Ken Hayashi Aka @CaptBradford - EP.115

Hey, and welcome back to the next episode of the right hand drive guys podcast the podcast for guys who like right hand drivesI'm Bobby. This is Aaron. Yeah, go and this is episode

115 and we appreciate you listening along with us and if you're JDM heads like us then you're definitely gonna be excited aboutWho we have on this week andthis manSome people know him some people have no clue who he is but a lot of people have seen his InstagramHis name is Ken and his Instagram is atcapped ca pt Bradford andWhat is he what is he know like what is he known for on Instagram?

Basically just posting super technicalspecs to certain race cars and just behind the scenes typeType knowledge, I guess you could sayYeah, but he goes way beyond that I think yeah his knowledge isextremely vast and I got to meet him firsthand he lives in JapanAnd I got to meet him firsthand when he brought me in a group of my friends tothe Nissan Heritage Collection

Yeah, and instead of using the in this is funny instead of using the Nissanpaid tour guide. Yeah, we said no, no, we're good. We have Ken

And Ken took us around and literally I was mind blown the way that this man talks likeThe his intelligence level is like so high and andSame with his like memory retention like the amount of stuff that he knows isIs just mind blowing so after meeting him I might do we got to get him on the podcastWe're kind of nervous to get him on the podcast to be honest. Yeah, because

He can very easily talk over our heads and he's just knows so much. He knows so much that

Scrolling his Instagram you see that too like holy cow like this guy read the captions dude, and it's like whoaYeah, andSo you know a brief low background on Ken Ken used to drive for the Mitsubishi Rally teamYeah, and he helped develop the evo 7 so he worked for Mitsubishi for quite a long time andI thinkYou know probably his background in motorsports just kind of brought him down that road of knowing damn near everything

Yeah, so yeah, let's get to it. Let's see what Ken has to say

This is episode one 15All right, and we're back with Ken. Hi, is she what's up Ken?

Oh, I'm a fine. You doing guys inviting me absolutely here

We I knew after our Nissan Heritage tour. I was like man there

We have to get this guy on here. He is a wealth of knowledge and he loves to share it

Thank youBut so you know, I know who you are Aaron kind of knows who you are, but let's give the listeners just a little rundownYou know who is Ken?

So there's a lot of Ken's in the world a lot of Ken in Japan. It's a quite a common name

But maybe viewers or listeners might have heard my voice before on this YouTubeWell kind of now to front YouTube channel called JDM Masters, which I used to be the host ofand of course I mainly talk aboutJapanese cars or what you call JDM review them and go to shops andI've been in the car industry forWow, maybe more than 25 years 27 years or something andIn the beginning I used to I used to work with its V-SIM Motors actually and I was involved in WRC as

a as an engineer and then later on I did some competition and became a rallyRadist, a rally driver, a specialist and later on moved on into doing motorsportsengineering and logistics and logistics andall the while I was also a kind of journalist for some magazinesinternationally andI got to know quite a lot of people my my master was one of talking a lot of things in industry started to help me to get into the

motorsports industry so I was a bit with super thank you andeven things like WEC and and then I started to become a kind of like amedia, especially so I started to organize events and do logistics for car companies like Matsuda andlater ondecided with the with a friendThey encourage me to do YouTube channel andTo talk about cars and review cars and because I love cars and I've been all many cars in my life as well

So to just share knowledge with people outside of Japan who love Japanese company also the pointers to keep Japanese car culture and historyBecause as you know now we have internet and the internet isWho's not very accurate so that kind of got me thinking no we need to have accurate informationEnglish and so I hope that I canShare with people about you know the real car culture and history of Japanese cars

Yeah, that's that's basically it. Yeah, and I agree

You know with the internet things have become diluted as far as this knowledgeYou know there's specs of truth in there and it is nice to have somebody who truly cares about keeping it honest so to speakSo yeah, I mean we're excited to hear what you have to say manso the the first thing I want to kind of talk about was you knowObviously we're kind of here in America. You're you're there in in Japan and

Like the ownership of cars in Japan. I feel like through my experience

It's kind of looked at a little bit differently than we do over here in AmericaWhat would you what how could you elaborate on that?

Ownership of cars in Japan first of allWe have to consider thatUnlike American where I think my get the impression Americans use cars in a very different wayIt's a basic mode of transportSo I don't know like unless you live in New York City or some very built up areaEverybody needs the car to travel around even to go to the shops. Am I right?

Yeah, and of course that is the same in rule like more countryside or we call Inaka areasSo basically where I live is quite near HakoneEven though it's in Kanagawa prefecture not too far from YokohamaBut if we don't have a car we can't go to the shops. However, the car ownership

Problem with Japan is space still compared to AmericaWe don't have a lot of space so even though we need the car to go to the supermarket because in a countryside area theIt probably transport is not really good a lot of people use bicycles of courseandThe car is the sole means of like you know to use to go in daily lifeBut houses are still small. There's only car park space for one car if you're lucky

You have two if you live in a in a kind of a apartment you have to rent the car park spaceWhich is quite expensive so this limits people for like freely owningMultiple cars for example. I'm talking about like really basic, you know like normal people who are not car enthusiasts and

To own a car in Japan. You need it's quite trouble through you need to get a

Some what we call Shako Shome which is a permit from the police to verify your car park space andBefore you own a car you need to get this and then you need to get the check shakkan which is like ayearly inspection in order to just own one car if you want to own a second car you need to prove you have space a lot of people rent acar park space and it varies in pricesFrom as much as from as least it's five five thousand year where I live

to20 to even 40,000 in places like Yokohama and Tokyo so this is something like in Hong Kong for example where space is a premiumSo the idea of ownership of owning a car here is just like it's a very important tool andpeople also are very cautious aboutYou know the maintenance of it and most normal people would send it to either the dealer or to a workshop people rarely rarely do

Work but it is even guys who are our partners is the reasons because as I mentioned about the spaceThere is basically no space to DIY. I mean can you imagine like there's some young guys in the past who would just like check out the car in the rented

You know for four four meters by two and a half metersChange the tiresThis is this is really normal so a lot of people don't do DIYBut I think from the outset this is the biggest differencein basic car ownershipPeople trust the workshop or the dealer and it's of course very expensive to call a basic carYeah, and I guess that makes sense as to why you know the shops are more plentiful because you do have

You know this large population of people who as you said can't really do DIYyou knowThat has basic maintenance and so they do need to kind of bring it to a shopI guess that because I always wondered you know like why does Japan have so many more known shops than us and I guess it makes senseThere aren't guys in their garage just pulling the motor by themselves reallySo in America they're much less garages or shopsYeah, for sure. I mean

Yeah, yeah, I mean of course there are some especially in highly populatedareas, but I mean it's not like Japan especially like very notable shopsYeah, tuning shops especially like aftermarket type like sellers and stuffThere are far and few between especially ones that have an actual garage and like a whole setup soBut I guess that makes sense right because we could order a part and put it on our car right hereWhereas if we were living in Japan we'd be having to buy even a parking space

So what I'm seeing in the image in front of me the space you guys have I mean if we had that kind of space in JapanIt's it's already five times more than a normal garage, you know, it's dreamYeah, so I can imagine you know the Japanese have really learned how to utilize their space correctly because it really isn't as plentifulOh, yes, yesBut when it comes to car enthusiasts guys a lot of the

Guys, I think it's also changingMy generation of car enthusiasts maybe we are one of the lastOkay, maybe guys also in the 30s to actually try the best to do DIY where it's possibleIt's funny because I remember back thenI was with some of my friends and we had I was living in a small apartment with the said rented space

With everybody else and so we had no space to do even things likeChange the air filter or spark plugs or something and we'll go to a multi-story car park that has lights or has good spaceLike the movie theater or on the rooftop of a of a mall andBasically do it there until the security got to the eight what you guys doingOr in the auto-max car park, you know, oh, yeahYeah, I mean, yeah, we do

But I mean that's part of the thing right like utilizing what you haveBeing efficient, you know, these are things that I personally correlate with Japanese people right likeThey're very efficient. They use what they have they don't generally overdo it, you know

And so it makes sense. It's probably from culturally, you know, what they what they've gotten used to

It's it's by necessity actuallyYou know, do you remember when you guys come here and you go to some restaurant?

