Cody Okouchi

I met Cody through Instagram (@jpn_hunters), a day before I left to Hawaii. I found him on the suggested page and I gave him a follow. I reached out to him and found out he was in Honolulu which was where I was going. We were chatting over Instagram for a couple hours on the day of my flight to Hawaii and I threw the idea out there that it would be cool to interview him since we were talking about a lot of rare Miata parts and he was showing me his Miatas and the things he’s done. There was just too much to talk about. So he was down with it, we met up a couple days after I landed and unfortunately he couldn’t bring his Miata but he did bring his bagged TRD Camry. He brought some rare parts, prototypes to show me, and some trophies from Wekfest Hawaii. This is how our 4 hour convo went down.

L: I’m kind of just doing this freely but let’s start with your age, name, and where you’re from. C: So my name’s Cody, Okouchi, my friends call me Fujio. I’m from here (HNL), I’m bouta be 28 this year… been in the Miata scene for about 10 years now, something like that. L: And how many have you had? C: Oh at least 30. At least 30 Miatas. L: 30 Miatas! Are they all NA’s? C: Most of them NA, there are a handful of NB’s that I’ve owned. I don’t want to say I’ve built all of them or whatever, I kind of picked and chose which ones I threw money at. For me it’s like, I can’t pass up a good deal, but I also can’t turn down a good offer you know? I’ve been in the scene so long that a lot of people are like “Oh I’ll just hit Cody up if I want to sell my Miata.” or “I’ll hit him up and see if he has any Miatas for sale.” L: So you’re pretty known around here? C: Yeah I kind of just throw them around the market haha. L: That’s cool man I have somebody just like that back home. He’s “the guy” everyone goes to for Miatas because he always has like 7 on deck. But that’s awesome really. So out of the roughly 30 Miatas you’ve had, how many of them were NA’s? C: Probably 26 of them. L: Okay because I was looking through your Instagram and I saw a lot of NA’s. C: Yeah so last year I had a 94m-edition- L: That’s the Montego blue yeah? C: Yup it was super clean, I was the second owner of the car, it was always garage kept. I paid a lot for it though I paid a little over 8 grand and I sold it for around the same price. L: Oh wow. C: I didn’t make any money off it, I only drove it for a little bit. I wanted to keep it but it was hard because I only have so much room for other projects and stuff. I also had a 91 BRG, that was my daily for a little bit too. The idea with the BRG was to replicate my white Miata as far as suspension goes so like driving feel. It was also on TE’s and R888’s, Xida coilovers, it was a full supermiata alignment on it. I converted the car from a power steering rack to a manual rack. So I actually bought one of the last manual racks that Mazda had in stock. L: You got it directly from Mazda? C: Yes a brand new OEM rack. Yeah I kind of wanted to mimic the driving feel of the white Miata. The white one was similar except it had AST coilovers, remote reservoirs the whole nine yards… that car has a lot of suspension bits.

L: So before we started recording we were talking and you told me about Project G, you mind expanding on that? Did you work for them? How did you get involved? C: So I had a black Miata, the one I won Wekfest Hawaii in 2013 as second place Mazda. Me and the guy Steve, one of the owners of Project G, saw my post on Facebook and he congratulated me and then we just started talking story… shortly after that I was representing Project G. Because of him I was super lucky and able to run some of their prototype parts that never even made it to the market which was super cool. L: Are they still around? C: They do that RC drift kind of stuff now. It’s sad because they were heavy in the Miata scene and they just kinda got screwed over after getting screwed over after getting screwed over. They couldn’t make anything in house, so a lot of their parts were dependent on other people making them. I know the guy that made all their precision series (which is all the oil caps and billet stuff), he stole their designs and started selling their stuff on his own, without the Project G logo on it. L: Oh wow. C: Even the side skirts and the fenders and stuff like that, anything that was fiberglass that they used to make, the guy that made them ended up stealing the fender design and copying it. I don’t want to say what company it is, but there’s a company now that makes that same fender design. L: Damn. C: Yeah, super shitty. They just kept getting screwed over because they weren’t able to make anything in house. L: Were they big at that time? like 013/014? C: They were super big. At that time they were the top tier Miatas, if you were Project G, or if you knew Project G, you would know they had like the cleanest cars, they worked with Skunk2… because of that they helped make Skunk2’s intake manifold, the throttle body, they helped design the Kraftwerk’s supercharger kit and stuff so there’s actually a lot of parts on the market because of Project G and they’re not around anymore which is kind of a sad thing I guess. To me Project G is at a different level because they made products that were original to them. They went out and did the research and development, ran all the prototype parts, got feedback… so to me you can’t really compare it in my opinion. L: So you worked for them too? C: I used to be a vendor for them, so for Hawaii I would bring parts in. I was definitely lucky that not only did I get to represent Project G as far as helping them promote the business, I also ran the sticker and parts on my car for shows and stuff. At the time my black Miata was their full catalog. Everything that was Project G, I bought it. Anything that came out or was new, I ran it. L: Now that goes into the whole real parts thing like we talked about before the recording. Is there any reason you only run real parts? C: So after what happened to Project G, as companies copied their designs and replicated their parts for example the infamous Project G style hardtop spoiler on eBay, the one everybody buys, it kind of opened my eyes and made me realize how important it is to support the original designers because these are the guys going out and spending the money because they have the passion to do it you know? Another one is the Garage Vary panels and the sickspeed panels. A sickspeed panel you could probably buy it for like 500 bucks shipped to you, and a GV panel is almost a thousand dollars before shipping… so if you keep supporting those knock off companies, it’s hard for the real companies to make a living. And it just takes away like if these knock off companies start shutting down, there isn’t going to be a new real parts development on the market. It’s just gonna be this same eBay stuff over and over again. It’s just going to keep being a copy of a copy. So that’s kind of why I support real parts. But I do understand not everyone has the money for real parts- L: Right. C: Yeah don’t get me wrong, I’d rather save up and buy the real thing, know I have the real thing, and be proud I have the real thing rather than have an all eBay car you know. L: I hear you, some may ask, is it worth it? Depending on where you live, wouldn’t it suck to come outside in the morning and your car is on blocks from your wheels being stolen? C: I think it’s a passion thing. You don’t think of it from a financial standpoint. Yeah cars get expensive and risky, but if you’re passionate about it you’re going to do it anyways.

