The Chronicles - Car Culture Website and Video Blog Series.

09/24/2026

When it came to restyling Yasutaka Shimomukai’s EK9, we took a more traditional approach. Yasu said he had a mismatched pair of TEs he could paint and wanted to know what color I thought would be good. I said that we should paint-match it Championship White and he was like “Really?” and laughed.

“Every EK in Osaka looked like that when I was 19” he said.

That’s exactly what I wanted, I told him. We aren’t trying to re-invent the wheel or do anything crazy. I just wanted a very traditional look, something that blends in. We have a couple of pretty in-depth, stripped-down Civics already so let’s do an EK9 that still has full interior, side moldings and looks streetable. Simplicity is the key but with this car even more so…

Yasu acquired this EK9 with a lot of stuff on it already, it’s actually even a “Spoon-certified” Honda but the Spoon stuff wouldn’t really stay in the car long. To replicate anything close to a Civic from Kansai, you don’t really run Spoon stuff. That’s more of a Kanto thing. He landed from Japan with a lot. He somehow managed to convince the airline to let him board with a FRP hood, the CW TE37s, a valve cover, and other bits for the EK9. The brand new Exceed V2 96-98 lip showed-up a week later. We ditched the Fastline shifter for a Hybrid one with a Battlecraft k**b and a Hyper RQR now holds a Nardi Classic in black. The seats are the same Bride Autobacs Edition from my red EK9 since I recently installed a pair of Mugen S1…

The exhaust was a late spontaneous add. I found a Kakimoto GT1.0Z muffler in the trash at Yasu’s shop years ago and brought it back home with me. I thought it looked cool, maybe someday I’d use it. And finally we did. I had bbymole make a straight pipe from the header back, added some V-bands, and this thing screams now. Everything came together in a matter of weeks, looking very different than when we first picked up the car a few months ago…

The concept was to have the EK9 you’d see as a kid cruising down the street. One of those cars that made you think you’d want one some day. Mission accomplished.

There’s an episode where you can see it all come together and it is live now. Enjoy.

09/24/2026

New EK9 project at the shop and a new look for my red CTR!…

What's better than one EK9 Civic Type R at the shop? How about two?......

What’s better than one EK9 Civic Type R at the shop? How about two?…

09/22/2026

Series 2 of the ongoing “Hyper REV” tribute collection is AVAILABLE NOW. I’ve been having so much fun with these where I constantly find myself trying to create even more of these cars which pay homage to some very notable Honda builds from past and present. For Series 2 we introduce the DA Integra chassis along with the SSR EX-C series of wheels. Who knew that in 2026 you can rock a tee with a DA on it, right? Then again, who even knew they wanted to, lol. The DA I actually created completely from scratch and I’d say it’s pretty faithful to the real versions. The wheels are probably the most satisfying to make, especially when they look like the real deal so a lot of time was spent dedicated to making truly realistic iterations of some of our favorite wheels…

Series 2 shirts debuted at Wekfest Los Angeles this past weekend but are now available to the world on our digital storefront!

www.CHRNCLS.com

Get your’s now and thank you as always for continuing to support The Chronicles!!

09/22/2026

The most necessary photo dump from the past week…

09/18/2026

After the show it’s the Afters party?…

Join us on Tuesday following Wekfest USA Los Angeles at the one and only DOGHOUSE GARAGE for some late night hangs to celebrate another great year of SoCal car culture and community! Gonna have some cars on display from the show, probably Hung screaming at people, a churro guy might show up randomly, and maybe some smash burgers or something. No matter what it’s gonna be a great time as always, nobody does Tuesday car meets better than CHRNCLS and DHG, nobody else wants to lol.

Got some friends in town from Japan too so show them what SoCal is all about in the most peaceful, non-asshole way possible. Let’s keep it classy people, see you there!!

Wekfest Afters
September 22
7-10PM
Doghouse Garage in Santa Ana

🫡🫡🫡

09/18/2026

Got some new stuff coming for Wekfest Los Angeles this weekend including Series 2 of the ongoing “Hyper REV” tribute collection. I’ve been having so much fun with these where I constantly find myself trying to create even more of these cars which pay homage to some very notable Honda builds from past and present. For Series 2 we introduce the DA Integra chassis along with the SSR EX-C series of wheels. Who knew that in 2026 you can rock a tee with a DA on it, right? Then again, who even knew they wanted to, lol. The DA I actually pretty completely from scratch and I’d say it’s pretty faithful to the real versions. The wheels are probably the most satisfying to make, especially when they look like the real deal so a lot of time was spent dedicated to making truly realistic iterations of some of our favorite wheels…

I got a whole new booth setup you guys will like too along with a new look for my red EK9 and the ‘debut’ of Yasutaka Shimomukai’s ‘97 EK9 CTR with the first V2 Exceed lip ever produced. See everyone this weekend and grab a couple of shirts if you like them!…

Series 2 shirts will also be available to the rest of the world next week after the show at our digital storefront!