Especially a rather small restaurant and when you go inside the washroomHave you noticed how small the wash basin is? Oh, yeah everything everything in there is small

Sometimes it's on the back of the toilet. Yeah, that's what I was about to say the sink on the back side of the toilet

That would always gets me like that's efficient. Oh

That that's actually not a sinkIt's oh, no, it's not like a sink. Yeah, you can sort of rinse your fingers or your hands there for a while

But you should still wash your hands properly and take it in the sink. It's like stage one stage two

But you've probably seen how it's all the wash basin is and it's very efficiently designed to fit within that smallcubicle space, right? Mm-hmm

Yeah, they really are good at that, you know, just as far as making use of what they have I I do appreciate thatAnd so we can also come to the conclusion about the design of cars themselvesWhich is why we have a lot of K car I think many many visitors to Japan especially those who love JDM are probably quite shockedTo see more K carWhat we call light vehicle in Japan more than everything else in fact, it's you you can see on the road that's more than 60%

Of yellow plate compact cars with 660 cc engines of various different designsAnd that's the majority and the history of the K car itself explains this very compact, you know, the need to brutalize spaceUh in in in Japan. So this is

The reason why K carsBecause of this low taxes is sort of the main modes of transport for most people who don't reallyWant to own a carbon at no choice, but just need basic transportYeah, well, I can say that when we got off the plane our first time in Japan, you know, of course what we expected to see was just you knowevos in r34's and you knowHey, we we expect to be a driftYes, exactly. Yeah, but in reality it was

Alphards K cars, you know that type of thing and it really took us quite a while to see our first like hero carSo to speak and and we were kind of freaking out because all of a sudden there is one, you know, and it happened to be aAutek r33GTR. Yeah, so so it was a cool sight to see, but yeah, I agree, you know, I think the general perception is probably you guys just have the most amazing cars running around everywhere

But in reality they're cars that are economical and efficient for you know the generalJapanese citizenIsn't it isn't it like making some cities in America, but cool that it's just EVs and test laws right?

They pay yeah exactly right that makes senseumSo moving onSo over in Japan, right like we as Americans I feel like have kind of idolizedYou know the Japanese tuning culture those of us who were into it have idolized it for a long time andYou know, I just was hoping we could kind of talk about theApproach that the Japanese take to the customization and tuning and everything in the different genres, you know like for example

The drift guys the VIP guys the soul dress up guysYou know and the difference in the attitude of their vehicles and builds and the interaction with the community so to speakHow was it like in America currently with this um, soI mean in America, you know, there's there's drift. There's big power straight line. There's muscle. Yeah, there's drift there's

Stance cars. What's up?

What is the what is the perception of Americans?

Japanese cartoon because I guess you guys watch worse motoring and see option magazineOr whatever maybe you know, yeah, and that's really what it was right especially before the internet was the magazines and the DVDsThat's like that was our perception of Japan tuning. Yeah, we're were those, you know, and then of course once the internet came

Everything kind of blew up and I feel like the peopleAnd the holidays that are into that type of stuff that are into the you know the best motoring the options and all that are kind of like theThe JDM nerds. I guess you could say it, you know

They're the ones that are really into and really into the style aspect of itIn a that like time periodWhereas kind of the shallow the new fans they go off Instagram reels and YouTube shorts and they kind of see it for theThe face of it instead of like the depth that it really has they see for the hype I guess you'd sayOh, yes, it's it's one of my most unfavorable words the full letter word isn't it? Yeah, Hyp

IOverused and when it's over done it becomes a problem, right? Yeah, then it makes it look like oh

Um, I would say you guys and you know, we're I think we're all the same. We've been kind of yes for a long time

And those who are really into cars look at it from theaspect ofThe technical performance and the history the motorsport history and you know, maybe in sports cars as what we would sayBut in reality in Japan, I would sayThe things that you've mentioned before the especially nearly the dress up guys and the VIP guys called Vibbubfor Bibbub which comes fromA style that originally imitates the kind of Yakuza from the 80s and this is this itself has a long history of

Actually preparing the car to look in a certain way so every genre of thisincluding what we call it ashathe animeDecorated stickers onTo be honest when that became very popular maybe in like late 2000sUm, I was like oh my goodness. What's going on here with a new trend

You know, but that these guys started to really improve the of course with technology is with them you knowLarge format then that can't what you call that large format a wrap printing. I'm not sure yeah

And the details the design started to become even more intricate and then as you know you you start to seeUh, it does show our anime car design started to appear on real race car like in split gtAnd even spatikyuThen it's it becomes official. So let's go back a little bit further further back into the 80s. Of course you know

Dori Doriaka drifter kingakatss the highly revered and respected and most famousracing driver personalityIn gdmo, which happened his car cultureHe's also known as the person who influenced heavily the drift cultureBut you look at the drift culture behind that where he startedracing drivers like alsoWhat would they do with any good? No, no, none the best

He was these guys were from the generation ofreally street drifters andThis is also the point that field and inspired initial d the whole drifting thing that these this was a very clear cut fromum, okay, so you havePaul gayWhich I think this word is also quite misunderstood in western cultureThe word Paul gay basically means mountain pass and not every mountainroad is a toge

The toge is only a toge if there is a height elevationWhere you actually have a very clear uphill to downhill and it's quite windy and it transverses a certaindistance and there are roads namedSomething something toge in japan if you go that going you can see also on a togeme kuni toge andA winding road is just simply a road that goes left and right and has hairpins and a lot of cornersSo the drift culture

Uh, was was very present in a lot of these toge roads because they could turn uphill and come down in the downhillNow if you look in the internet now you can see like the old nanamagari which is also part of theuh roads in hakonenused to be where people would goIn groups and they would occupy a certain number of corners. So you know go downhill

To come back up again to do the drifting only on the uphill for example and because they did thisuh it clashed withMy type of guys we call the group guy sort of this group versus strip group is obviously just going from point A to point Bas fast as possibleLike in rally style. Yeah, so

There was a very clear distinction between the enthusiasts who did grip and who did grip rightI bet yeahYeah, it was actually some kind of like big argument and so it uh in certain areasOh, by the way back in those days in 80s and 90sUh, there were really small little teams with silly names likeum speed stars or whatever that appears in initially but even more silly names and they had the stickers and they're all that is reallyreal

umI have a friend who runs a workshop in Odawara and uh he's a bit older than me in his 50sAnd we were talking about all these and he said yeah, you knowI missed all these when people while kids would come and they have their own citiesteams and then they would you know just want to change his suspension and you knowAir filter or or just or work they couldn't do themselvesUm and do alignment because they couldn't do it at home. So I think if I can America, you know

People would be doing it by themselves right because they have the spaceAnd so that created like as you said the culture where there's a lot of shops and a lot of opportunity for businessAnd so this leads also into the whole classification of or rather uh organization ofgrouping intoloyaltyareas so you have the teams you have theThe small garages behind it and these small gar- everyone starts small these small garagesThen become more famous they become bigger they eventually get themselves into option magazine into hyper rev

And that's where they make their name so then you haveFrom you have area loyalty from Kanagawa from Saidama from even all the way to Orsaka KansaiAnd once they get rich enough, this is during the bubble period of the 80s where everyone had moneyAnd when the bubble period came down that the also industry still was maintaining but the uh technology behindCar makers and also the electronics industry everything help and the sort of what you call the golden agehelp to boost this kind of auto industry or the aftermarket industry so everything goes how they had

Motor sports into the tuning industry that's connected the user base every guy young guy back then wanted to have a sports carIGrowing up in Europe, I believe that it was something like you know your young guy you needed to have a sports carThat was the guy the kind of like acool thing to do you know you needed to get someAt least you know a sports sedan or some hatchback a hot hatch. There was a lot of choice back then

From European makers and Japanese makersAnd today every you know, that's like what I think what 25% of guys actually get a car licensesAnd of course, you know, we get mad they don't get manualAnd you ask them what kind of cars that they want does I'll just say some some crossover that the interest isYou know really really died out and those are really into carsSplit off into different genres like you have the guys who do the fifthWhich is that is another completely different style they started to become even more and more serious

With the way to lower the carThey started to come up with different accessoriesTo black tint the windows to put the chrome to put the big exhaust pipes the big antenna to the fact allIt was in the stars, you know, and then things became even more and more detailed what they put in the carThat fueled a business industry to create parts of like I think maybe you know the brand DAD with reverseYeah, that cheeseYeah, yeah