L: Since we’re on the topic of parts, how Did you get into the rare parts scene? C: I never really was into the rare parts game in all honesty, I only got addicted to it when I started getting into ARC magic. So my white car was ARC magic everything like the strut bar, the dead pedal, oil cap, radiator cap… my car was obviously ITB so I didn’t have the airbox and stuff like that. ARC cooling panel, my car was pretty much a full ARC catalog car. And that’s how I got into rare parts and collecting… I’ve found a lot of cool parts over the years which I’m grateful for. Nowadays I kind of just do it at my own pace, I don’t really look on auctions anymore. My white car was all about 90’s JDM, that style that I had on that car, I wanted it to be like 90’s rice. It has the big Wangan style wing, (Bomex) and just a bunch of other rare unattainable parts. That’s what fueled my hunting on the auctions. L: I see it a lot on Instagram, but why would someone want to do ITB’s? C: So individual throttle bodies are just more efficient, each cylinder gets the same amount of air in theory, so it’s just a more efficient design. If you want to build a real big power house, in all honesty ITB is not the way to go. The throttle response, the noise and everything, it’s incredible. It sounds like you’re driving a race car, it feels like you’re driving a race car, but unfortunately if a turbo version of you pulls up next to you… you’re not going anywhere haha. And it comes with the whole passion thing like I talked about earlier. If you want to do it because that’s what you’re passionate about and it’s the style you want, just go do it you know. It’s reliable though, a lot of people say ITB’s are not reliable but I daily drove my car for a while, and besides the fact that it did eat a lot more gas than a stock Miata, it’s never really left me stranded some place. To me that’s proof of how you build a car and stuff like that, if you build it reliable it’s gonna be reliable. But if you take short cuts, you’re gonna see the short cuts. L: Haha, 100%.

At this time, Cody had opened his trunk and brought out a box of old rare parts, some prototype pieces, and some other sentimental stuff to show me. Try to imagine how this went down as I write about it, here’s the conversation.

C: *opens trunk* I brought some stuff that’s kinda cool. L: That’s a nice tank setup (for his bags). C: Thank you this is from Wekfest Hawaii 2019 right before Covid, *shows me first place Mazda of the festival*, this one is 2013 second place Mazda of the festival- L: With the black car right? C: Yes with the black car. And then this is third place Mazda of the festival 2017. L: Oh shit that’s cool that you got first second and third. C: Yeah that was one of the cool things, I completed the trifecta like, I’m happy. So this here is something cool to me but it’s something that never made it to production. This is Project G’s coolant reroute prototype, *shows me how it works *, it’s just one of those things that’s worthless to everyone else but for somebody that was associated with it, it was definitely obsolete you know. And this coolant reroute was designed around 2014 so it just goes far back. L: You ran it and everything too? C: Yes this thing had coolant in it and stuff like that so it’s definitely cool because it’s never ever made the market. There’s probably one other set out there that Joe has. L: Yeah I can definitely appreciate stuff like this. Do you know more people like that? Like Steve and Joe? C: Yeah I don’t know if you’ve heard of Chikara Motorsports but they’re based in Canada. There’s a guy there named Ken Lau, has a really sick track Miata. Maruha motor, Maruha ITB’s, makes 200 and something horsepower, really really sick track car. They’re a lot bigger now, but at the time they were just kind of doing stuff in Canada. So my catch can was made by Ken Lau, then 3-4 years later when they became more mainstream I was able to snag one of their exhausts that they made. They made 3 exhausts, all dolphin tip, all TIG welded. They were all made to your specification, so like they would ask you what chassis you have because different chassis have different mounting points and stuff like that. They did all those small details which is cool. Now they always hit me up on stuff their developing, stuff they’re gonna make… so the best way to do things in the community is keep branching out you know. L: That’s awesome. C: This is my motor plaque from a motor that I had. I don’t know if you know about this company but they’re on hot version they kind of have like a baby blue Miata- L: Oh! Yeah the tealish color Miata, R.S Aizawa. C: Yeah so if you were to buy a built motor from them, or if you were to have one of their race cars, all their motors had that plaque on the valve cover. It’s kind of like how Spoon Sports has their serialization and stuff like that, it’s pretty much, you had a catalog car. Later on I ended up buying the whole front end from probably one of their demo cars, it was the same teal color, the headlight lids (R.S Aizawa lids), which is kind of sad to think about because it means that car probably doesn’t exist anymore. L: Man, that’s my favorite roadster.

