The Nissan Skyline is a popular car in Japan, especially known for its sporty versions. It's famous for its speed and technology, making it a favorite among car fans.
The Nissan 260 RS is a special version of a Nissan car that is designed for better performance and racing. It's part of Nissan's lineup that appeals to people who love fast and sporty cars.
The Toyota Vellfire is a fancy minivan that has a lot of space and nice features. It's popular in Japan and is often used by families or for driving people around in comfort.
The Mitsubishi Delica Space Gear is a type of van that can handle rough terrain and is often used for outdoor activities. It has a tall, boxy shape that makes it easy to get in and out of.
Vanning is when people take vans and make them special by adding cool features and decorations inside. It's like turning a regular van into a fancy vehicle with things like leather seats and big TVs.
Luxurious interiors are fancy and comfortable designs inside a car or van. They often have nice materials like soft leather and cool gadgets to make the ride more enjoyable.
The 2JZ is a powerful engine made by Toyota, often used in sports cars. It's famous for being very strong and can be modified to produce a lot of horsepower.
Overlanding is a way of traveling where you go to remote places, usually in a vehicle built for off-road driving. It's about exploring and camping in nature, often for long periods.
The RB26 is a powerful engine made by Nissan that many car fans love because it can be modified to produce even more power. It's often found in high-performance cars like the Nissan Skyline.
The Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX is a sporty car that was designed for high performance, especially in racing. The wagon version offers more space for carrying things, making it a practical choice for families who still want a fun driving experience.
The Subaru Forester STI is a sportier version of the regular Forester, designed for better performance and handling. It has a more powerful engine and special features that make it more fun to drive.
The Subaru WRX STI is a sporty version of the Subaru WRX that is designed for high performance, especially in racing and rallying, featuring a powerful engine and all-wheel drive.
The Subaru Levorg STI is a sporty wagon that combines the features of a family car with the performance of a sports car. It’s great for people who need space but still want to drive fast.
The Dodge Charger Hellcat is a fast car with a really strong engine. It's made for people who love speed and performance, and it's one of the most powerful versions of the Charger.
The Toyota Alphard is a big, comfortable van that's great for families or people who need to transport others. It has lots of space inside and comes with nice features, making it a popular choice for those who want something more luxurious than a regular van.
The Mazda RX-7 is a sporty car that uses a special type of engine called a rotary engine, which is different from most cars. It's loved by many for being fun to drive and having a cool look, but there aren't many left that are in good shape, making them hard to find.
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Hey, and welcome back to the next episode
of the Right Hand Drive Guys podcast,
the podcast for guys who like right hand drives.
I'm Bobby, this is Aaron.
Yeah, yo.
And this is episode 159.
And we're back in the garage, AKA the studio.
And today, you know, we're like, all right,
let's talk about something we haven't really talked about
mostly, and that is like,
why Japanese people love their vans and wagons?
Dude, they do love their van and wagons.
They do love their vans and wagons.
100%.
You go over there, that's about all you see, right?
Right, so that's the thing, you know, you get off,
you know, you get off the plane in the Rita or Haneda,
and you're like, ready to see some skylines
and Supras and NSXs.
Yeah.
And what pulls up?
A high ace.
And then there's another, and then another.
Or a Vellfire.
Or a Vell, yeah, or a Vellfire for sure.
You might get lucky.
You might get lucky and see a sentry.
And see a sentry, yeah.
Maybe.
Yeah, and they got the rug out on the side,
ready for you to wipe your feet and get in.
Yeah, with that, when we first got off the plane in Japan,
the first trip ever, that's exactly what it was.
We walk out and there's this like,
it's hard to even tell the years on those things,
but it's like, there's this gorgeous, beautiful woman.
I thought I was gonna say car.
No, no, this is like gorgeous, beautiful sentry, right?
With actually a woman driver.
I remember this vividly.
And she gets out and she opens the door for this guy,
like a Japanese guy in a business suit and stuff,
closes it, gets in, the curtains close.
Like, who is that?
Who is that?
We're just like, oh my God.