In Japan we call the kind of the genre of people who like such car yankiVery funny wordWhat yanki which comes from the word yanki which obviously is like I'm not I don't know isThe rugby term for American, you know, yeah like a northern American. Yeah

So like we're yankis because we're from like the north part of America. So we're considered yankis. Yeah

Right, right, right, but that's kind of related. I'm not wrong to like

It was something historical and sports team or something like that. Yeah, there's the New York Yankees. Yeah

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeahWhy we have to work on yankis because the kids back then would use to dye their hair blonde. So it looks like America, you know

But yanki kids were like kind of like lower education a bit delinquent style, you knowThe squatting smoking blonde hair, you know foul mouth, but really friendlySo like DAD goes likeYeahOh noDon't know todayI was just talking with my girlfriend yesterday and she she owns a

two s 210 crownWhich is the two generations ago and it's black hybrid just normalAnd we were at auto box and we were looking for stuff and then we came to the section we auto box sellsDad accessories, right and and she was just going oh my gosh. This is so yanki. We're just laughing about

Because even today there's the so-called VIP Yankee culture is dying to be honestUh compared to the payday in the in the in the 90s if you look back at some old video on YouTube you can seeumDaikoku Futo PA which I affectionately called tkfuhIn those days that it was so bad when it started in 1989 because we gathered so muchThey were trying to get in until it created a line until the loop

Can you believe it all the way up to the loop of the queenThere was crowded in the middle lane people doing barbecue doing danceThey brought their kids and just not there was a mix of vip mostly vip and other kind of thingsEveryone went that today what you see is really really controlled reallyOrganize of course there's a lot of tourists foreign tourists ago there uhButBack then everyone started to collude into a very clear sort of cultureSo you had people who love tuning had drift and in out of all of those

the guys who just tuned the car for pure performanceNot a lot of flashy body kit on the outsideWere the origins of original American JDMLooking back at super streetum san mi tani at the age when he started to do all these uhA coverage of guys who would notice the style in JapanBut really what it was was just JDM car parts so people who tried to useEK9 civic type of parts that e g6 car parts the the lens the whatever from spoon sports the pure

How do you say?

Normal tuning look of purpose built of only you know for running on circuit into American carsYou know to imitate that so that was the base of real JDM and then that word started to changeUh, but the approach of how we did in Japan is like I said going back to what I said earlier aboutGoing to the shop. We don't have space to tune our car so we trust our local tuna or then

Everyone wants to go to these famous tuners now obviously when you go to a famous tuner they start to get a lot ofum, you know become very full and get a lot ofYou know business until they can't keep up that's where sometimesshops start to break off sped off as a business opportunity so then it creates these loyalty groupsJapanese are very loyal to a brandSo it is very possible that you know the Odisan down the street

Who is maybe now in his sixties and if you go and talk to himHe has only owned either Toyota or Nissan cars for most of his lifeReason is because when he was young he went to a car dealer introduced by a friendIt's a local Toyota car dealerAnd the in Japan relationship is very important the trust betweenUh the salesman who takes care of you he will come to your house and you yearGive you gifts and we have a cultural exchange in gifts as you know or Miyagi but also

Uh a business gift where youKeep the relationship between the customer whether it's insurance especially with carsWith your phone contract with anything your house builder and this relationship of that trust is very very importantThis trust also goes to your car tuner soThat's the good side of it. Maybe what you see is oh wow. There's this relationship of people actually

Giving business to the local smallRaman shop for exampleAnd while this is of course very very goodIn another way and this is where IOr what I see I see both cultures western style and Japanese styleSometimes to be completely honest. It's not good because they get Japanese. We're very

Uh prone to obligationUh, yeah, I could see that yeahYeah, you become obligated to the salesman guy. So it's like they pressure you with very nice words to buy a new car every three years

And youWhat will come out?

So this oldie sundown the road is probably bought every single crown or corolla for the past 20 yearsOhThat's what each the auto industry going and so his old ground gets sold off to the auctions and gets recycled into the into the use market and gets exportedThat's why we have had such a very strong exportBusiness which you see the auctions now back 20 years ago JDM cars were very cheap and remember back in uk

Uh in the 90s the reason to buy JDM cars was not because it was attractive and desirable like todayWe're not talking about sports cars. We're talking about regular cars, you know

Models that you couldn't get off course JDM the other reason to get them is because they were cheaper than official importsWow, and there was no log and stat at that time there was no log in uh yeah my my sensei my mentorSusuki sanHe was the first to export us started to GTR to uk and also the Hong Kong wowThat's pretty crazy. It's cool

Yeah, yeah, and um he startedHe was one of the pioneers in the gray import export from her export business and in ukHe was also there importing and I was over that time was of seeing all these JDM cars coming in in the sport EuropeReality is there are a lot of normal car models that maybe enthusiasts don't really care aboutAnd they get exportedSimply because it's cheaper more economical to buy and they also have better specificationsBut people must remember that also a lot of the specifications don't suit america especially like radio frequency

For exampleDisprecipification headlights and many various things right okay. Sorry going on off tangent

But coming back to my topic aboutThe attitude towards this so because people renew the cars all the time because they're sucked into this obligation businessWe're in a relationship with their salesmanThen you get the same thing happening with the tuners with the with the workshop guysThey trust completely whatever the tuner says now. It's a good thing if they're famous and they're reputable

They actually have skill my reality is a lot of them don't really have based sort of skills right so it's a huge competitionThere's a lot of shops these shops in order to gainUm credibility start to push further further really talent that onceThen start to make a name for themselves. They go to amateur racing. They go to track days and then they start going up into like grass roots

Uh and in the 80s this was also so we look back at some history books which I think I shouldUh make some documents about thatWe can probably see in my instagram. I sometimes talk about this

uhFreshman days and then you go up intoType you into n1 a lot of small shops start to become more famous and when they become more famous they createEven larger loyalty group of course in reality a lot of people start to you know want to become more individualBut back in those days it was really like I want to go to the shop and everyone else is likeConsider rival they get sucked into this group mentality. This relates to something in japanese uh structural

uhCommunity where when you're in junior high schoolA lot of people will join some club because we'll cut theIt's like a what you call eca in the uk uhbaseballBasketball at the softball on whatever right all these sports andYou start with a photography club even and everyone is a very close pack community. It's it's a teamwork thing

You know in japanBusiness decisions or group decisions are always made as a group on census not as an individual like in western culturesoThis very same mentality when they carry on the graduate from university and by the way in japanese university when you graduateYou're almost definitely guaranteed a job in a in a company already the moment you graduatethis workseminars to help from the year three andmost of them are guaranteed a job and when they leave they go and join big companies. Let's say if you can join some political group

uh andYou know then youJoin a different community a lot of them go from sports. So you know like all thani san

It was very famous in american out of baseball playeryou knowHe's from the you know he joined some company because he was very good in baseball from since high schoolAnd uh but in like reality like he's different but a lot of baseball players who playedAnd all in leads but they're still working if they're attached to this company, but they don't actually work there but they'reSponsored bySimidomaSo you're doing whatever you know that's their company base even likeumYuzu han you you know

The these kind of famous athletesSo when you look at that and then you see that these community groupsExist because of the idea thatWhen you choose a brand when you choose aA tuner when you choose a shop then you're loyal to itThat is why when you see a lot of guys put stickers on their carsAnd a lot of them do the formula type of tuner you see a lot of replica a lot of them want to doLike mind style for examples boon style yeah top secret styleAnd you start to see a lot of these replicas right and then you think well there's not so much originality

uh, but we like to follow what is like a set formulaThat's why you have the idea of complete car from manufacturerMy needs more STIBecause people like to buy something that has been professionallydesigned and packaged they have that kind of unseen this in japan is that security feelingThat it is certified to work soMany people do not sell their car onuh

newspaper or classification of Facebook nobody sells car on Facebook in JapanWowThat's like where everybody sells their car hereYeahYeahWe don't do thatHowever a lot of cars do appear on Yahoo auction uh, but the reality is that is a very small percentage to most peopleWe just go to the car like use car dealerUh, and if they import the car and it's not very oldThey go to a Toyota car use car that we just conveniently always located right next to the dealer on the sideYou have the new car and the use car

The same salesman will introduce them to the use car side and say heyHe want to sell the car now useAnd we go start the week which like uh or you go buy in and thenThey buy and shifted to the use car and then they buy a new carThose were the good old days now people keep the car so longer because economy is badWe have no money and you knowUh, people tend to keep the car longerSo you have thatThen you also have this this this secondaryuhKind of like a thinking whereUh, they buy the use car and then they want to restore it and they want the day to do

So they start to look for what we call in japanese pro shopPro shop is also the word used for not only tunerBut any company that specializes in uhMaintaining or doing accessories for a certain type of company can be vip it can be 4x4Now there's a huge trend on even mini van tuning. I could you not uh if you look books in books. No, yeah

There is a whole magazines dedicated only to alfadoFor exampleThose are coolUm, the genre now is getting so wide that every young person now actually desires to have a mini van soumMy my my partner, she's she's a single mom and she's got a daughter who is like uh just finished gradedShe just graduated from universityAnd she's gonna work in the car industry actually um they both love cars by the way

and and and i asked her like what's yourWhat's your dream car and you know how answer was?