See everyone this weekend!…

09/13/2026

Car guy math dictates that if you got the car with the wheels on it already, whatever you sell them for subtracts from the cost of the new wheels and however much you have to put on top is the *actual* price…

So I that means I got myself some $150 MF10s then?…

I really enjoyed having the Regamasters on the S2000 but I felt like it was time for a change. Over the past year or so I acquired a set of WEDS TC005s and a set of Racing Hart CP-035 from Japan but had a hell of a time getting them to fit. I knew S2000s were notorious for being difficult when it came to fitting wheels but thought I had figured it. I crunched the numbers and the wheels seemed to fit on paper but when it came time to put a tire on them, the math just wasn’t mathing…

A deal came up on a set of Mugen MF10s that I really couldn’t pass up. I thought about holding onto the Regas but realistically, I wasn’t going to put them back on and the shop is so full of stuff that it just made more sense to let them go. I knew the textured bronze would work on this silver but I was surprised by how good it looked. Maybe it has more to do with the ride height than anything but it almost looks like a different car. The height I have to mess with some more since the fenders were definitely riding the tires more than I’d like (the whole time) but man, it looks good this way. We raised the car up today and went to the GReddy event but now it just looks high to me. Eventually I’ll find a happy medium, aka rubbing 50% of the time, but I’m sure it’ll be fine. Sacrifices must be made!…

I told myself I’d put some time and effort into the S2000 this year too so I added some stuff to the engine bay. But that’s an update for another time…

Huge thanks to Yokohama Tire for the assist. If I’m gonna run rubber on my fenders, it’s gonna be ADVAN rubber lol…

09/04/2026

Gotta get these Wekfest Seattle photos up before Chicago happens this weekend. Yes, the rest of the San Jose stuff will be posted I swear, lol. Lots of stuff happening in the next few months but I’ll definitely make time to get everything out in-between the madness of Japanese visitors and me being the visitor in Japan. Then SEMA and so on and so forth. I can’t even imagine doing The Chronicles Anniversary meets like I used to because Sep/Oct used to be down time. That will eventually come back too, I hope. Maybe when Year 20 happens, haha…

Anyways, let’s head to multi-caption…

First up we have Terry (Spriggan) Suvonnarith’s Integra GS-R on some green CEs. After seeing Hondafest happen and everyone getting together for the Menace show, I should have just kept my car up there and went to all those too…

09/02/2026

Man, I really gotta get these photos going out consistently again. It may appear like I’ve been idle but I’ve been super busy preparing for the next few months. Yasu is coming back soon for Wekfest LA and there’s a high probability of me heading back to Japan as well after...

We start things off this week with the absolute highlight of this year’s Seattle Wekfest, Alex Chac’s Civic, a build many of us have been waiting to see completed after probably a decade of build-up…

Many builds take time to reach the summit in an owner’s mind but almost 10 years is a bit much. It wasn’t for lack of trying of course, but some cars end up in body shop hell and disappear into the void, never seeing completion. Alex and Sarah refused to let it die however, and saw the project through—no matter how long it would take. They collected parts, remained patient, and perhaps it worked out in their favor. Some things wouldn’t have happened had the car not been stuck in perpetual limbo…

Underneath the Civic is an OEM ITR rear subframe which had to be welded to the chassis. A task which most fabricators wouldn’t take on until they found AJP Automotive , a business that hadn’t even existed until years into their build. I wish I had more time to really collect more images of this car and to dive deeper into the story. It’s one of the most ‘complete’ Honda builds you’ll find anywhere. It has a custom audio set-up, a rare Spoon cluster, has Jenvey ITBs attached to the K-series swap and even has a rare Buddy Club front lip. One of only 3 I’ve ever seen in all my years doing this. There are a set of floor mats in the car made by Karo to commemorate their 10-year anniversary of existence, and this build took so long that those mats are now 5 years old…

Great builds flow, they have a consistency about them that you really can’t describe with just words—it has to be seen. The knowing eye will appreciate how everything comes together. alex+sarah chac gets it, it’s understood. This Civic is proof that great things take time and resilience, and sometimes a little bit of bad luck which lends to the concept that “everything happens for a reason”. It took long enough but honestly, what’s the rush?…