Dude had the curtains, the doilies on the seats,
all that dude, full kit.
And so this is our, you know, this was our first,
like we literally walked outside the airport
and this is what we see.
And we're like, oh, is this for us?
Like really, for us?
They heard we were coming.
Yeah, no, we got into a different van.
Yeah, I think it was a Vell fire.
Yeah, and so, yeah, and you know, like he said,
you're not on the highway, you're not seeing
just all these like 90s superhero cars.
What you're seeing is a ton of vans, a ton of wagons.
Like, you know, and I don't know if you could consider
from the high ace all the way down to like the inbox,
like those are like vans, you know,
even though the inbox is like a K car or whatever,
it's still just a miniature van.
Right.
You know, so that's realistically,
and then on the wagon side of things,
you're still seeing a ton of those as well.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's not a lot of the ones
that we're necessarily gonna talk about in this episode
because those are specialty, right?
But the average driver, you know,
is probably driving some resemblance
of a van or a wagon, like in Japan.
100%.
So, yeah, I mean, that was what we started to notice
throughout the trips quite a bit was like,
these people love their vans,
and not only do they love their vans,
they love to modify these vans.
Yeah, they do, like they get pretty crazy.
And, you know, it kind of shows,
you can kind of compare and contrast culture
because like in America, what do you see mostly?
These huge SUVs.
Oh, yes, yes, for sure.
And then you go over there and they,
I don't know, they make a better use of space,
I guess you could say,
and they use all these wagons and vans
to make the best use of the space that they have.
You know, there's no wasted space in those vehicles either.
Yeah, and so, you know, practicality-wise,
like a van or a wagon,
especially in single vehicle families,
because that is what you get a lot of in Japan
because of all of the public transportation.
So, if you have one vehicle per family
and you got at least four people in the family,
like a van or a wagon is gonna be the most practical
because you can fit the whole family,
plus you can fit whatever you're going to get,
whether it's groceries or whatever, right?
So, that makes sense.
I mean, the cities, especially Tokyo,
if you live in any city, Tokyo, Osaka, whatever,
they're tight, right?
They're busy, they're tight.
And parking, parking is a huge deal.
Right, so instead of, you know, yeah,
so instead of these big SUVs, right?
Like you said, where there is a lot of wasted space,
if I think about a high-ace that I've ridden in
compared to my Yukon, dude,
the high-ace has insane amounts more.
Yeah, your nose might be about to touch the windshield
when you're sitting all the way back in the seat.
Yeah, yeah, for sure.
Hey, I mean, it's good use of space.
Yeah, it's one of those things.
And so, you know, I can see that.
And a lot of times it felt like those vans
were much taller than our vehicles here.
Yeah.
And then they were also much more lower to the ground.
So, I feel like that's what created
a lot of that interior space, period.
You know, whereas, like, again, a Yukon,
you got to jump up into it.
Like a high-ace, you pretty much walk straight into it.
It's like, you know, they really set them up like that.
Unless you got a Delica space gear.
A Delica what?
Space gear, it's all, those are the lifted.
Oh, yeah, yeah, the off-road type.
The off-road, it looks so foolish.
But, right, they took that,
and what they call it over there is vanning culture,
vanning.
So, you know, they took that and really ran with it.
You know, where we, in the U.S.,
we definitely, like, modify our SUVs
or modify these things, but definitely not
to the extent that they do these vans.
Like, some of these vans, they open it up
and it's like a Rolls Royce inside.
And you're just like, what the hell?
Like, orange leather, stars in the ceiling, 42-inch TV.
You're like, what the hell is this?
And then like, dude, I remember the first time
we're driving down the road,
or down the fucking whatever the highway,
and we look over, and this frickin' mom's seat
is spun all the way around,
facing them in the back,
and they're all watching TV in this van,
and we're just like, what?
How is this chick sitting backwards in the front seat?
This is crazy.
But in Japan, that's like a huge thing.
That's almost like standard, rotating front seats.
Or like, going to any of the PAs during a holiday week
or something, you'll see families just posted up.
Eating lunch or whatever.
