Saurus USA: Shop Visitors Part 1 - A Trio of R32s

Amidst the other projects we've got going on for Skyline Syndicate, one thing that we've been a part of the last couple of months is helping our friends at Garage Saurus get their US operations started. With Fujita-san all settled, we've had some cars come through the shop for the Garage Saurus to perform work on. Ranging from full builds to basic maintenance and inspection, we'll be sharing on a regular basis some of the cars that come through the shop. 

We hope that this series of posts can give everyone insight on the crazy attention to detail that Garage Saurus has, as well as provide good information on Skylines. With cars of this age coming into the States, inspections and repairs are highly recommended. 

We'll start off with a PPI that we did for a customer who is in the process of getting his car ready for the US roads. This car had spent its life in Japan, Europe, and Canada before being imported into the US. With a journey of that many stops, many mechanics had touched it. The customer brought the car in for Fujita-san to evaluate the health of the engine, check out the chassis and suspension and to do an oil change with Moty's. Thankfully, nothing critical was found. Aside from a few common leaks, and questionable work from previous mechanics, the car was in decent shape. Timing was clearly off, so the next step for us was to open up the cam covers and check out if the cams are aftermarket. 

The good thing about Garage Saurus is that they take their time. They truly treat customer cars as if they were their own. Fujita-san likes to always remind us that "your car is your girlfriend[or boyfriend]. If you're letting me work on your car, it means you trust me. When I work on your car, I treat it like it's my girlfriend too. If you love your car, then I love it too". 

If he sees missing or incorrect bolts, washers, hoses, and clamps; he digs into his stash and replaces it correctly. If he sees something dirty, he cleans it. If your car makes his hands dirty this first time he works on it; he makes it a personal mission to get the car to the point that it won't dirty his hand the next time. 

Next up, we have a Nismo R32 that came in to replace the power steering lines and install intakes. The customer had recently purchased the car from Toprank and he was slowly beginning to modify it with some really nice parts. We're looking forward to seeing this car around a lot more.

We'll close up this post with a really sweet R32 GTS-T. The owner had been in contact with us before we had even officially opened for service. It was nice to see that the Garage Saurus name was known by enthusiasts Stateside and the owner made the drive all the way from San Diego to have Fujita-san work on his car.

For this visit, the customer needed his speedometer cable changed after it had been damaged by a different local tuner. It's something that we commonly see fail as inexperienced mechanic usually aren't aware of the small details when it comes to Skylines, but it was easily diagnosed by Fujita-san and quickly replaced with a new OEM speedo cable that we had shipped from Japan. 

We look forward to seeing this car around more. Hopefully the owner can make the drive up when we organize meet ups at the shop.

Thats it for today. We've got some more projects in the shop so stay tuned for more!