I want a new alfado like whatAnd you want a boxIt's like oh no, no, it's not a box. The inside is luxurious. I have a lot of space. You know, I can go with my friends

Uh, it's comfortable. Yeah, I know but like

freaking refrigerator boxYeah, that's because you likeBut that's because you like uh you like sports cars and the model play doneTo me it's a car is a nice sedan. You know, so that's why she bought a crown, right? So um

Everyone's changing, but then they're really into that type of carWhatever the shape is and you have enthusiasts for likeI don't know cx5 orEvery kind of crossover and surprisingly there's a huge community which may surprise American peopleA lot of guys you loveAmerican muscle car. Oh, yeah, you've probably seen that yeah, we saw it

For sure. Yeah, I mean, so a few muscle cars and a few low riders. Yeah, yeah, yeah, some yeah some

On hydraulics and flipping their switches and that whole yeahAnd a lot of these and you probably know how into the whole culture they are right like they don't just buy the carThey live the culture guys look like American cultureThey probably do hip hop they wear the cap sideways. They wear baggy pants. They try to walk like they've got a limb

You knowYeah, they eat only American hamburgers. They only hang out with their own group and it's all about embracing the whole

culture behind theLike what it represents. So this is something that goes back to the culture of Japanese groups in sports in school where

There's an old thing in Japanese where that the nail that sticks out gets hammered down you don't want to beseen as a outcast type ofIndividuals all there are people that even people who are seen as kind of outcastIn a way where it's different from the normal generic groupStill have a group to follow they all follow sort of formulaWhereas maybe in America or I don't know in in in in Europe orOther Asian country people want to do their own individualismBut I think in reality there's no more difference. There is still a kind of group or

How do you say like a genre that you follow so like you guysLooking at the cars you have your morph into like the real I would say core enthusiast type of performance and also visually relatedSo I just I think it's the same but Japanese tend to be a bit more extreme about that and you can see that even in likeOda Kukum and TV anime community. What do you guys think?

Yeah, I mean I would agree. I mean not just car

Car related but when you know as an outsider when you kind of walk around and tour around JapanYou kind of see that in multiple genres of life, you know peopleMaybe not not individual but definitely following a pathYou know and kind of staying within the boundaries so to speakYeahBut I mean is that something that America American countries? Yes, um would like to follow

I'm just asking out of curiosity because I see a lot of guys who really admire the type of for example kind of styleWell, whatever it is they like so like you knowNoriaro my friend. Yes, I actually been covering

Uh the drift community for quite a long while and he knows a lot of people in thereSo a lot of guys come to Japan and like they go to Ibisu for exampleRight, they're really really really into that particular type of driftingUh, and then that culture hasUhCome spread to America. This is already not in 20 years and uh the D1 has gone there and then people were doing that kind of pure drifting

We're not talking about like irresponsible cross-section and undercake orWhat do you call takeover stuff and no other than I saw a video that somebody was actually copying that the Japanese guys actually copying that styleThey used to do for drifting like in industrial SD it's going for one area to anotherBut now they're doing it in the circle is like oh my gosh American culture is crazyYeah, I mean I feel like Americans especiallyI mean what I pay attention to is a lot of the the drift scene of the drift cultureThe ones that

You know the ones that are real and the ones that are like really into itLike the like the old style stuff and you know they they take the whole thingYou know they're they style their car, you know the way they dress even like the brands they wearYou know everything is styled for you know like the Japanese drifter styleI guess you could say you knowEverything from their wheel setup to their interior like every single thingYou knowIf you were to do the same thing to an American car it might be kind of what they consider ricey

But since it is on like a drivetide car or like a full you know like JDM buildI guess you could call it it's cool andI think that likeThe what the real ones understand that but the the ones that might just see it, you know face valueI don't know they they might not understand how deep it is I guess you could say right like your via your car your 32Is styled completely after Japanese cars like 100% which I think the true enthusiast that's how it is right like like for me

I respect theThe long history of the modification of cars in Japan and so therefore I try to take that same routeYou know whereas maybeI know you hate this word but like the hype boys. They don't see the depth right they don't see the depth of like

The Japanese tuning culture right they just see T37s rightAnd in the guy with a lot of followers has them so they're obviously cool, you knowYeah, but you want very funny that they raise the manufacturer themselvesUnderstand how popular the T37 still is and they keep remaking them and putting inadvertisements, right? Yeah, it's best seller. Yeah, and I'm best seller. It's like it's like pokey

chocolates, you knowYeah, T37s built that building they have huh?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, which is which is of course it's good like like RSWatanabe wheels or I mean even if you look at BTS wheels, right? It's kind of cool

So I wanted to ask you guys where does the term RISER come from originate in America?

Oof, that'sIt's a I think it maybe would be I think it's really kind of a tiny bit racistIf you think about it, I mean a little bit and just come from like the the late 90s when the the Honda tuningWas on the upper eyes and you know the fast and the furious movie started coming outIt's kind of what the muscle guys or the muscle car guys the guys with the Mustangs the Camaros the Trans-AmIt's what they would call the import guys they would call them the RISers because they were rice burners. Yeah, they're from Japan

So yeah, I meanExactly so I mean, you know, maybe it's borderline, but yeah, I mean it's basically somebody that likeGoes above and beyond with flashy kind of stuff a lot of times, you know somebody thatOh, parts maybe not you know going the whole right go in the full length that you could have with your build like a bolt-on hood scoop instead of an actual hood with a hood scoop

You know just right some of these like kind of I don't know what to call me. Yeah, that that's a RISER can

If if you ever see one you'll know ohYeah, yeah, it's very funny now with social media and a lot more interaction between people of different countriesWe've a lot of Japanese kids who are much more able to understand and foreign cultureUh much much better than than you know, maybe 20 15 years ago evenUh, then they also learned of a lot of different words and soUh, young guy the other day was actually seen to me. Oh

And a RISER mobile and I'm likeHow did you learn that word from you know, I like like do you know what it means, you knowIt was likeYeah, uh, Asian Asian style book car with a bat tuning, right and I'm likeDo see that in Japan actually very rare the other dayI saw exactly what you describe and we call it like just umCheap what do you call that sticker only sticker tuning like you knowIf you put

One HKS sticker adds to worth power kind of thing that stuff exists in Japanonce in a whilefake bonnet vents and you know just everySticker that he got from every motorsports event, you know that he went to yeah, he represents pretty pretty heavy for sureum, soCan can you explain to us what is otaku-ness and uh what is the otaku-ness of the Japanese enthusiastJust nice that you come to ask that because exactly the kind of guy that we were talking about early with the sticker tune and all this

He is probably a type of otakuUh otakuDon't mistake uh in Tokyo. There is an area called otaku

Which is otaku is the word word or like a section of the cityOtaku is one word so in Japanese we have you must be very careful somevowel sounds are longBut in English when it gets red there is no there is noRecognization for short sound or the long soundOkay, Japanese there is short and long so very quick exampleSorry going a bit of Japanese lesson, but I think it's very important for people

When you say TokyoBoth the old and long soundsSo Kyoto is differentKyotoUh it's not otaku is otakuLong oh so I see so yeah so this section and uh where all more effective used to be is otakuNot to be confused with the word otaku which is I see translate