They're all sitting in the back,
Indian style, just sitting there eating or talking,
whatever, doing what they're doing.
And they're not in a huge car.
They're just in a regular-sized van for over there.
It's pretty crazy.
It is. That's cool.
And so, the vans are really cool.
We definitely started kind of becoming fans of the van.
We would start seeing them,
whether it was at a pit or whatever, up garage,
and we'd start being like,
oh dude, fuckin' look at that high-ace.
Where there's a S13 sitting there.
And we like-
Oh dude, the high-aces, dude.
Yeah, the high-aces.
The Toyota high-ace, man, that first trip over there,
that opened my eyes to those, I think both of us,
and we were just like, by the end of it,
we were just like, we were almost obsessed with high-aces.
We were like, dude, how long until these can be imported?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
For sure.
Because they are, again, all of that space,
all of that style, and it's a decent vehicle.
I couldn't tell you what they have for motors in them,
but I know that there's for sure multiple levels.
Just like any vehicle, there's multiple levels to it,
and you would see the highest level one,
and you could tell.
But then you would see the ones with the body kit,
and the slammed-on wheels, and the whole thing.
T37s on it, yeah.
It was really crazy.
Yeah, that's the thing with those, man.
You can modify them to literally any style
that you want to any extreme.
I've seen them fully gutted out with a K-Genit, a 2JZ,
wing on the back, slammed on some aero,
like as a road-race-type build,
but then you see other ones that are kind of jacked up
and more overlanding-type builds.
Yeah, off-road-type stuff.
And it's the same platform, it's the same chassis.
It's just like, which extreme do you want to go with?
Right, it's a blank slate, for sure.
So, okay, so the vans are dope, right?
Like you said, people do a lot of overlanding,
and then maybe even the U.S. overlanding trend kind of,
because it's interesting how the trends
like mix across the oceans, right?
Like somebody will either whatever come to America
or see it on the internet,
and then they replicate it just like we do
for certain vehicles, right?
And so that is just interesting
because we did kind of start seeing more overland-type
with the little ramps that if you get stuck on the side
and extra gas tanks and the whole thing.
But dude, remember one of the auto-box we went to
had a full, dude, it was like a quarter of the store
was this one brand, I forget the brand,
but it was like a high-end overlanding-type brand
for vans, like maybe not necessarily just cake vans
and cake cars, but like, I don't know, it was crazy.
I think they had a Jimny,
that's the one I was looking at.
It was decked out completely, dude,
like everything was modified on it,
like everything was touched.
It was just like, what is this brand?
And like they must be doing good
if they're having a whole quarter of the auto-box.
That's a US guys brand, I know exactly what you're talking
about because I walk past in a pit every single time.
And it is all exactly what you're saying,
like camping out of your vehicle stuff,
like overlanding stuff, like all of that.
But right, it has like an American-type name.
I keep wanting to say Robbie Gordon for some reason,
but I know that's not it.
No, I think it's close to that.
It's something like that, Gordon Miller.
Gordon Miller.
Yeah, that's what it is, yeah.
And I believe it is a US,
because I remember we looked it up
and I believe it was like a US brand,
which is smart if you think about it.
If you take something that you see in other country
is emulating and you take this already kind of successful
brand and rename it in the US, in Japan,
does it say that?
Yeah, it's Gordon Miller, that's who it is.
And like they make all types of stuff.
I mean, they make just everything.
I guess there he is.
Oh wow, okay, not who I expected, but that's dope.
But right, they make all types of stuff
for that type of culture.
I mean, it's pretty cool.
And I guess since it's an American-type name,
like Japanese are gonna be into it.
Right, and so that's actually like really smart
if you think about it.
And so yeah, like, you know,
when we, let's move over to the wagons.
When we talk about wagons,
which we've already kind of had a wagon episode
so we don't need to beat this to death,
but in Japan especially, every manufacturer,
not every, but a lot of manufacturers
created a wagon version of one of their,
like one of their hero cars, right?
So, I guess you could say any sought after engine
that you would like that came from Japan,
they probably had it in a wagon.
Right, that makes sense.
