JDM ICON! Paul Walker's R34 Skyline from Fast and Furious at The Shmuseum

To date, we have never seen a JDM car here at the Shmuseum, a true JDM car. Well, today we are welcoming Robby, Ghost Skyline, with his R34 to come and visit because my collection definitely has a notable absence of anything Japanese. It's a topic often on the channel. I recently went to HJA and drove an R34 GTR, which was absolutely epic, an awesome experience. These things have ballooned in prices in recent years. But Robby's car is pretty special. It was at Petrolheadenism Underground where we had taken a number of my cars as well. Today, however, he's coming by so we can talk all about it and head out for a run on the roads. The closest I've got personally to owning a Japanese car was my Mk5 BMW Supra. And I say that a little bit in jest, but of course, the BMW Z4 Toyota Supra collaboration, a little bit different because they were built in Austria. And that car actually, having sold it a while back, did come and visit here at the Shmuseum. We had welcomed my A90 edition here to stop by. But when I visited my friend 458 Destroyer out in the United States, I had a surreal driving experience in Paul Walker's very own GTR, a car that had been owned by the late Legend of the Fast and Furious movies. And that's going to tie us on to what we're going to be talking about today. When it comes to things like the R32s, R33s, R34s, the interest in these things in recent years has ballooned. The likes of TJ Hunt has his midnight purple R34. Amelia Hartford just took delivery of hers in the United States, having shipped it over from Japan, in fact, at the same place where both the GT Black Series and the Zenbo have, in fact, been. But R35s we know very well. Godzilla have won many a drag race over the last decade or so, and still going somehow. But when it comes to the earlier cars, there's a massive following for these things. And I've always been much more about the European exotica, the kind of cars you see here in my collection. But there's something about the JDM cars that I'm trying to learn, that of course you guys absolutely love. And the car coming today is very much a big part of that. Hi guys, I'm Shmee. Hello and welcome back to the channel. Today we're catching up with Robbie. We're going to be talking about the R34, everything that's involved in these. Let's do it. I hear a distinct rumbling of a very cool looking car. Welcome to the Shmuseum, this amazing thing, which we are about to take a full look around. Check that out. Welcome, welcome. That is absolutely awesome, straight out of Fast and Furious. How cool is this? Right, say hello to Robbie. Let's have a look around it. Here we are. Hello, Tim. Welcome. Thank you very much. Welcome to the Shmuseum. Thank you for bringing this by. What a thing. My pleasure. It's been, what, a couple of weeks since you had it at Petroheadenism? Yeah, it was at Petroheadenism, pink lower underground. We had a Fast and Furious collection of cars there. We had about 15, 16 vehicles there, ranging from the Charger, Skyline, Supra, Jetta, etc. So yeah. Just down from where we were, because that was actually pretty cool. You met Craig Lieberman there. Ah, my hero. I think without Craig, there wouldn't be like the interesting JDM cars there is today. I really believe that. Without Fast and Furious 1 and 2, where would we be? From seeing that film, it was just like, I've got to own a Skyline. An R34 Skyline has been my dream car. So having met the guy that put all that into action was just amazing. That's super cool. How long have you had this? I got it imported last, yeah, last April. So just over a year. So you brought it in yourself? No, it was an importer that brought it in. He just happened to advertise it. I seen it. And it was just like, I've got to buy it. You were like, there's nothing else. Yeah. Isn't it that thing, right? Fast and Furious and the movies, and Too Fast, Too Furious, where this was, has been such a cult thing. It's become like, there's so much importance to these cars. Can we talk a bit about this? What exactly is this as a car? As a car, it's actually a Nissan Skyline year 2000 model. It's a GTT, not the GTR. Unfortunately, I couldn't afford 140,000 pounds. Prices have gone crazy. They've gone mental. They really have gone mental. It's in the American markets because of the 25-year-old rule. So this could be sent to America next year. Been on for 25 years. So of course, prices have just bumped up higher and higher and higher, and they're just getting silly. So yeah. So R34 GT Turbo. Yep. The one thing that I'm very proud of, ultimately proud of, is I actually own the actual HRE 446Rs. And as I believe, they're the only set in the UK. Oh, really? Yeah. So