Cars, Coffee and California...

[oldgrayleather]

The trip down to Los Angeles was fantastic and always a highlight to be seeing roadster friends in Oregon and Northern California before getting back to my other home. I'd been collecting parts for the coupe for over a year so had the chance to install them with friends. I'll get to that later (organizing the photos will take a bit more time) but in the interim there's a video Emilio and the crew at 949 made about the coupe...

https://mazdaroadster.net/showthread...Royea-NB-Coupe

[oldgrayleather]

I’d always dreamed of having a garage that I could fill with my roadsters, all the spare parts I’d accumulated over the years (OEM bits I was keeping, parts I’d swapped out but wasn’t prepared to get rid of, new parts I hadn’t installed yet, etc) along with all the nicknacks and references to the Roadster and Mazda that I’d collected over the years. A place to hang out with Roadster friends who would appreciate some of the junk I’d picked up.

I had a rack that would work for holding bumpers, trunk lids and GV panels along with the Starsharks for now.


New cabinets and a cupboard for parts. And my grandfather’s Oak rocker would give me somewhere to eventually sit and enjoy the magazines and books (as soon as I could find a home for the clutter).

[oldgrayleather]

I had an ever growing collection of posters and artwork from MRLS meets, JCCS, a print on canvas that Adam so kindly had made and sent of Sam Mamiya’s commission, the KINOD anniversary Akira/ JonB tribute PhireEagle designed, the side profile render of Benny (and the layout of all colors available for NA, NB and NC that I loved), a few of DCuattro’s prints they’d designed around the NoPro, MazdaSpeed C-Spec and a gently modified Red NA, R Speed’s Miatapalooza poster (which now carries a deeper sentiment since Joe’s passing) and a poster Goff sent me of one of the Thailand crew’s events. Thanks to Michael’s frame sales and winter I finally got up to figuring out how to get them up on display.

[MaRcOp01o]

Hope your shoulder recovers quickly! Awesome pics of the new place and what a garage setup and a big congrats Pete it is well deserved!

[oldgrayleather]

Hope your shoulder recovers quickly! Awesome pics of the new place and what a garage setup and a big congrats Pete it is well deserved!

Thanks Marco - maybe you and your Dad will be able to swing by someday for another Roadster BBQ!

[MaRcOp01o]

Absolutely! Mazda Roadster house warming party?

[oldgrayleather]

Knowing there was a lot of wall space to fill I ordered some Japanese Nibori flags and had one designed for “KINOD Speed Stars” (a nod to the fact that KINOD introduced me to Initial D and that like the Akina Speed Stars, we weren’t necessarily the fastest club but we were local to the mountain and tried to have the most fun).




I also had lots of other smaller hand drawn works, etc and figured they could bring some life to the shop.

I also saw the work by a woman named of Lindsay who had been making custom JDM wheel rugs and after over a year of patience I finally had her accept a couple orders from me.

The Starshark was a given


And I thought the bronze TE37 was a better complement than Wats, Mk2’s, RPF1’s, or MS03


I never expected they’d live in the entranceway or master bedroom but actually thought they added some fun to the house. They won’t live on the shop floor but for now they made there way in while I continued getting things settled

[thatbluena6]

This is amazing Pete! absolutely beautiful garage.

[—atank—]

Do I see a Vintage lounge chair by Charles Eames for Herman Miller ?

[MaRcOp01o]

I spotted the Eames aswell. Such a comfy chair.

[HarryB]

Random question, since I got reminded you have a 997; how do you like it?

[oldgrayleather]

Do I see a Vintage lounge chair by Charles Eames for Herman Miller ?

You do indeed. The design is vintage but they're still produced. I bought it about five years now...

I spotted the Eames aswell. Such a comfy chair.

... because I'd sat in one probably thirty or more years ago and thought "One day, if I work hard enough, and have enough luck I will allow myself to get one!!"

Random question, since I got reminded you have a 997; how do you like it?

I've had it since we moved to LA fulfilling a dream after growing up as a lifelong Porsche fan. Hands down they were also my favorite automaker that I ever worked with in terms of how they thought about their customers, what their brand meant and their product strategy all of which just reinforced my love for the marque. When we moved to LA my wife ever so kindly encouraged me to get my dream car after decades of long hours, extensive travel, hard work and an untapped outlet for my passion for cars. The Carrera S was that car. So to answer your question? I still really like it a lot though the usage would suggest otherwise (last year it did just under 2,000 miles including the 1,500 mile drive up to Canada). The biggest fault is that I stupidly followed bad advice and bought the tiptronic (LA traffic, reported resale since I wasn't planning on keeping it for long, etc, etc). It's just not as engaging even as our Roadsters but something with modern performance cars is that the performance is mostly unusable except on the track. And I now don't have the options for tracking our cars like I did in LA. I think I ultimately would have been much happier with the 1970 911S I passed on at the time (fear of having to deal with old car woes despite it being much less expensive. funny how all the older cars I had on my wish list then have now appreciated into the unreasonable) or a 993 even. Certainly not complaining but I did have to think about how to answer that one

[druz]

The garage is really coming together, looks fantastic! I'm glad you're getting to update the thread with your down time, it's filled with so much of the best things of Roadstering.

[Satisaii]

We have had an Eames chair for about 10 years now. 3 years ago, one of the arms broke off the base. I was lucky that the arm wood did not delaminate when that happened. I was able to reattach the arm with a better (according to the internet) epoxy. So be careful and not put a lot of force on the arms. It is a common failure and can be an expensive fix when the back breaks.

[oldgrayleather]

The garage is really coming together, looks fantastic! I'm glad you're getting to update the thread with your down time, it's filled with so much of the best things of Roadstering.

Thanks for the kind words D. In fact I'm most looking forward to filling it with the truly best things of Roadstering.. Roadster friends!

We have had an Eames chair for about 10 years now. 3 years ago, one of the arms broke off the base. I was lucky that the arm wood did not delaminate when that happened. I was able to reattach the arm with a better (according to the internet) epoxy. So be careful and not put a lot of force on the arms. It is a common failure and can be an expensive fix when the back breaks.

Thanks for the warning John. I've always been careful on it and we didn't get it until our kids were grown enough not to play on it but I would have been gutted if that had happened not knowing it was a potential fault! Will keep an out of for that and treat it with extra care!