RB26, obviously the Stadia RSV4, is that, yeah.
Or RS260.
260 RS.
260 RS, there it is.
The Evo, the Evo had a wagon.
The Evo wagon.
There was an SR20 in a wagon.
I believe it was the Avenir wagon.
So if you want an SR20 all-wheel drive,
there's one for you.
WRX wagon.
Yeah, the Legacy GTB twin turbo boxer wagon.
That's another one, like.
STI Forester, the Legnum VR4.
Yeah, I mean, they pretty much, yeah,
they created a family version of their hero cars,
so to speak, that everyone could enjoy,
which I think is sweet.
I think that the US kind of skipped over
some of the wagon culture that really is just,
it's awesome, it's a car, but it's a van, so to speak, right?
Like you get the storage space of something like that
with the performance of that car.
Perfect example, Evo 9 wagon, right?
That is such a pure version of a wagon
in the sense of that's literally an Evo 9
with just an extension on the back.
They didn't dumb anything down,
they didn't make it tamer because it was a wagon,
which I think is sweet and we probably should've
kind of embraced that a little more,
but I feel like in the US, you're on one side or the other.
That's always what I remember.
You either liked wagons or you thought they were lame.
Yeah, I know, and it sucks
because most people think they're lame.
I think we're coming around.
I'm starting to see more and more wagons being imported over,
like from Europe or whatever, not necessarily Japan,
but I feel like they're starting
to gain a little bit of traction.
But I think, dude, I think they're awesome.
Just what you said, like they're like the car version,
except they got a little bit extra space.
And as far as handling goes,
a wagon will outhandle anything else with,
like an SUV the same size will outhandle that, right?
Oh, for sure, yeah.
And the driving experience of it,
it's more like driving a car, not like driving a truck,
which some people probably don't like driving SUVs
because of the frame or how it rides, right?
Whereas a wagon, you have plenty of space,
but it still has that car feeling.
If you're into driving fast,
it's way easier to drive fast in a wagon
than it is basically a truck wagon.
Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.
I agree, it's much more nimble load of the ground,
which helps for loading things in the back too, right?
Like there's countless times when I gotta load something
in the back of a Yukon that I'm like,
almost smashing the rear bumper
because it's so high off the ground.
Whereas if it was a wagon,
it would be more of a straight load in
and just less struggle, you know?
Yeah, I mean, I think that Japan was super smart
making these wagon versions.
It's too bad we didn't get them.
It's cool if people are starting to embrace them.
I know we got like the WRX wagon,
and that was always super cool
when a guy would modify his WRX wagon,
like that's so different, you know?
And so, yeah, I mean.
Do we also got the legacy,
was it the, no, was it the legacy
or the Forester STI wagon here?
We got one of those for a couple years, I believe, didn't we?
I feel like the Forester, yeah.
Because I remember it had like the huge hood scoop,
and I don't know why it looks so much bigger
on the Forester than it did on anything else.
Yeah, it's true.
But it was like monstrous, dude, I'm like, holy cow.
And those were pretty well received, I think,
like in the US, you know?
But when you have this huge market
and then you're making this car
that only appeals to this small market,
it is probably hard to continue to create things
for this super small market.
When the rest of your market is so huge
and you could create a vehicle
that applies to more of them and sell more units, right?
And I feel like we see that across the board
with a lot of the cars that we're into is,
you know, these cars are such a small piece
of their whole manufacturing lineup
that eventually they almost fade off
unless the company is super dedicated to that brand.
Like for example, Subaru with STI,
they are super, super dedicated
to that portion of the brand,
and that's why there's still a WX STI, you know?
Whereas like...
But there's also a Lavorg STI.
There's STIs on it.
Right, right, right.
Oh, in Japan especially, everything is like an STI,
you know?
Here a little less, you know?
They did keep it a little more exclusive,
which I think was a good idea.
But just in the sense of, you know,
GTR discontinued, Evo discontinued, you know?
But Subaru has like held on to STI
regardless of how much of the market
it actually is for them.
Because in the Northeast, we all know,
like Subaru wagons a lot of people buy, right?
