This is another entry in our archive series, where we’re bringing back shoots from the original Tunerzine era that either never had a permanent home online or disappeared along with the sites that originally hosted them. This one ran on the cover of the March 2006 issue of Modified Magazine, and I photographed the car in December 2005 at Swift Springs’ warehouse in Southern California.
If you had told me in late 2005 that a car I photographed in a warehouse would eventually end up in a Fast and Furious movie, I probably would have assumed you meant one of the drift cars I was shooting at the time. The Swift Springs 2002 Nissan Silvia S15 wasn’t being used for drifting, though. It was a time attack car, and it wasn’t something we could simply drive across town looking for a better location. I ended up working with the warehouse itself and whatever was available right outside the door. It wasn’t the most glamorous setup, but the photos still made the cover, so I can’t complain about it two decades later.
A few weeks before the shoot, the S15 had competed at a U.S. time attack event held shortly after SEMA 2005. Yasushi Kikuchi was behind the wheel, bringing experience from Super GT, Super Taikyu, and the Nürburgring 24 Hours. Time attack was still relatively young in the U.S. at the time, and part of the appeal of those early events was seeing Japanese-built cars and experienced Japanese drivers go up against the local field.
At first glance, the Wise Square D1-Spec 50mm Technora widebody kit makes the car look more like a drift build. Under the hood, though, the setup was clearly aimed at circuit use. The SR20DET ran Tomei 272-degree cams, a Nismo head gasket, an HKS Power Flow intake and intercooler, a Garrett GT-30 turbo, a Wise Square exhaust, and a Blitz-URAS boost controller. A factory ECU reflashed by Yashio Factory handled engine management. According to the original Modified Magazine spec sheet, the combination produced 420 whp at 17.6 psi.
Power went through a Nismo six-speed transmission with a 1.5-way LSD and an ORC twin-plate clutch. The suspension used Kei Office DG5 coilovers with Swift springs and stabilizer bars, along with SPL bushings replacing the factory rubber.
The wheel setup was unusual even for an S15. Up front were 19×8-inch +5 RAYS Daytona DR505s, while the rear used 18×10-inch +5 DR505s, all wrapped in Toyo RA-1 tires. The brakes were stock, which is still one of the more surprising details on the original spec sheet considering how the car was being used.
Inside, things were kept fairly simple. A Cusco bolt-in cage, Bride seat, KEY’S Racing steering wheel, and Takata five-point harness covered the essentials, while DEFi gauges for boost, EGT, and oil temperature sat on the dash.
Of course, the reason a lot of people recognize this S15 today has nothing to do with time attack. The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift hit theaters in 2006, and the Swift car appears briefly in the final parking garage scene as Sean’s S15 when Dominic Toretto shows up to race him. It isn’t on screen for long, but that appearance gave the car another life entirely and probably introduced it to far more people than its competition history ever did.
That’s still the strange part for me when I look back at these photos. At the time, it was simply the Swift Springs S15 I photographed in a warehouse for Modified. A few months later, it was in a Fast and Furious movie, and nearly two decades after that, people are still asking about it.
We also have another S15 from the same era in the archive, Yoshinori Koguchi’s HPI S15, which makes for an interesting comparison. Same chassis and roughly the same era, but two very different ways of building an S15.
GalleryPhotos by Jason Siu