Thought so it translates into nerd what you callUh so the nerdy miss yeah yeah yeah yeahWeep is quite bad now I guess uh let's just go with nerd so nerd isThe 90s definition of a nerd was like a computer computer signs kind of guy right likeOkay geek is another yeah yeah yeah yeahGeek right because growing with the 90s of course we know

Oh, you're such a nerd you're such a geek means you're so into a particular subject andUh you're so deep into that you research every single detail about that particular thing it can be anything cars anime toUhTrains and we have a lot of um we have a lot of guys who love trains hereWe call tensido kuhnReal-world real-world nerd

You can even have nerd on very very obscure subjects likeUh the history ofUh citySigns or lampposts are not kidding youUh the Japanese tend to have this kind of tendency where they'd like something they could deep into it

So just to give you a descriptionIt starts with liketendency to if you want to take up a new hobby and this also relates to carBut let's talk about normal sports. So I had

Some friends back then I used to say some normal salary manNever had a hobby in his life. I never had strong interest like us in cars or or or anime or

Whatever by the wayOnly I would say less than 50% of Japanese are really into animeThat you would know uh people as even close to an enthusiastSo on the scale of being interested in stuff you haveinterestedYou have being into i'm just using english wordThen you haveEnthusiast which means it becomes a regular hobby right and then when you go to that extreme you start to become a nerd or

orOrGeek about it because you research everything that is where the realm of otaku comes inWowYou can be a camera otaku you can be a car otaku you can get anime otaku you can beThe street signboard otaku you can be a food otaku you can be a travel otaku anything is fineHmm. I love how the Japanese have their own word for that because

Going over there and visiting you can definitely tell that that is an actual thing that you know wheneverYou know they're into something they areHead over heelsDeep into it as far as they can gotheir otaku is hereTheir otaku is for sureAnd this first friend this old friend this friend of mine where he decided wanted to take up tennisRightI want to join a tennis club. I'm like okay

Have you ever held a racket in your life? Never okay

Then there's up on the final tennis clubAnd he signs up for a time to pretend his lessons and the next weekend he goes out and buys all the gear like amid-expensive racketthe shoes the headband and theWhere the god of theTurn up to their first lesson looking like Roger Federal, you knowYeah, like professional, you know, he's got like the expensive racket everything and then he takes lessons for about three months

And I decide oh he's he's crap at it and he quitBut he's bought all this gear already right like like like 100,000 into a thousand worth of itAnd he doesn't need it anymore. He sells it on yaku auction

I think Americans do that that portion of it. Yeah a lot like they

Think they want to go super hard on something. Yeah, and then realize it's either not as easy or not as fun or whatever

Yeah, and then they're immediately putting it on eBay and trying to resell, you knowThese tennis rackets or whatever it may be and I feel like that's an American tendency for sure. Yeah

I don't think Americans a lot of Americans don't reach that of talk who stage right they fade out right before nowRight, right, right, so that's it's quite a that's kind of so I think this part of Japanese soldiers if people want to go into itThey go into it, but then the one that survived then maybe this guy becomes a like he starts a research all the history ofof the techniques of tennis or whatever right soYou could kind of say I'm like that. I was a very early version of this so called what I call so deep into cars

I did I've done everything in the industry fromYeah, I think the only thing I've not done in kind industry was going into like actual likeLike a used car sales hardcore, you know, maybe that. That's probably a good thing

It's probably a good thing. Yeah, I want to do car preparation rather than learn and just selling, you know crappy cars

Because we are countries is ourselves and so we have some pride in it. So this is the word the pride

the integrity of beingThe positive what that so the negativeOtaku which existed in the 2000s whetherWhat British guys called the numties, you know, they're a little bit pajibad haircut, you knowGlasses wearing glasses and just like looking like a computer nerve in the backpackAnd these guys would line up in akihabara to support their favorite idol like a kb or something

You know and buying tons of CDs and you know maybe doing a very questionableThings, you know that that normal people would shun on like you're not they don't have good relationships with with the womenFor example, they just not they're really into that kind of like reallynegative world of just being too much into the idol the computer or the video games or something that created a very bad imageand they were also shut-insUm, they didn't have a job they dependent on their family for

For you know living expenses and couldn't talk to anybody. They don't have friends

That was the negative the worst type of otaku in Japan today doesn't really existI think these guys have grown upThey've disappeared from like the social media or whateverToday's anime and idol lovers of the cold so-called otaku young guys. They're actually very normal. All of them are actually with girls

The good looking guys they're fashionable. They have normal friends

Nowadays it's quite kind of cool to do this otaku because everyone has likeA smartphone a lot of people play gamesIt's kind of normal to be into like jpop or or something like that andThis word has now become like you are very into this kind of culture you're very into this kind of genreSoWhen we come to caught otaku now there is a new trendThe generation

ZZUhare nowGoing into or probably you've noticed especially inIn America like young guys who you know watch our stuffThey're very into the 90s cars because of the legends because of all these stories because of like that small trick or whatever influencesThe very same reason why you guys still collect 90s cars are why I still like these cars maybeOf course for us a lot of us it's it's a real timeBut the young guys who never lived in the 90s wanted to buy and own these 90s cars because of various influences

They are now the group of called neo classicEnjoyers what I would call it. There are many young Japanese people into 20s for some

Demented reason start to want to buy a 90s car that is very difficult to maintain and expensive and hard to keep in itYou know i'm not a saved not a lot of the economical as more than cars because the style is great and everythingSo they try to explore this and as we were talking about earlier they go into the whole lifestyle as wellThey want to explore the music they want to dress the parts where the 90s clothes and so it becomes a retro club anything retro now starts to sellAnd companies are taking advantage of this whole retro thing. So I would say these kids are also type of otaku

They're a kind of neo classic otaku and they're soUh, it thoughUhreallyWanting to keep the period correct the wheelsUh, I couldn't itLike I know this young guy and he had aUh one of aCedric or some some just not even a sports car right and he was he said he'd been looking every day on yaku auction to try to buy the cassette deck player

That is correct exactlyPatelon for his 1989 Cedric you know likedudeWhat's the work right? He says yeah, I don't care as well

I can use my phone if I want to listen to music or I just wanted to have a repair a correct oneThey remove all the detuning parts that were done. There was ex you want an ex VIP a bid car

Throughout the that's just the lowest of spanish throughout the chrome wheels he put in the socks stock wheelsUh, I was very careful to restore it to how it looked like in the catalog. I'm like wow you

Got even more crazy than me, you know, that is otaku. Like I can see that version of it

Yeah, yeah, yeahUm and every time you buy go to the dyke of dyke of stock a lot of I know a lot of people want to look up for all the cool you knowLBK walk cars and all this flashy, you knowTwo-step popping band man man man kind of cars, but then in the background you see some of these young guysWe have a fully restored or a period correctsomejunk boxFrom the outlook of it right but when you deeper his dedication intoRestoring and keeping that period correctness is beyond even what we would do to be honest because I wouldn't I mean I

I'm I have a 90s carAnd I had my EK9 two years agoHeck IActually, I did it through I sold the originalUh cassette CD player to another young guy who wanted it simply because of spirit. I'm like go. Oh, you do I ask that

Here for a thousand yet. I'm gonna put my bluetooth player in that

Yes exactly right because their fascination isRestoring it back to that like originalLike when it was in the 90s type things where you know guys like us like of course we want to keep it period correct to an extentBut then we want some of those updatedElectronics and whatnot that actuallyBenefit the driver right we've already had the tape decks. We don't want those to be more back

Oh, no, do you want to do you want to play over the CD 10 CD change in your trunk?

Hell noYeah, so I can see that for sureUm, yeah, so Ken all rightumBefore we run out of time here. I definitely wanted your outlook

Because when we are at uh, you know the heritage collectionYou were really telling us the history of Nissan and you clearly know Mitsubishi and I'm sure Honda as wellBut those three names are about to come synonymous with each otherHmm. What do you think about that?

The whole world now in order to even normal people are talking about the possible merger between Nissan and Honda withMitsubishi kind of in the background with hiding behind Nissan goingHey, don't forget about usWe're kind of here, you know like like you you guys invited us into your club like a couple of years agoWhat are you gonna do about us and so these are all okay?