Because they're all will drive
and represent certain things.
So yeah, I'm glad they kept a hold of the STI.
That's not just the Northeast.
Yeah, for sure, for sure.
So yeah, I mean, it's like, so the Japanese,
I think, love these wagons
because it still represents their passion,
which is maybe these cars like we have,
but also caters to their family,
which in Japan, unless, you know,
there's only certain guys that got five cars in Japan, right?
Like most guys in Japan have one car, two at absolute.
Most families, most families have, right?
One car, if not, like maybe two.
But that's, I think that's pretty rare.
So if you have to choose one car,
like you know your old lady's gonna be pissed
when you show up with like a sedan, you know,
like it's like, it's this fast sedan
and she's like, dude, what the hell?
Like we need to be able to carry stuff in the back.
You show up with the wagon.
Dude, the wagon.
The sports wagon.
The sports wagon.
Now she's happy and smiling and dancing.
Yeah, for sure.
Oh my God, wagon.
So I think that that was really smart, right?
Like in terms of like,
let's just say Nissan creating the 260 RS.
You got the GTR guy that can have the family car, you know?
And it's like now you have like Autech and Nismo and STI
and Raleigh Art creating these wagons, dude.
Like this whole other genre of car.
So and they're creating them for families,
which is like sweet to think about.
That's something I feel like, you know,
performance motor sports skips over families in America often.
You know, it's a...
Right, you're getting a two door
if you want a performance car.
Right, for the most part, right?
Like look at all of our performance cars.
They are two doors.
Muscle cars, I mean, they're all...
Two doors, yeah.
Unless it's a...
Oh, one of them hell scats.
One of those hell scats or like...
One of those hell scat charges.
Yeah, that's cat, pack scat, whatever it is.
I don't know.
What are they talking about?
Yeah, that's the only four door thing
that you can get a rest in around here, you know.
I guess, yeah.
And so it's like back in the 90s,
from what I've read back in the 90s
is when all of this started with the vans and the wagons,
right, because of this.
And this is before they even created
these performance versions.
And maybe it was the inspiration for the manufacturers
to create those versions because the family guy
started modifying the regular wagon.
The regular van, you know,
to be able to have something in common with his friend
who had maybe a GTR, but like, he can't do that.
And dude, they modify everything over there.
Everything.
Everything has a set of wheels on it.
Everything has a shift knob.
Everything has stupid stickers all over.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, everything is so cool.
Yeah, 90% of people are into it.
Yeah, which is really cool.
Whereas like here, I would say it's a drastically,
drastically less amount of people
that are just modifying even their daily drivers, right?
Like, which maybe there isn't the money for that.
Maybe there isn't the interest.
I'm not sure what it is.
But I mean, I don't know.
Do you think that once the Alphard,
the Hiace, Elgrand, all of these different crazy vans,
once those can be imported, you know,
and whatever, 10 more years, I don't know,
whatever it is, do you think that there is a group
that's waiting for that ready to get them and modify them?
And then B, if not, do you think that once they can come
over here that they will catch on?
I don't know, I don't think so.
I mean, I think that most people not in Japan
or not in an Asian country,
don't even know some of these things exist.
Like some of these vans, they don't know they exist.
Right, right.
You know, the people that have been over there
and they're into the type of culture,
they know what they are, but you know,
they're not going out of their way to, you know,
buy a Vellfire at auction or an Alphard.
You know, they're not, I just don't see that.
I don't see them being a huge thing, which sucks
because they can be cool.
But I mean, I haven't even heard of anyone
or seen anyone online really talking about.
But do you think that it's so far out that like,
because all the ones that we were seeing
were probably newer than we realized.
Yeah.
You know, so I don't know what the years are,
you know, production for the ones that are cool,
but maybe we're so far out from that,
that like, just no one's talking about it, you know,
because it's just so far, like, or...
Because I mean, right, I feel like in Japan,
the way they do their cars, it's weird,
like the 90s, early 2000s, you know,
almost up to 2010, it looks, everything looks very kind,
not dated, but you can tell it's from that era, right?
