Sakura Performance Engineering Review

What is an Evolution X owner to do when you want to modify your car? So many choices, so many different parts from many different vendors and manufacturers. The first step is obviously searching for quality built parts. Parts who have a well known name behind their products and stand behind their reliability.

Kaizen Tuning has been one of, if not the best tuning facilities for high performance vehicles in the Northeast. Their recent entrance into their own branded products, has been nothing short of the reputation they have built up over the years. Enter Kaizen Tuning's own Sakura Performance Engineering.

Seeing these products in pictures, I immediately saw the skill and craftsmanship of Kaizen's fabricator. The welds of the one piece upper inter cooler pipe are incredible, the welds, MAF adaptor, and bungs of their 3" intake (also available in 3.5") are equally as stunning.

But you really have to see these in person to admire the craftsmanship of Sakura parts. You can immediately tell these are made by a skilled professional who has been doing this for years.

What you don't see is the trials and tests Kaizen has put their brand through. The intake possesses a velocity stack, which allows air to be forced into the piping with minimal turbulence. An integrated fan shield also protects the intake from AC fluctuations, and from engine heat, all the while making this intake look stunning. Want to hear your turbo spool? Get a Sakura intake. When I drove off from Kaizen's lot and heard this sucker sucking in air at 3000 rpm, and started screaming, "woosh!" as I climbed in rpm's, I immediately had a huge grin slapped across my face and proceeded to laugh out loud and yell out profanities. Compared to my friends ETS intake, also of great quality, Sakura's intake definitely looks and sounds better.

If you don't know Kaizen, you should read about them. These guys gutted and built and learned about the Evolution X platform from scratch and made their own time attack Evolution, one who wins races and awards. If that doesn't put your trust into Sakura products, I don't know what will.

In summary, I am extremely satisfied with Sakura's UICP and 3" intake. The black ceramic heat coating helps keep engine heat away (customized powder coating to any color available for a fee also), while simultaneously looking sleek. I picked these parts because of their build quality and because of who built them. I also chose Sakura because they look as if they came off of the Mitsubishi factory. No other well built parts that come to my mind look this clean.

Get Sakura Performance Engineering parts for your Evolution X (and also Nissan GTR), you will not regret your purchase.

Kaizen Tuning Experience and Tuning:
So it's been a year since I've had my 2012 GSR. I remember first driving the car and then having so many smiles every time I drove it. I told myself I was never going to mod it, at least until my warranty was up.

Well that failed and I soon caved in and ordered an ETS V2 Quiet. Six months go by, and after being totally anti-tuning, I researched the tuning community. To keep it simple, I quickly learned that the stock tune on these cars was an absolute joke. It was so bad, that you could actually be doing more harm than good to your engine by running at the rich levels stock was. After hearing multiple good reviews by customers of Kaizen, I decided to give it ago. My plan being simple, keep stock driveability, and stay as stock as possible, while still getting a great and reliable tune, that would be even better than stock. My experience at Kaizen was nothing short of fantastic, granted they were very busy, I really liked that they took their time in working on my car, nothing was rushed.

Now for my tuning review: Being my first turbo car, Rob really walked me through the nitty gritty. I told him what I wanted and he listened, perfectly. I stood outside the dyno bay and let him work his magic, while I simultaneously went deaf and inhaled exhaust smoke , but I didn't want to move away since watching it was awesome (not to mention the 6-7 GTR's that were around, one of the owner's even let me sit in one!). I also got my wheels mounted and balanced. A+ on this end also. I've actually never left a garage after getting my wheels balanced, and not having my wheels vibrate. Perfect balancing, zero vibration.

Ride back home: HOLY **** my car is awake! Intake SCREAMS! Sounds like a damn dyson vacuum sucking in air, brought a huge smile to my face. I ended up making 50 hp over stock pull of 200 on their dynodynamics (heartbreaker) with just those two parts and a tune. Super happy with the results, exactly what I wanted, nothing too crazy, nothing that would require any more maintenance than stock.

To anyone out there on the edge about tuning because they don't want to mess with the stock tune, stop waiting and make an appointment at Kaizen. You will not regret it. To all the people that I met at Kaizen today, thanks a lot for all of your help and patience with this noob's first turbo car By the way, I just noticed that someone had ziptied my FPR hose without me even asking! Excellent service!

Drive on,
SpardaVR4
EvolutionM