that is it. And it's on Craig Lieberman's channel where, apparently, when they were actually supplying the wheels for the film, HRE had done them a deal at 500 pounds apiece. They should be 2,000 dollars apiece. And that's Craig Lieberman who said it. So currently, they're probably worth 10,000 upwards. And I've got the only set in the UK. That's pretty special because the car is effectively a tribute to Brian O'Connor's, Paul Walker's characters' movie car. Exactly. And the way it's finished with the livery, with the underglow. That's it. It's got to be done. That's one of the jobs that I did was actually putting on the underglow, getting the wheels. We've got the shopping list. Yeah. They call it the shopping list. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All the mods, everything that's been done to it. Yeah. And that was a guy off YouTube. Sorry, YouTube. Sorry, eBay. I needed that shopping list and he couldn't find it. That one. Gold line. Yeah. And as it was, he looked on Gran Turismo 2, found it there and says, I know what it is now. I've got them all. So it's guideline. And that was it. So we've got those on. That's quite good fun. In terms of mechanics, how far from stock are we? It's pushing about 380 to 4. I'm not exactly sure. I've not had it dynoed. So it's one of those that I'm happy. That's what I was told it was running in Japan, about 380. There's Blitz intercooler. There's a Blitz dump valve. Yeah. HK induction. HKS, sorry. Induction. There's a Keikimoto. Exhaust has been de-catted. Yeah. A Blitz dump valve. Yeah. Can we pop open the bonnet? Yeah, certainly, yeah. Sorry, throwing you at the deep end. But always nice to take a look if we can see what's there. It's pretty well stock underneath. There's no flashy chrome as yet. Let's get on with it. But I mean, it's pretty spectacular. When you're driving this thing, the looks of attention it must get. Oh, it's crazy. So somewhere just shy of 400 horsepower or so. It's cool. Were these kind of the RB25s? RB25, yeah. This is where I'm testing my limited JDM knowledge. Regret you need JDM. Yeah, it's the RB25. The RB26DETT, that's in the GTRs. Which, there isn't much difference between them, other than between turbos, I suppose. Yeah, makes sense, makes sense. And as I've been learning, how this runs for kind of a minute once you turn it off. Yeah, turbo timer. Which is quite a funny concept if you're not familiar with it. You can turn the engine off, take your key out, go in the house, have your breakfast, have a shower, have a bath. Whatever you've got to do, you come out and that will still be turning. It's still running. So whenever you pull up at a petrol station. Reason being, it is to carry on oil circulating around the turbo. It's an old turbo. It's 24 years old, a ceramic turbo. So it's a thing that circulates oil for another minute, then the car will switch off. But when you're trying to put fuel in at a petrol station. They're screaming over the tannoy, like. You're standing there, I can't do anything, the car's running, I think I'm gonna do a runner. Turn it off, turn it off. Yeah. So what was it like then, meeting Craig Lieberman? Because obviously you've owned this car. The history, the story, the reason for it looking like it does. As you said, it's down to him, right? It's down to what he did for the movies. You must have spent some time chatting with him. Oh yeah. Fantastic guy. Absolutely fantastic. They say you should never meet your heroes because you're going to be disappointed. I met Craig and he was one of the nicest people I've ever met. He sat with us in the pub for a couple of hours, telling us stories of on set, how he knew Paul, a bit about Vin Diesel and so on. And he was just like, this is the man that started it all off. And he's sitting right opposite, having a drink with us in the pub. Fantastic bloke. And what I managed to do, well, I should say Craig managed to do for me. Yeah. And this means a lot. Yeah. Oh yeah. Craig actually signed it and sat in that seat and signed it. That's amazing. Do it fast, do it furious. Craig Lieberman in 2024. I love that because the team behind Fast and Furious have been responsible for the automotive love of a generation. I mean, people can say what they want about the movies and different opinions on them. Especially the latter ones. Truth be told, it's been a big part of the automotive experience for so many people, right? Yourself, for me. This is what, 20 years old or so, the movies when this appeared? Yeah, the first one, 2001. 