday I phoned Litchfield and was invited to bring the car down for inspection. They didn’t have a Saturday appointment till Jan 25th, which wasn’t the end of the world. I rarely use the GTR around December/January due to the attrocious weather we get here on the Mersey coast.

Fast forward, and I’m off to Litchfield in -2 degrees temperatures, doing 70ish on the motorway, temperatures steady at 58. I slow down and pull in behind a HGV. Temperatures increase 64 with the lack of airflow directly at the car. Better. I get some warm air through the vents.

Around 2 hours after arriving at Litchfield, I’m on my way. It was the thermostat, I’m a mechanical genius. And on the way home, I treated myself to some boost, some dump valve chirps, warm air and a few overtakes.

It’s still mega.

Back down in March for service and an MOT. Then it may be time to think about a new car?

The post R35 GTR: Time for a new thermostat first appeared on BlownByTwins.

13/11/2024: Current Specs for R34 GTR

Overview & Quick Specs @ 13th November, 2024

• Engine: 2.6l I6, single turbo
• Horsepower (bhp) and Torque (Nm): 513whp& 451lb/ft.
• Top Speed: 180mph
• 0-60 mph: 4s.
• Weight: 1666kg
• Transmission: V160 – 6 speed

Detailed Specifications & Modifications

• Engine & Performance:
  • Intake: Rajab Racing RB26 Intake Manifold and Pipercross Intake
  • Exhaust: 3.5 Tomei Titanium.
  • Forced Induction: 6 Boost manifold with Pulsar G30-770 and 60mm wastegate.
  • Fuel System: ASNU 1050cc with Walbro 400lph pump.
  • ECU: Emtron KV8, running Throttle Mass Flow
  • Other: Tomei 260 poncams, with 9.15mm lift
• Drivetrain & Transmission:
  • V160 with Exedy Twin Plate Carbon Clutch.
  • Stock front, with Cusco rear differential.
• Suspension & Brakes:
  • Suspension: Ohlins Road and Track Premium Suspension
  • Brakes: Endless pads, and OEM discs on standard calipers.
• Wheels & Tyres:
  • Rays TE37, 18×9.5+12 all round
  • Michelin Pilot Sport 4S. 265/35/18 all round.
• Aero & Body:
  • Mutlistage machine polish with and ceramic coating by Detail and Protect.
• Interior & Tech:
  • Corbeau RRB seats with Luke harnesses.
  • Momo Steering Wheel
  • Joying Android Headunit.

The post R34 GTR | Latest Specs first appeared on BlownByTwins.

13/11/2024: Current Specs for R35 GTR

Overview & Quick Specs @ 13th November, 2024

• Engine: 3.8l V6, twin turbo. Litchfield Stage 4.5
• Horsepower (bhp) and Torque (Nm): 767bhp & 645lb/ft.
• Top Speed: 206mph
• 0-60 mph: 2.8s.
• Weight: 1752kg
• Transmission: GR6 – Stock

Detailed Specifications & Modifications

• Engine & Performance:
  • Intake: Pipercross Intake and hybrid MAF/SD
  • Exhaust: Linney Street 102mm Titanium.
  • Forced Induction: Nissan / NISMO GT3 Turbos.
  • Fuel System: ASNU 1050cc with Walbro 400lph pump.
  • ECU: EcuTek v8.1 with Litchfield map.
• Drivetrain & Transmission:
  • Stock GR6.
  • Stock front and rear differentials.
• Suspension & Brakes:
  • Suspension: Litchfield Suspension setup for fast road with Litchfield alignment.
  • Brakes: Alcon Superkit with 400mm discs and 6 piston calipers upfront and 4 piston at the rear.
• Wheels & Tyres:
  • Vossen HF3: Front 20×10+30; Rear 20×12+20
  • Michelin Pilot Sport 4S. Front: 285/35/20; Rear: 345/30/20.
• Aero & Body:
  • Litchfield LM20 Carbon front lip and rear carbon inserts
  • Mutlistage machine polish with PPF by Detail and Protect.
  • PPF carbon effect roof by Detail and Protect
• Interior & Tech:
  • R35 Audio alcantara steering wheel.
  • Tech add-ons like dash cams, upgraded audio, and other installed gadgets.

The post R35 GTR | Latest Specs first appeared on BlownByTwins.

13/11/2024: Current Specs for Supra VVTi

Overview & Quick Specs @ 13th November, 2024

• Engine: 2.6l I6, single turbo
• Horsepower (bhp) and Torque (Nm): 355bhp& 338lb/ft.
• Top Speed: 160mph
• 0-60 mph: 6s.
• Weight: 1530kg
• Transmission: A340- 4 speed

Detailed Specifications & Modifications

• Engine & Performance:
  • Intake: Stock
  • Exhaust: 3″ decat
  • Forced Induction: Stock twin turbos.
  • Fuel System: Stock.
  • ECU: Stock
  • Other: Stock
• Drivetrain & Transmission:
  • A343E tiptronic
  • Stock A02B differential.
• Suspension & Brakes:
  • Suspension: Lowering springs on OEM shocks -20mm
  • Brakes: OEM.
• Wheels & Tyres:
  • Volk GT7 – 19″
  • Michelin Pilot Sport 4S. 265/35/19 all round.
• Aero & Body:
  • Stock with rear wiper delete
• Interior & Tech:
  • JC Clubsport Rear Seat Delete
  • Stock interior and trim

The post Supra VVTi | Latest Specs first appeared on BlownByTwins.