Star Road

Star Road was founded 24 years ago by Shoji Inoue, a former truck driver and a car lover who decided after experimenting several jobs to take his destiny in hands and build his very own business. More often than not in this industry, the smaller companies provide with the best stuff and Star Road definitely fits this description.

If not for the good looking cars parked outside, you would never imagine this is a place where magnificent machines are built.

Piles of tires, engines, interior elements, chromed bumpers… There are parts absolutely all over the place and that’s what makes this place an real garage, one of those places you get your hands dirty fixing a pair of carburetors or fabricating a custom set of suspension arms for a KPGC10.

Star Road takes the restoration and tuning of these antiques to a very high level, probably one of the highest in the world. Cars are completely rebuilt, repainted and upgraded with specific and unique elements. A lot of custom fabrication is involved in every car and it can be felt as soon as you take a ride in one of them.

Inoue-san makes very definite choices regarding what he touches or not. Specializing in the old sports cars from Datsun (former name of Nissan). He doesn’t like turbocharged engines and he doesn’t like exotic swaps in car because he believes the engine is the core, the very spirit of each and every car. When some would not hesitate to install a RB26 in a 240Z, Mr. Inoue would always prefer the original L type 6 cylinder-engines. That doesn’t mean these engines don’t receive proper treatment. When you floor the pedal of one of his cars, you will come to realize how well old school mechanical tuning can be. It pushes hard, delivers torque and massive power with a raging sound only the race cars of that era were capable of offering.

First, the amount of detail on each vehicle is simply mind-blowing. Every single element looks like new, down to every bolt, screw or nut, and that is only what you can see. Even the electric harnesses are completely redone to ensure that it will work flawlessly.

Engines receive proper tuning and are most of the time equipped with double Mikuni carburetors on every pair of cylinders as it is the way Inoue-san likes them best. He recently converted the Yellow demo car to run on injection but admitted it was not as good as the carburetor version.

Talking about the exhaust, this too is a completely original Star Road replacement for the factory pipes. Looking just right while generating a beautiful soundtrack.

The all new Glowstar wheels designed by Star Road and made by Work Wheels gives the ultimate retro touch to the cars and are available in several variations; silver, gold, black, diamond cut and that’s not including special requests from customers. Nice carbon fender flares will give the final touch and house the big wheels perfectly.

Back then production technology wasn’t as advanced as today and there were irregularities in some water conduits. When machining those heads it is not uncommon to accidentally go through one of them rendering the part useless.

So much quality can’t come from anybody. Inoue-san is not only a very nice person he’s also totally dedicated to what he does and you feel his touch when you drive his cars. “Kokoro wo komete” literally means in Japanese “put your heart into something” and that’s exactly what he does. Each car made by Inoue san is a little part of his heart and this is definitely what’s more precious in it.