2003, I think the... Literally it's 20 years old now, isn't it? Too fast, too furious. Yeah, 20 years on and it's still got as much fascination with people, even as little kids who just want to sit in it. Do you find that though? If you're driving along with this, is it every age group that's looking at it? Oh yeah, every age group. Without a shadow of a doubt. I mean, there's guys that like seeing it with their dad sitting at the cinema watching it. There's everybody like me. I was middle-aged when that came out. So it's just like across the board. It never first amazed me that kids of five, six, seven years of age know about the car. So they want to sit in it. So it's like, yeah, of course you can sit in it. Let them rev it up. Sometimes they redline it, sometimes they don't. But yeah, and you'll get the dads as well who want to sit in it with the kids. And yeah, it just transcends all ages. It's that cult classic that's, I mean, like we just said, right? It's captivated the hearts of a lot of people. And this is so iconic. Have you had any crazy experiences? Because I know you drive this. Have you had any crazy experiences where you've been on the road in it and you've had somebody holding a camera getting a bit close? All the time. Yeah, all the time. I had it going down to underground as it was and it was a little van and he kept like hanging on my shoulder. So he was filming it and then he's got in front of me and he got his passenger filming. Then he was behind me and then we're filming it. And it was a bit off-putting because I'm trying to drive and I've got somebody who's just constantly moving from front to side to back to front and just that. Then on the night time, he sent me a DM off the Instagram. I've got some video of your car, mate. Do you want it? Yeah, do I want it? Yeah, of course I do. But yeah, the camera's come out a lot. It's that unicorn car. I mean, Skylines, every Skyline you see has been imported into this country from Japan at some point. And then to have it in the Paul Walker livery from the Fast and Furious, again, it's a unicorn car. So how often do you see it? So it's one of those that I don't mind anybody taking pictures, video. No, they love to be shared. It's the fun of taking it to different events. Are you in touch with anybody else who has a kind of replica Skyline of that? No. So it's really few and far between. It is. As far as I believe, there's probably one or that, maybe two others in the whole UK that's got that livery on. But I've never seen him at a show. This is only what I've been told. Where's the original one? Do you know him? I got him out. I don't know. We'd have to look at the Craig Lieberman video for the original one. Yeah, any heads up? Actually, the original one. Sorry. Yeah, because it was actually Craig's Blackbird, which was a black car that he used for the first two films. Sorry, the second film. It was his Supra and Skyline that he used in those films. And when they decided to make it silver and put the stripes on, he lost his mind. He said, what are you doing putting muscle stripes on a JDM car? Yeah, yeah. That's madness. It's like having a muscle car. Yeah, it's not a Shelby, right? It's not a Mustang. That's it, yeah. Why would you do it? So he wasn't happy about it. But as it is, it's probably the best livery of all the cars. So it did work. I mean, it's an icon. It's iconic. And in terms of condition, how many miles has this car done? 194,000 kilometers. So just about 115,000. Yeah, something like that. So it's had some good running. It's still kind of looking amazing. I'm impressed by that. Under the lights here, the paintwork's looking beautiful. As we walk past, Ghost Skyline. Yeah. I've got to ask, why Ghost Skyline? Several reasons. I had a white four-door Skyline, and it was just getting a name for Instagram that was kind of punchy, rather than letters and numbers and underscores. So I had a white one on after start. You mean not ending up with Schmee 150? Yeah, Schmee 150. I could do it on that. And it was a case because it was white, and it was just white like a ghost. And that was it. So it was a white car. So it was just like, yeah, Ghost Skyline. I love that. So when I changed from the white one to this one, I said to everybody, what should I do? Keep the old name or just get something new? Most people just said, yeah, just keep it Ghost. Be known as Ghost. So just leave it as Ghost. So it's been like that since. The little tribute as well to legendary Mr. Paul Walker. Yeah. 2013, isn't it crazy? 