A comfortable car to drive with modern technology

At the Tokyo Auto Salon 2024, legendary tuners showed their strong love for old cars. Among these, AMW focused on the 1974 Nissan Cedric 2-door hardtop by VeilSide. When it was built, it was one of the cars that were filled with the strong desire of representative Yokomaku to “put Japan’s world-class tuning technology to work on an old car”.

VeilSide has risen to the status of top tuner

If you know much about tuning, you must also know about VeilSide’s glorious history of glory in the past. It is a well-known story that the representative of Yokomaku has broken many historical records in the drag race, which he is particularly particular about. He also devised his tuning to increase the potential of the car beyond the rest, and rose to the position of the top tuner in the tuner’s battle organized by magazines, as well as in Japan’s top drag races such as RRC and Big End, which were held at Fuji Speedway.

VeilSide was a Nissan Skyline GT-R (BNR32) user, and was famous as a tuning shop that drew out the maximum potential from the RB26DETT, the most powerful power unit in Japan. However, it is not widely known that the origin of the tuning shop is deeply related to the tuning of the L-type engine and that Yokomaku’s skills and instincts as an engine tuner were cultivated on the L-type engine. When asked about Yokomaku’s younger days, before he had even set up his shop, he replied.

“At the time, street Zeroyon was just getting popular. Everyone who liked modifying cars spent their days getting into drag races. I was also researching how to extract more engine power from the L-type engine, which was said to be the strongest power unit at the time, to drive faster than anyone else, and I was obsessed with winning. I learned mechanical tuning, studied carbs, and built injection and turbo versions.”

“During that time, I broke countless engines and there were many times when I didn’t get the results I wanted. I learned the basics of various engine tuning techniques from this L-type, made a lot of mistakes, and developed a lot of emotions and feelings other than technique and experience, such as frustration, bitterness, pain, enjoyment, and fun.”

The 230 Cedric has been given a special thought

Because of his passion for tuning the L-engine, Yokomaku became famous on the street Zeroyon circuit and established Yokomaku Racing Service, the predecessor of the current VeilSide, at a very young age. He also spent his days at a tuning shop immersed in L-engine tuning and used his own experience to provide information to owners looking for speed.

Because of this, the 230 Cedric with the L-engine tuned this time was an opportunity for Yokomaku to get in touch with cars and power units for the first time in a long time, which is why he also has special feelings about it.

By the way, why is the driving VeilSide a Cedric?　This is a bit of a question, but Mr Yokomaku tells us why.

“My father drove this car when I was a child, and I had a vision of one day buying a car of the same model and making it into a comfortable car to drive using modern technology. I bought it about 10 years ago. After I bought it, I kept it in the garage and finally decided to get serious about building it, so I started restomodding it for this year’s Auto Salon to pursue the ideal I had in mind.”