Yeah, yeah, Mitsubishi kind of that's why recently the three the three chat jawCEOs took the stage at first. It was only you noticed it was only Nissan and Honda presidents. Yeah, I can need to be sure

So um everyone's talking about it simply because Nissan and HondaOf course Mitsubishi linked to Mitsubishi group by the way, just want to talk a very very quickly about MitsubishiUm, maybe Americans only have the idea that Mitsubishi makes cars but in reality in Japan when you come hereYou see a lot of things to label with Mitsubishi logo because Mitsubishi is a huge company that does everything from land to banking toThe state of electronics. They make heavy industry. They make ships planes

military vehicleshairdryer not hairdryer. I'm sorry

TVs computer screens everything so Mitsubishi motors as a quarter motive companies only a very small part of a whole groupAnd that was the reason why when they fell into financial difficulties in due to years of scandalThey were working with Nissan and Nissan the colors gone brought them into the Mitsubishi uhSorry brought Mitsubishi into the alliance and so now they areheavily influenced and controlled by by NissanSo that's the setting why Mitsubishi is inside the group

And the current platformOutlander PHEV and the extra are actually a shared platform between Nissan and MitsubishiThe K-Cars Sakura all of the K-Cars are actually Mitsubishi carsNot Nissan K-Cars those are rukesThey're all made by Mitsubishiso uhThe technology sharing and the platform sharing is already established between Mitsubishi and NissanOkay, so you have that as a group and now we have Honda which is very famous and wellknown for being independent they never had any big tie-up uh with

Any car maker and on one hand you have the Toyota group which wholly ownsKino motors and that had two motors 100% ofThey're on 36% share of uh the former PHEV industry which is now renamed SubaruAnd so they're a very close partnerMazda is also in the group because they've had a technologicaltechnological layer the client way back so that's group Toyota so nowIt's going to become is it going to become group Nissan Honda Mitsubishi just like how you have

Uh the Daimler group the BMW group and the Fox Baden group in Europe and the GM you know group in AmericaThe auto industry today is no longer like in the old days where automakers can survive on their ownUh a lot of it is linked to uh just in a just the economic difference of the the current day where you knowPeople are actually not able to make by cars as much as before cars are going to be becoming more expensiveum

But they're also becoming more quality so this is whereCompanies that have a very good chance of understanding the market trend now as you knowEvies is finally losing its ground as a trend setter America has realized that Evie is not completely the way forwardsThey're now turning to what what is it?

Hybrid yeah hybrid yeahHybrid is now being realized again as the most viable solution for today's current uhAutomotive economic environmentPossibly into the future going ahead as well. There's a little background to this

Let's let's be completely honest. Do you think all of the oil and

Petrochemical companies will easily allowelectrification to happen without them going out of business?

No wayAnd this is very controversial for me to say this but i've been observing something that auto-motivision for a very long timeWe all know that petroleum oil prices are artificially pushed up and tax quite a lot right?

And it's controlled andThere's actually more oil left than what is always being told to us the same way how oil is running out always running outAs it's been said for the past 30 40 years. Oh, yeah, but it's been a steady

Reclamation just like diamonds, you know diamonds are not the most precious and most you know a valuable stone on earthIt's other other stuff right so same thing happens in industry so when you come back to this thenElectrification also is not the way forward because not everyone can have a electric car because it takes a huge toll on the gridWhich is the first form before the manufacturer think so let's go back to hybrid who has the world's best hybridsFor your time. Hmm. Yeah, they do the Prius. Yeah

So you guys only think of Prius but every every model in Japan and in Asia possibly in Japan has a hybrid optionInge from the crownAlphard to the vids the areas that know everything has a hybrid option. I did not know that and now me neither that's smart. That makes sense

It's it's it's been like that for 20 yearsHoly molyAlso, so really really really if you go to a Japanese car dealership in in Toyota there is only nowehHybrid or the option of hybrid and a petrol gasoline engineHmmAll right, but now the next trend is towards pH EV soFrom January the new Alphard and Ville fire now has a plug in hybrid option

Plug in you can have the best of both hybrid and electric cars right nowThe reason why electric cars are not so popular in Japan is because we lack that infrastructureYou look at our houses. They're so small. It's not possible to put a charging station in apartments

Even if you have a house it's so small you only have a space for one car parkIt's not possible to actually put a charge only people reach people in that so the amount of EVs that are able to be used in Japan is not popular in the first placeThey're not very into the whole idea of yeah, yeah, EV. We already use a lot of electricity

And it's even though we use nuclear it's just not practical to have that kind of thingSo people still want to use gasoline petrolThat's why hybrids are very popularWhich means Toyota has seen from over they were the ones who pointed this technology from 1997 with the first-prest HondaPat use hybrids, but they were using in a different way only to recently where it's more of a series parallel systemOkay, so let's fast forwardSo it has the world's best hybrid technology. That's the trend of the world now

American market is not going back to hybridThat's why they're gaining a large sharehold in the sales market Honda hasBeen struggling with it with their sales worldwide and so while they have hybrid technologyNissan has almost no hybrid technology to be completely honest zeroThey have not developed their own hybrid technologyMitsubishi with the outlander PHEV actually is a hybrid systemAnd this is the reason in my opinion why Nissan has always needed Mitsubishi technologyFor the future technologies not the other way around Mitsubishi has a research

I was without doing Mitsubishi we already started researching into EV shares in the 90s alreadyhad that technologyFrom Mitsubishi heavy industries the batteries they were already like every various motor shows to prepare for electrification in the futureOf course Mitsubishi group is so big that they controlAll of the like major components that's necessary to turn into a infrastructureOkay, Mitsubishi is very bad management Nissan is also bad managementThis is the reason why they're all in theThe shitties today. Yeah, okay, so everyone

andI predicted that in 19 in 2023 automakers will consider their EV commitments right and today prices have raised even moreSo Honda has already been in talks with Nissan in the like early 2023About these these things because you know when Carlos gone leftHe left a huge legacy ofNothing to do with his problems just talking about the company itselfNissan did not sell well

Because they don't have a strong product and the product range besides GTR which was already as you know very allFairly is very old is very niche market the normal Nissan very unappealing. They had a very poor

Product appeal even in Japan. So in America they tried to push the prices down by doing a lot of fleet sales

And so this pushed the general image of Nissan cars so lowThat reseals very bad and this contributed to a hugeYou know like a sales deficiency in in offer the companyOn top of that you had bad management Carlos gone at least was able to give a company their directionAnd when he left all the kicked him out. Let's per se according to his words

Uh the Japanese managers were just completely incompetent and that's something that we all knowThey have admitted themselvesWhich is a son is admitted themselvesAnd that's reason why they're really just likeHomadown and sales so now what Nissan really does need they need moneyThey need to be bailed outRightYeah, I said this is where they've been talking toHonda and our Honda is doing much better they have

Certain technologies they're talking about this mergerMerger doesn't mean they willCombine their brands know each brand will keep their own individualIdentities but like Toyota Nissan Mitsubaru and Mazda who twice has shared the hybrid technologySo by the wayNow there's a new cross track Subaru cross track which completely adopts the the THS systemIt's called its strong hybrid finally Subaru has a car that has completely the way that

Toyota hybrid has been is doing like like also Mazda ohYeah, yeah, yeah, it's a hugeI've been waiting for it for a very long time because it was quite difficult to integrate the motorOnly before it changes into a serious parallel with the engine assistingTo give it a very good feel economy and a good EV kind of feelThe only car that can do that in Nissan's lineup right now is the new extra which isdevelopA bit with Mitsubishi'sOutlander PhDV so only really they have the technology Honda has their

EHV which is the next step and it's getting closer to what Toyota hasSo you can see from the Nissan Honda Group thatMitsubishi Group that they can they have a lot of opportunity toTo compete with the Toyota Group in order to supply with JapanesehybridTechnology and going towards more EV right this is the reason why they've been talking to each otherearly on toCreate the basis for the current

Need for overlapping type of markets. Why?