11 years has flown by. Absolutely. This is crazy. So Garage Defend as well. Notice the stickers here. Yeah. There's a guy in Japan that sells mostly Skylines and stuff like this. And every car he sells puts one of his own little stickers on it. And so at some point it went through their hands. Yeah. It must have done this. Night Tour 2016. That's cool. Yeah. Isn't it fun to think this car was bombing around Japan at some point? Oh, yeah. Yeah. The one thing that did upset me is I found no Japanese money, no yen or anything. I thought, at some point, somebody down the back of the seat. Nothing. No, they're too organized and tidy out there for that. Yeah, this is it. So yeah, to be done, it's... Have you ever been to Japan? No. Is that like bucket list? You'd love to go out there? Yeah, I don't think the missus would be too key. But yeah, it's one of those places to go to actually see their car culture. It's another level. It's a completely different thing. I've only been once. It was a long time ago, but... And more focused on like the Lambos bombing around. But the lights, the car scene, it's like no other anywhere in the world. That's right, yeah. To go there would be a... Well, yeah, a dream. Passion like no other. Detroit. I guess what we should do, if it's all right with you, is get the car started up, take it out for a little run. Should we do it? Yeah, let's do it. Let's go for it. We're out on the road then. This is what it's about. This is what it's all about. Oh, that's cool. The induction sounds. That's it. HKS. Thank you very much. The flutters. Dump valve flutters. It's all about that. The emotion. Yeah. I see the smile on your face. I love this. You know when, to me, when I jump in a car with somebody, you know, we've never been in a car together before, but as soon as you're at the wheel of this, I see that you're in your element, you're in your zone. This is a special thing. It is. It moves the soul. That's what cars, that's what transport should be about. It's not just an A to B, it's an emotion. It just gets you tingling. It makes it special. So yeah, this does that. It really does. I love it. So we've got 400-odd horsepower, obviously quite some poke if you wanted to, but the GTT is more your kind of road daily version, isn't it, of the GTR? It's slightly softer than the GTR. What do you think? Yeah, I mean, the thing with the GTT is you can get it mapped up to do 600, 700 brake horsepower. So it is capable there to do it, but you can enjoy it a bit more because GTR's been over £100,000 now. You're not going to want to put your foot down. You're not going to want to do those things with the GTT. You can pick them up like half the price, a bit cheaper. So yeah, you can rag it a little bit more. You can actually enjoy the car more without having to worry about it. So for me, GTT is where it's at. What does this have in terms of ride and suspension? It's got HSD Mono Pros on the front and it's got Teens on the back. When I changed over the wheels to the HREs, I had to change some of the suspension to do with the offset and camber. So yeah, that's the reason why there's Teens at the back and HSDs at the front. Makes sense. One of those things. We're actually kind of lucky because when you arrived earlier, the weather was atrocious. Oh, the sounds are cool. It's gone from torrential downpour to the bright sunshine. That's right. Roads are still a bit wet, but hey. It's called a skyline for a reason. The sky is doing all sorts of weird things when you're out in it. But I love, obviously from the passenger side, I'm staring at Craig's signature. But not just that. It's all the Japanese in the summit, if I could say. The dials up on the top of the dashboard. That's it. The Fast and Furious video playing on the screen down here. Yeah, absolutely. Does it have like, when you get in it and turn it on, does it start talking to you in Japanese and that kind of stuff? It does. It's just fitted down here and every time you get in it and start the engine, then you get a little Japanese voice then that will give you, in Japanese. And it's a little tolt roll. Oh, the tolt roll device thing. Yeah, and it always makes you smile. Just somebody speaking to you, get in the car. It's a nice little touch. Reminds you a bit of its past and kind of where it's come from. Exactly, yeah. That's it. Somewhere around some Japanese roads, this was airing about. The five-speed manual. Was this car an auto? Yeah, it was. It started off originally in Japan as an auto, and somebody's changed it to a manual gearbox. Heads forth the controls on the steering wheel there. Yeah, so it's still got the kind of up, shift, down. Not that they're going to do much. No. Is that an easy change? Is it a common thing in these? It is, yeah. You don't want an auto skyline. It's just, nah, you want something there. It's analogue. You want to be able to put your gears where you want it, not when an auto decides when it's going to do stuff. Oh, those sounds are epic. Nice, isn't they? That mid-range, mid-rev, just ease into the power. You know, I actually always say that high 300s, 400 horsepower is about the right number for driving in