L: As we kind of wrap up here, I just have two more questions to ask. Two best decisions you’ve ever made, and the worst decision you’ve ever made, what did you learn, and would you have done anything differently? C: Outside of cars? Or inside of cars? L: Your choice. C: Best choice would definitely be getting motivated again to pursue a career, or pursue something in life. If I wasn’t in the position that I am in now in life, I wouldn’t have a bagged Camry and I wouldn’t have all this extra fancy stuff lying around, I definitely would be budgeting and stuff like that. I might not even own my black car today if it wasn’t for that. I feel like a lot of people get caught up in debt because of school, but if you look at the long run and you find a career path you wanna go into, I say just do it. At the time I was like side hustling, working full time, going to school full time… like I had literally no time, all my friends were out partying and stuff like that. So it’s definitely cool because some of them are still in the same place they were at x amount of years ago. I’m just grateful that I made the sacrifice. The other best decision would be my white car. Oh my gosh that was probably The best decision I’ve ever made. That car… playing with that car, modding that car, doing everything with that car. At the time the NSX market was still really low. You could buy like a first gen NA1 for like mid 20’s, pretty clean pretty low mileage. I was actually looking at a silver ‘91 or ‘92, and it was right before I was going to go back to school and stuff like that. I had my white car, it was all stockish, it had coilovers, wheels, hardtop, and a GV lip. I was already planning to do the individual throttle bodies, I had the spare motor on the side, the Koyorad… pretty much everything laid out. I had some money saved and I’m like, well you know, I wanna buy an NSX. Till today that’s still my dream car. I don’t know why I didn’t haha, instead I just dumped Everything into that white car. I went to look at the NSX and everything, I wanted to buy it so bad, but I had all the parts for the Miata, everything set up for it, so I just want to follow through you know. I told myself another NSX will pop back up on the market later. So I did the white car, it took about a year to actually get on the road and stuff. At this point I was in school, I was super busy with that, work, buying/selling parts, and importing parts. Because of my white car I kind of got a reputation, so I started getting more into the Miata scene even more than I used to be. Then my dream of an NSX kind of slowly went on the back burner and now today they’re worth double than what they were back then. So it definitely appreciated in value. The NSX is a dream car of mine but I don’t regret investing all that time and money into the Miata mainly because the amount of experience that I gained with that car, some of my best friends that I’ve met are because of that car. I also saw a lot of cool parts because of it, I got to have a lot of cool opportunities, Koyorad hooked it up with a radiator on that car, it was a Garage Star car, Chikara Motorsports built me the catch can and exhaust… those are things I wouldn’t have been able to experience unless I owned the car and invest so much time, money and energy into it. L: 100%. Now worst decision. C: One of my worst decisions ever made… I guess in all honesty it kind of goes hand in hand, is not buying that NSX. L: Haha. C: Mainly because they’re worth so much now, and that is something I do wanna buy eventually. But unfortunately now because I built that white Miata, which I am parting out now, I’m essentially gonna have to pay double of what I was originally gonna pay for my dream car way back when. I guess that’s one of the things I would consider a bad decision because who really dumps that much money into a Miata willingly you know? I guess it’s a bad decision because if I would’ve bought the NSX and kept my Miata all stock, I would’ve ended up in the same place that I was now, it just would’ve taken a little bit longer you know. L: Thank you for sharing that these are great stories. Well I think we covered pretty much everything, thank you for coming out tonight to stand here and talk with me on this rainy night I appreciate it. C: Of course, thank you for hitting me up. L: Before we go, any last words for the people reading this? C: Two things. Everyone has gone through something that has changed them. When you look at a person, any person, remember everyone has a story. L: And the other thing? C: Don’t be pushed around by the fears in your mind. Be led by the dreams in your heart.

Photos of Cody’s white car can be found here.