Driving Sports

We crashed a recent Cars and Coffee meet in Las Vegas to find a car worth featuring for our new series, PetrolRazzi! We'll be finding our favorite cars and photographing them on the spot and interviewing their owners -- wherever that happens to be. For this first installment we found John Oshima, a Las Vegas transplant who drives a smooth 1977 Nissan Skyline 2000GT. This is an extremely rare car that is still a work in progress, according to the owner.

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Introduce yourself, please...
My name is John Oshima, I’ve been living in Las Vegas for 15 years, and previously grew up in Okinawa [Japan].

What car are we looking at?
This is a 1977 Nissan Skyline, nickname "Skyline Japan" and it’s the 2 door hardtop model. It’s a car I’ve been restoring for the past 4 years and I’m still trying to finish up the car, which has been been taking a lot longer than expected. Mostly due to the availability of parts.

What generation is this?
This car’s generation is a fifth generation. It was the first year Nissan dropped the GT-R badge from the lineup, until later on it was brought back in to the R32 lineup.

Because of oil shock? (Japanese term for the 1973 oil crisis)
I’m not too sure the reason to drop the GT-R badge, but it could be a new direction. They changed the engine to gear more towards the non-aspirated engines, and this car was originally equipped with an L20 engine producing 135 horsepower, uh, a lot of people what they do is take the engine out and put in a bigger engine, like an L28. This engine has an L28, its been bored up to a L29, later on I’ll probably stroke it up to a 3.1 liter car.

How did you bring this car to the States?
Actually, a friend of mine was in the military and he was stationed in Iwakuni in Okinawa and he brought it about 20 years ago. After he imported it into the United States, and after owning it for ah, quite a number of years, I took it over 4 years ago to do the full restoration.
The body was straight, there are a few rust spots, but the amount of work… took a lot longer than I expected.

Is this your daily driver?
I probably drive it every, once a week, if that. I still need to find more parts  to restore it, maybe some bushings, that might be missing, or some things that might pull out. Actually, the restoration of the car, where it is right now, I’d say it’s about 95-percent done, all the parts replaced were brand new Nissan parts, which is why it’s taking a lot longer than expected. I think the only used part I had to reuse was a brake cylinder, probably.

Are there lots of old Skyline in the States?
This particular model, no. I’ve seen 4-door versions, but not in this top shape. A lot of my friends thought I was crazy to restore the car from ground-up. But I figured to be different, drive something different. I’m sure this is the first one that has been fully restored.

Is this the Ken&Mary aka “KENMERI” version?
Actually, the KENMERI version was the fourth generation, the one before mine. This is the fifth generation, known as the Japan. It was actually used in a TV show in the early 80s and has that American muscle car look.

Wikipedia: The C110 Skyline was better known as the "Ken & Mary" or "Kenmeri" (Skyline, stemming from the advertisement campaign in Japan at the time which featured a young couple (Ken and Mary) who relaxed and enjoyed the countryside in Ken and Mary's Skyline. The ads were highly successful and perhaps as a result the C110 was sold in very large numbers in Japan.

I remember growing up in Okinawa, watching, flipping through channels, I remember seeing this car featured in the television program.

Do you have a favorite aspect of this car?
I think the thing I like about the car is that is has that American muscle car look. Square shaped, you know, which is one reason why I like the car a lot.

Is there another car you would like to have some day.
Actually, if I didn’t pick this car up, I would like to do an early 240Z, I’d like to do that car. I’ve always like it for some reason.

So, you’re a Nissan guy?
I’ve owned about ten cars, and a lot of them have been Nissan.

What were the other cars you owned?
Nissan Cima, like a Y33 model, a S14 Sylvia a long time ago, an S13 Sylvia, so I’ve had a few Nissans over the past couple years.

Are you a member of this club? What do you like about it.
I’m not a member of this club, but I come out every once in a while. I guess what I like is the variety, you don’t have only one type of car out here, you have a variety of American cars, European cars, Japanese cars, which is one thing I like about it.

What are your primary modifications?
I have the oversize fenders, the oversize rims,  and uh, engine is a bigger engine, it has triple, 44 Mikuni carbs,  pretty much a full suspension kit on it, exhaust, headers, the basics. Suspension is the old school KYB. A lot of no-name brands, but you know, companies that still manufacture the stuff.

You don’t race this do you?
No, not too much. I’m still trying to finish the car. So, until it’s 100-percent I won’t feel comfortable. Even the engine right now is just a stock rebuild. Later on I’ll probably want to do more to the engine, but, that’s probably later.

We heard there’s another old Skyline in Las Vegas, do you know this person?
Yeah, actually he’s a friend of mine. He has a 1972, Hakosuka. That’s actually a third generation Skyline that he imported from Yokota, airforce base. Every once in a while we hang out, drive around town.

Which car is better?
He has a more popular following, ‘cause his car was one of GT-R trims that came out and Nissan… the parts availability are much better for that car than for this car. I still like my car, but, you know, it probably fits me more than a Hakosuka.