the UK, right? Any more and you're at silly speeds too quickly. Any less and you sometimes want a little bit more poke out of it. I totally agree. I do think it's just having the right amount of power to get you out of trouble, to put a smile on your face. Yeah. You don't really need much more than that, especially on our roads with the potholes and the police. Yeah, you don't need it. And all of those very real sounds happening in the background. That's it. Or part of the skyline thing. It's cool. So I guess your biggest difference between GTT and GTR is the single turbo to twin turbo. Yeah, they're also the GTR, a four-wheel drive as well. Yeah, of course. And I think, I believe, they're also four-wheel steer. Yep. So I think the GTT, I think this has got it as well. Oh yeah, I don't think, I know it is actually thinking about that. It has got the rear wheels that'll steer. Now on track, that's where it comes into its own. Basically, the car says, hold me beer, I'll get you around this track. But on normal roads, most of the time it's just driving normally, but it can catch you out. So suddenly it can kick in when you least expect it. And then yeah, you can oversteer. So it's one I'm always mindful, but you can get a kit to get that taken out. Right, here we are. I have a question, have you ever been a passenger in here? No. Thank you very much for this opportunity. I promise you, I will look after your baby. This is important. Yeah. This is a special cool car. Thank you for the opportunity. Just get familiar with everything, make sure we're good. Yeah, don't really need to move everything. That's it, indicators on the right-hand side. Of course. JDM, so that's everything that will throw you out, isn't it? Throws a lot of people out, doesn't it? Oh God, yeah. I still do it now from the daily. I can get in and get the wrong side. Where are we? Very high by point on the clutch. It is, yeah. I think it's due a new one, really. So then there's getting used to the dashboard being in kilometres. Oh wow, Hurricane Technica. It's Lambo Day. It is, isn't it, yeah? How funny is that? After we've seen the SPJ before, off camera, then we have Hurricane Technica go past. Yeah, they've all come out to see us. Lambo Day, Lambo's everywhere. So that noise as you build back in the power, that's really cool, isn't it? It is, yeah. I love that. Turbo spooling up, getting ready. And then this flutters. Even just taking it easy. I'm actually impressed by how well it rides. Like it's... Yeah, it is. For a 24-year-old car, it is surprising how good it is. I think, obviously, with the teens and the HSDs, I think that's carrying over a lot of it. But still, for a 24-year-old, this... I mean, this is a pretty bumpy countryside lane. We're in the UK after all, right? Countryside here is atrocious. I like that. Just keep it in fifth gear, back on the power. Some flutters. No feeling of needing to absolutely Mach 10 anything. Ah, this is amazing. Just keeping it, you know, about 100 kilometres an hour, 60 miles an hour. Slow it down. Drop it down a gear. Down to third gear. I would go and do that at the bit where, clearly, it flooded a touch earlier. Oh, you're a lovely clean car. I'm sorry. That's all right, mate. I'll send you the bill. Yeah, so of course, rear-driven rather than all-wheel drive. I don't know why I don't have a JDM car, a GTR or a GTT or something of this ilk. I think it's time you did. I think so. I think you should definitely do it. Because down here, this is really nice. I suppose I composed it, isn't it? That's the thing. How big do you think the interest in R34s would be without Fast and Furious? Oh, yeah, that's a good question, though, isn't it? It's like probably nowhere near the price they are. But the Skylines do have a reputation. I mean, when you turn up at a car meet, everybody expects the Skyline, spitting flames. It's an expected thing. As soon as you say you own a Skyline, people are like, the eyebrows rise and, it's a Skyline. And I didn't go down the N3 route. I mean, I've had a lot of BMWs in the past. I've still got one today as the daily. So yeah, it's easy to go to the N3 and the N5s all day long. But I just went and thought a little bit out of the box. It's always been a car I've wanted, is the 34. I like the 33s, love the 32s, but the 34 for me was the halo car. It was just, it's got the looks, it's got the sound, it's got the mythos behind it. It's got the Fast and Furious. Paul Walker even said on set that his favourite car that he drove on the films was the GTR. So much so he bought one in real life as well. So he put his money where his mouth is. Yeah, I've driven his very car, which is kind of crazy to me. Oh, that is mental. Absolutely legendary thing when I was