Yeah.
And then all of a sudden, the next generation,
everything is like, futuristic almost.
Yeah.
Huge headlights, huge tail lights, like just, yeah.
Right, like cool interiors, light LEDs everywhere,
like just cool type stuff, but I don't know.
I mean, when do those come legal?
I mean, is it gonna be 2035 or is it gonna be...
Well, I think the determining factor
beyond the fans of those cars, right?
Because of course there are some dudes
that are into them already.
Right now in the US, we don't have a glue.
Just like if you think about it,
and I know this is a little different,
but the K trucks, right?
Those got this weird cult following,
which I get because they're like miniature trucks,
mini trucks, right?
I do get that part.
But will the same type of thing be created
for like VIP vans from Japan?
I don't know, I think the difference in pricing
between a mini truck and a VIP van
is gonna be light years apart.
Obviously because whatever you can get a K truck
for eight grand, are these things gonna be 35?
Like are they gonna be 28?
Like I don't know, and that I think is going
to be the determining factor of whether
you can get a 25-year-old Alphard for less
than you could get, let's just say a 25-year-old Yukon.
Where are even are those?
You hardly even see those, dude.
Well, that'd be what, yeah, I don't.
A 2000 suburban dude, you rarely see that, yeah.
Down south probably because obviously things last longer,
but I don't know, I feel like that's going
to be the limiting factor is how much are these vans
when they finally make it over here?
Is there still tariffs?
Is shipping still astronomical?
That's also a bigger vehicle.
But dude, they've made so many of them.
That's true.
So many of them.
So what are those gonna be going for at auction?
Are those gonna be the rock bottom,
you know, 1,000 yen out the door, like?
Yeah, right.
You know what I mean?
But you get it.
Yeah, is it, yeah, are they like just super cheap
because they're mass produced, over produced?
Yeah, yeah, because that's what everyone has over there.
Yeah, that makes sense.
I mean, yeah, I'm interested to see
because it could either be a huge thing here
or it could be nothing.
And like, I hope it's a thing over here
because I do love those.
I don't know, again, I don't know like what they have
for motors, I feel like they make a diesel high ace.
Like that's cool.
You know, like that type of thing is cool.
Dude, you got a diesel van that can pull your car.
Yeah.
Like that's sick.
Yeah, totally sick.
And then you can sleep in it too.
You can sleep in it, you can put your spare tires in there.
Like, you know, it's a cool thing.
It'll just really be interesting to find out.
But I know they're not legally yet
because you would at least see one or two over here.
You know, there'd at least be a few.
But you really don't see anything like that.
Like you'll see a Delica or whatever, that type of thing.
But like, rare leak, kinda.
Yeah, I haven't seen many.
Like there are high aces,
but they are the older generations
that don't look at school.
Yeah, square headlights, yeah.
And I've been looking for,
well, I haven't been really looking for,
but I've been looking at campers, JDM campers.
And just seeing those pop up around here,
it's not that many.
It's not as many as you would think.
And like, damn, like,
I wish more of those would come over.
Yeah, literally.
Yeah.
I mean, I don't know if it's because of the size,
like the shipping is a little different.
I don't know if it's like top deck
because of the height or, you know, what I'm not sure.
You know, they could be more to ship,
which, you know, cause when I was looking at a ramp truck,
that was way more to ship because of the size.
Oh yeah.
So, you know, who knows?
But yeah, I mean, I think that there's a place for them.
I really hope that they do catch on,
especially as some of these hero cars age out
from importation, you know,
everything's been scalped over there for these hero cars.
Like, will the importers kind of shift
to what we're talking about?
Like, you know, VIP vans and, you know, hot wagons
and whatever else it is, right?
Yeah.
I mean, they're not, they're either gonna have to
or they're gonna go out of business
because there's only so many 32 GTR Supra's
RX-7's over there left that aren't destroyed.
So like, they either get a pivot or,
True.
You know, change industries, I suppose.
Change industries, holy cow.
Dude, I mean, I don't know, it's pretty crazy.
It's not just the JDM vans too.