BecauseAs you know in the industry by standardizing and a lot of development and products for human which is very important from third partyThey can reduce costs and they can create new vehicles that are able to be more competitive per unit per dollarYou know just compete you cannot compete with Toyota let's just put it this wayThey have all the suppliers in a tightYou know family based they're all based in in Toyota City all the suppliers are within

Like a like a I don't know like a like a more even a hundred kilometer radius whereas other car companies have thisAll around the country the logistics cost to bring all these parts to the factories like in Q-ShoTo to come a much to to put G-E side-time is much larger than what Toyota can do. This is why you cannot meet them

Uh, and so they need to have a merger now the problem is Nissan needs to be bailed outSo a lot of people say oh Honda you're coming here to build on then the president me be all said noIt's very difficult. We're not here to bail them out. So the latest news now is that

Uh, it's very funny now they've said thatNissan needs to fix their problems first before they can really do an effective mergerThe merger is supposed to be yeah, yeah, yeahThey they will each make a founding like a like a homing company to protect their interests on the outsideuh, and then they try to streamline intotechnologicalintegrationUh, but then now it's like it may not actually happen that soon although they're said they're supposed to sign an agreement

In June this year to come to the agreement to try to fast forward things becauseThere's you know as you've heard there's news if Nissan doesn't recover in a yearThey're dead. They bankrupt actually they're now in a state where it's worse than

1999 when Renault and Colors Gordon stepped in they're worse. The market was huge. That's not that's not good

Not good. That's not good. However

Nissan is the oldest car company in Japan started from likeLike pre 1920s and then without the group of companies as I was explainingThe government has a very stronguh, uh, it I would sayEmotional stake in Nissan of course through that Nissan is also toOfficials and governments than who the is to ever seen as like a you know from iGburefecture farmerYou know that made so machines into a big company whereas Nissan has a lot of actually

governmental ties traditionally from the presidents and whatever even thesounds likeLike in America sounds like GMYou know, they're the government couldn't let GM go outExactly the cut so some way or another they had to structure aSaving kind of thing right. Yeah, but they won't do

Yeah, by the way Nissan has the word son in it the the there's Japanese word for heatWhich is the same as nihan the same kanji so there is aImage of like you know, it's a national car company everyoneWe just don't want to see Nissan die right so what to do they need money? Are they gonna

Let foreign Chinese company or Arab company or Indian company or whatever company coming and buy a stake in Nissan know with thatWhich Japanese would rather kill ourselves than yeah us too shootThey sureSo theThe only way is to have aLocal investor company which was also in the talksUh, but before that happens why not try toCombine car companies together actually this is not the first time that this has happened in the 60s and the late 60s

It actually happened did you guys know that soThat's one of the reasons why prince motor company gotYeah, merged with NissanHis prince was strugglingPrince was struggling very very badly princeUh hadVery high technology that came from aerospace in the same group that Fuji heavy into this battery comes from any company that has an indirect language of

Of aerospace making war planes and engines, you knowHas an advantage in terms of technology in that time where Japanese car companies were trying to catch up to the westIf you know all the European car makerssoAs a result what happened was in our the proposed war there were actually many Japanese car companies much more than what you see todayThere were too many small car companies. It was not a good thing the government was trying to consolidate and

Trying to get companies to merge with each other the bigger companies to eat up the smaller company that was whereumPrince came into NissanSoIn today's automotive environment the same thing is happening on a larger scale where where largest established companies have come together and make aCongron company kind of group so we shouldn't be surprised that today this is happening with Nissan andMitsubishi and uh and HondauhThey need each other and the only way to go to survive for is the cool for is to just share technology much to the chargray of

Car enthusiast like you don't want to see aBMW super but i think you're right. We've got him about that now the super is such a good car that you forget is gonna be

W engine right?

It's not a bad car, so uhThe what i think so just to finish off i think what's gonna happen is uhI have this small opinion that it really won't go well. The colors gone actually

Did a little interview and he said yeah, it won't go well. See what happens when they kick me out and they leave me

All right, I think he's just gonna be selling grapes, but he's got a pointHe's got a pointHondaCannot completely save NissanNissan has to think of some waysUh to to you know likeSave themselves because there was also rumors that a Taiwanese crew con high was trying to buy NissanBut ujida the president denied this and still they're saying officially that Honda and Nissan were working towards integration right and they were talking aboutLike synergy

achieving a multiple effectAnd the objective is that they aim to become a world-class mobility company with a sales of over33 lean yen in operating an operating property of over three3 lean yen, which is very very ambitious, which means they would beThe second largest group to Toyota group which by the way Toyota group has at you knowThe distance between Toyota as number one and the second is crazy. It's like seven times

Worldwide. Yeah, it's seven times you cannot beat Toyota, but you can try to

maintain your maintain your position by synergy. This is the reason why this needs to happen

Right so officially they're saying thatUh, they want to achieve the synergy in seven different ways number oneGenie economics of scale through standardization of vehicle platforms. This is something that's been done in the industry so far

They've worked like even Toyota group GM group and uh, you know Volkswagen groupNo matter improving development capabilities and realizing cost synergies through integration of R&D functionsNumber three optimizing production systems and bases number fourStrengthening competitiveness through a supply chain by integrating purchase functionsNumber five realizing costs synergies through improved operational efficiencyNumber six achieve the economics of scale through integration of sales finance function

And lastly number seven establishing a human resources based for intelligent and electrified vehiclesSo this is where it's becoming a little bit fuzzy becauseUh, each three of these three companies have their own strengthsAnd they really need each other in order for the Japanese automobile industry to survive and to maintaintheir identityUh, but what is more scary is that how many jobs will be lost and uh, whenNissan president said oh, we're gonna cut 9,000 jobs, you know, there was a huge huge huge

News about this hub rule that a lot of families uh, you know, we're gonna losejobsUh throughout thecountry with justBlancs closing down and and everything already Nissan in my I so I live very near one of Nissan's biggest plantsin Kiratsuka and a couple of years ago, the sole half the plantTo create a shopping mallAnd that was like oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that was like the silver is made in KiratsukaUh, the 13th

30th year, you've seen right so I have I have a lot of friends who used to work in NissanWhen I was an English teacher 10 years ago, I taught a lot of Nissan executivesI'm very close to a lot of people in Nissan and everyone was just likeHoly shit man. Holy shit. What's going on the company's gonna go?

Go into a bad situation, but we did not expect that it will be this badum, andThe problem is that todayWhile we all want to see a next GTR we want to see all this as contours. There's like sports cars

It's and you know on us sent a gunner actually make the prelude, which is what do you guys think you think is people gonna buy it?

I don't know not if it's basic becauseYou know now it's just another car in the lineup that is an automatic, you know like that type of thingI mean if it has sort of sports to it. I mean

Yeah, it has to pay homage to the old old prelude. I feel like for it to sell well

Yeah, for our generation at leastExactly exactly and our generation at least the people love have money to buy these kind of quite expensive sports cars right?

Yeah, it's very funny howA lot of like the younger generation theyI feel so old when I say this I shouldn't say it like thatNo, but I'm like people will come into cars people will come new into cars. I wouldn't say they're age

Uh, they always say oh should you be like in the back in the good old days, right? Like but then like yeah dude

Like you complain about these cars and not coming up, but you're not the ones buying themEvery new gr86 and Subaru VRZ or super upbought by middle-aged Japanese guysEvery are like in the back of the 33 and 34 GTR they were bought by guys over 40 years old. Yeah

Yeah, that's true. The only people with the income to support it

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, and then they decide to sell it 20 years laterWhich then you see one owner low mileage cars because they don't have time to drive itThen the 60s and late 60s now and you know that that's the thing right because they have the money to buy soEvery sports car today is in atThey have to aim at like the Democrats of all the generations. So the Predator is gonna be the same

Toyota has been very smart by aiming the 86th and the g-r-a-d6For young people also with a specification for older people that they have the luxury spec and they're the basic specGenius, how is Honda gonna do that the civic type bar?

Uh is expensive like yeah, I feel five right?

It's no longer like the e-c-k and I was two million where it was a boy races car. We all bought them just like you know

As basic motor sports car and new tuning go on all those days. So uh

Like how can car makers become more more?