driving it. So was this something you always wanted or was this a car that kind of came up and you were like, oh, it's going to happen. I've got to do it. It is, I think I said to you earlier, it cost me my marriage. I was supposed to be getting married. We was getting married abroad. We was going to Pretaris and he's going to do all that and dresses for bridesmaids, everything was bought. This came up at the right money and it was a case of, well, it's a bucket list moment. If I don't buy this now, I'm never going to buy it. So yeah, I bought it, cancelled the wedding and yeah, we're still together. Still together, that's the important thing. So yeah, she understood this was my dream. It was the bucket list moment. And that was it. It was like, so I do thank you. Thank you Sue. Thank you for still being with me. So yeah, it's amazing. What a story. And now you have something truly special. I mean, this is an investment as well. It's not just something you can enjoy, you can use, you can drive. It's also something that inevitably in the future is going to be even more so. That's cool. Oh, I love it. Absolutely love it. I don't think that will come across so well on the video because of the wind noise, but it's just the fun sounds without being too much, without being silly over the top. Well, that's it, isn't it? Sometimes they go over the top with straight pipe in them and stuff like that. And it's just noisy for the sake of noise. And it's got like, this is drivable at 30 mile an hour, 40 mile an hour. You can drive to town, hopefully it takes a bit longer to notice. So yeah, it's an everyday car as well. If a Nissan Skyline could be an everyday car. We have just filled up the car. So we get the start process now, which is normal turn. I don't know what it said, but it's cool. That was really cool actually, wasn't it? It is, yeah. Someone will have to tell us exactly what that just told us. Somebody will, absolutely. We need to know. Fun, right. Let's head back. We're back in the garage then. What a drive. Did you enjoy it? I absolutely enjoyed it. And do you know what? I enjoyed seeing how much you enjoy it as well. I like, I mean, obviously you've done a load of driving with this thing, but still to know that you appreciate it every time, to know what it's about. Some of the stuff we've been talking about off camera as well, like just how people react to seeing this, like how much of an icon a Skyline in this look has been to a generation, literally. Across generations as well, isn't it? I mean, from little kids to people like in their 40s and 50s. It's like, it's just got the appeal. It's pure cool. And I think as well, it's that people could own it. It's one of those as well. It's like, I could own that if I wanted to. Own one. If you get the chance of buying one, do buy it. You will not regret it. They're only going up in value. So yeah. Love it. Well, basically it's thanks to Ciro and Petrolheadenism that we've met. So shout out and thanks to Ciro. Thank you to you as well for coming by. It's been great fun. Thank you. Really appreciate it. I appreciate your time. Thank you. What an epic car. As a bit of fun, I have been honoured with popping a squiggle up here on the airbag above Craig Lieberman's signature, which is quite fun after today's experience. I think it's time for Rob to head on out to the Partridge Museum with this thing. I very much enjoyed seeing it here. Being able to drive it, take it for a run today. Well, the bad weather arrived here. We were kind of expecting it. And yeah, it did its thing. But we say farewell to the car. It's been a mega day. Big thanks to Rob for coming by today. And a safe journey with this back. Back to base. The question that remains then is when will we see a JDM car in the Schmiemaviles? When will something like a Skyline or a Supra or something else join my collection? And that remains to be seen. Today has been about the experience. Getting Rob's thoughts on a car that's very much a tribute to Fast and Furious, to Brian O'Connor, to the late Paul Walker, of course. And today I've enjoyed driving that thing a lot. There's so much hype that means you have this inherent intrigue into what these cars are like. What makes them so special? The engineering that was at the start of them. And in the case of this car, the specific story behind it. Behind what it represents. Behind the car and the story that it's a tribute to as well. So a big thanks to Rob and Cal for coming down today. A big thanks to Rob for the opportunity to drive his incredible R34 Skyline. I've enjoyed today a lot. And a big thanks to you guys for watching as always. That's it for this time though. Thank you very much for watching. And I'll see you again very soon. Cheers!