Like, American vans are super popular over there.
Yeah.
Like, I think it was Walde had a kit
for the Dodge caravan, like the newer, like bubble caravan.
They had a full kit for it that turned it
into like full Japanese style.
Astro vans, those are huge over there.
Like, huge, it is crazy.
Cause you'll see pictures of them at Daikoku or whatever.
And they have like little side markers
and like these little cues that tell you it's in Japan.
And it's just like, what the hell?
How did this Astro van from Alabama
make it all the way to Tokyo?
And wasn't Sean Morris's family,
the ones responsible for that?
A lot of them, I believe.
Back in the day, they were exporting.
You know, if you don't know who Sean Morris is,
he's the guy that was originally working for Hero at Motor X
and helped bring in some of, you know, the first GTRs.
And then now is part owner of top rank importers.
And he got his importing start with his dad
actually exporting Astro vans to Japan.
Like, and then obviously figured out like,
hey, this can go both ways type thing.
It's crazy.
Yeah, it is crazy.
Dude, another crazy van that the Dodge, the huge,
like usually CMS church buses or like utility.
Yeah, the huge Dodge Vans.
Dude, it's called the Dodge Van.
Dodge Van.
Dodge Van.
Trend over there.
And like, they have a full race series
where they're like racing these things wheel to wheel,
like on road courses.
And there's, you see huge vans.
Like little Japanese dude driving it.
Like the seats, like the only thing that's in them
is a seat and it's pushed all the way forward
into the steering wheel dude.
It's just like so much room.
It's crazy, but like, how did that become a thing?
I don't know, but.
I know it is interesting between the two countries.
You know, what caught on over there,
what didn't, same over here, you know,
like something we consider trash.
They're like, oh shoot, we'd love to have that.
Cause like over here we use those
for what conversion vans, like I said,
church buses or work vans.
Sometimes painters and yeah.
My stepdad used them for a carpet,
for his carpet link business.
He'd throw a whole roll of carpet in the back of them.
Yeah.
You know, but over there they're like,
ah, we gotta race these.
Yeah, these are amazing.
What?
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, I think, yeah, I can see,
you know, have been to Japan like quite a few times.
So I can definitely see the difference
in just Japanese people and their mindset
and why they would like these things
compared to like the American mindset
and why like they're too cool for some of these things,
you know.
Hey, hit us up in the comments,
let us know like wagon or van, like EVO or Legnum.
Wait.
Wait, what?
That's gonna be an EVO for sure.
But yeah, now let us know what you think.
Like, have you seen any dope hiases?
Have you been to Japan and experienced
what we're talking about?
Definitely let us know in the comments or send us a DM.
If you need to find us online, it's at our HD, GUIS.
And check out the show notes
for the Facebook group we'd love to have you for sure.
But for episode 159,
why the hell is Japan obsessed with wagons and vans?
I'm Bobby, this is Aaron.
See ya.
Peace.
About this episode
Exploring the unique love for vans and wagons in Japan, Bobby and Aaron discuss how these vehicles dominate the streets over more traditional sports cars. They share personal anecdotes from their trips to Japan, highlighting the practicality and cultural significance of these vehicles. The episode delves into the modifications that Japanese enthusiasts make to their vans, turning them into luxurious spaces, and compares the van culture in Japan to the SUV trend in the U.S. The hosts also touch on the potential for these vehicles to gain popularity in the U.S. once they become importable.
In this episode of the Right Hand Drive Guys Podcast, we dive into one of Japan’s most fascinating automotive subcultures — their love affair with vans and wagons. From the performance-packed Evo 9 Wagon to the ultra-luxurious Toyota Alphard and Vellfire, we explore why these practical rides have such a massive following in Japan.
We break down what makes JDM vans and wagons so special — the craftsmanship, comfort, styling, and over-the-top customization that turn everyday family cars into status symbols. Plus, we share which models we’d import in a heartbeat and how the van culture in Japan compares to what we see in the U.S.
🎙️ From track-ready wagons to VIP vans — discover why Japan does “family cars” better than anyone else.