I mean, say like create an identity where it's it's stillpleases enthusiasm to make sales for normal normal roadUsers or motorists. It's very very difficult as an individual brand. Basically speaking

Neither of these three companies have a strong sales brand of like carsUh as much as Toyota groupMazda and Subaru even though they're lucky to be attached to third group because they can capitalize on their uniqueness of their type of vehiclesSimply because Toyota is supporting them through various various means like it's their product being protected by Toyota groupWhereas Honda is the strongest of the sort of these three at the moment in terms of sales

So that's why they're becoming like a leader in it for them. We're gonna see something's changed

It's I think it's gonna be exciting whatever whatever the decision is uh don't worryWe are not going to let Nissan die one another. We don't gonna let it go into foreign hands as it does as it did with Renault

Renault's now taking a stage backThe relationship between Runo and Nissan has already since19 sort of just not it really existed anymoreAnd that's a very very good thing. So um I really hope like you guys as uh

JapaneseKindistryuh into the eastern also one I wanted to see this this future continueThat Nissan can really turn around. I really don't know how they're gonna do it

Every day new news is coming out about this um andWhat do you guys think what what kind of company would you like to see when the in the interp integration of these three companiesYeah, that's tough right because you know when of course our mindsI'm sure go into what they were right, you knowAnd it's actually with the evo Nissan with the R cars, you know these different things butYeah, I mean what I'd like to see is some sort of

Revival of that passion, but what I know needs to happen isAffordable economical cars that apply to the masses and not necessarily sports cars thatApply to guys like us right for them to get back on their feet. I don't see sports cars being leading the charge for that right like you said

It's a hybrid technology. It's many vans. It's these things that apply to the average Joe as opposed to

Guys like us unfortunately. Yeah, I think I think that's pretty much the same thing. I was thinking as well

I mean, I'd love to see Nissan come out with another r36 and you know the s16 all these things, you knowWe're rooting for him, but you know is it realistic?

YeahIt's to sell yes, the last thing that's presentThe president of meat Honda said was that I'm just translatingWe will create products that will please our customers including the content of the technologyWe will create a new value in the productsSo regardless of the business integrated integration. I hope that both Honda and Nissan will prioritize

Creating products that excites their users and this is very hopeful for usBecause while we have the normal motorists who want to buycars that are excitingAh for the families level for the normal user but also for car enthusiastsI think to be completely honest, this is also my opinion of being in the kind of street for a very long time thatThe average employee in Honda and NissanOf course even Subaru

are moreUhOf sports cars and motor sports than ToyotaToyota is a big company and even the people who are running the GRProgramming everything they're just doing it because they're bosses are similar the realIntusiest who really love sports cars in Toyota isWell as you know more resultI hear Toyota himself if he is a car nut wasn't leading the he would not have GR super arm and GR

You know jareus and corolla right I mean he started the whole program. Yeah

umSo that was what we thought of Toyota 25 years ago just car company that hadKind of interesting cars they've available but reliable you're just boring whatreliable umBut Nissan and Honda of course on the other side Mitsubishi andandand SubaruI was able to build cars that really exciteUh and have this motor sports passion right like I would sayOut of all the car companies Nissan and Honda have in their category

rich history of of like actualyou knowvictories andmotor sports experience than any other japanese car company soI believe that the engineers oh yeah and and and and and the Honda culture they have auhThey usually promote engineers to higher management or what most of the president likes engineersActuallyLike Honda sohimself so they're passionate to create something. It's like all of them want to make another NSX

S2000Trust me they are very very crazy about this but they can'tWe'll do exactly what they want that's why you seeThey they put in so much effort created the NSX is oh shit nobody bought them. How we have to cancel it

And they're like no we still never sports that they created the S660 right and then now it's out of saleIn Japan they couldn't keep up with the M8 emissions in the wayOkay, let's create this consider civic type of so that's what civic type of smell is too continueThey need to have and then like this one Nissan doesn't want to give up the R35 GTRAll the fairly these at they cannot give it up there to hang on to it even subarad ever keep at least up your ex rightYeah, uh, it makes senseBut if I thought you're the if I hear you or don't say let's just make a sports car let's make a live aim or

I would I believe they will you only have a very mediocreuh sports grade of a chaser or or or something at the very mostOh wowYeah, I mean so choices right that these guys madeAnd into stay in like our culture, you know like like you said they they need to like they want toYeah, yeah, so one really other they'll they'll finally to do it and even make the sportyversions of like the normal cars. That's why yeah, there's an easel version of of just so many even even a normal

E power note in Japan. Yeah, I think please

Just like there's STI sport of all the different models of SubaruUh, but I think my Americans misunderstand what is STI they think it's only a grade of car for the doubter's STI but in realityNeeds more STI they're all brands which means the technologyFrom the motorsports division is fused into the parts and we make the complete car with theDriving dynamics that correctly reflectsUh the sporting nature of these brands or companies. So what it doesn't have a high power engine

Because let's face it not many people are willing to buy these days a 200 horsepower turbocharged Nissan Note in Japan at least I don't know about AmericaSo that's why they putThe styling and the chassis reinforcements of the suspension tuning dampers or you know they even go to very great detail like like like putting differentbushings pillow ball mouth bushes in the suspensionputting crossFloor crossbeams you know like all the Toyota g sports and the gr sports

This chassis is actually fully reinforcedWow, it's the suspension sort of the car handles much well. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, people don't see this right? Yeah, the brand of the Timon

Not the power I mean America all new except power I mean I was probably got that 46 and for that manNothing, you know, you're so right though. That's best though

Man can this has been great, man. We we

Definitely appreciate the conversation. I know we could we could go for days. So much

OverdatesYeah, definitely we would love to have you back on in the future that I think that would be amazingJust the wealth and knowledge is super beneficial for everybody listeningBut so can we just let people know real quick like where can they find Ken on the internetAt the moment you can only find me on Instagram being quite busy, but look atCaptain Bradford CAPT B-R-A-D F-O-R-D

That's my name on Instagram. You can find me there. I have some old posts on a lot of articles translated and original articles

But in the near future. I hope to come back to YouTube awesome

It's it's it's in the it's in the mill. I've been preparing some videos and I'm just

Trying to balance other stuff to come doing and actually come back because I want one. What's in the front back?

And I think I shouldIt's been fun to meet you. So I will also see you guys maybe soon this year in America. Oh wow

Ken comes to America. That sounds pretty cool

I love to have you I need to go and see you guys here and actually check out the gd on culture thereI just want to see you stuff you like the back thereSo all right, Ken man again, we appreciate this 100%Hopefully you have a great day over there in the Hakanay areaAnd we'll talk to you again soon manYeah, thank you very much. I think I'll go to the mom's

Wow, I feel like I just got out of a college lecture dudeWow, yeah, did you see me taking notes over here?

Trying to take notes dude. I was like this man

Dude, KenIt's hard right because it's almost like the knowledge is overflowing. Yeah out of him and it's hard for him to

Not necessarily keep on track, but to solelyExplain this one thing because there's so much relative right behind that he wants you to understandYeah, and it makes sense that's how somebody helps you learn is to fullyYou know explain it to you instead of just give you a little tidbit right 100%I appreciate that yeah, and yeah after we ended the episode we end up on the conversation with him for another 20 to 30 minutesBecause it's hard to stop right because us as you know, enthusiast says you would say are so interested in this knowledge

In him as almost a teacher is so interested in teaching us that it just keeps going dude. I couldn't get enough

I know I know I'm like man. Maybe we stopped recording too soon, but yeah, I mean we could have went for yeah

This is by far our longest episode. It's it's definitely like you know three times the length that we normally go but

You know, there's nobody better to do it with right than that guyI hope that we do get to have a mon again, you know, maybe six or eight months and and you know after Nissan some more developments have come out andKind of pick his brain history wiseYeah, I love that but yeah, that was Ken man again. It's at CAPT Bradford

Yeah, check it out because you man just scrolling on his Instagram is like a history lesson. Yeah. Oh, yeah

It's I remember when I first found him on Instagram. I was just like whoa

Yeah, who is this guy and just likenext postRead read read read read read read read like whoa, I'm blown next put like I couldn't get enough of it and talking to him same thingYeah, it was awesome. Yeah, like I said at the Heritage Collection

We didn't need the Nissan the NissanTor guide was below can yeah, yeahAll right guys, we definitely appreciate you listening if you listen to this point we owe you because youWe're dedicated one hour and 40 minutes is no joke. Oh, yeah, appreciate that

Absolutely, and if you want to find us of course you can find us at our HD G UIS on all the social platformsBut for today episode 115I'm Bobby. This is Aaron. See ya peace

[Music]

Ken Hayashi Aka @CaptBradford - EP.115

About this episode

Nissan R34S

Toyota Alphard

Toyota Car

Toyota Corolla

Nissan Gtr

Toyota Crown

Mazda Cx5

Ford Mustang

Chevrolet Camaro

Toyota Prius

Mitsubishi Outlander

Toyota Gr86

Subaru Vrz

Honda Civic

Honda NSX

Honda S660

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