Tuners And Tea 7: Life After Cars And Coffee

January 8, 2015
Story By
Justin Pagtalunan

"Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind? Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and auld lang syne" is the universal song sung around the world at the stroke of midnight every January 1st of each year. It's a song meant to bid farewell to the "good 'ol days" of the ending year. Unfortunately, Southern Californian car enthusiasts just had to bid farewell to one of the most iconic Saturday morning car meets of our time, Cars and Coffee Irvine. But never fret, there are hopes of the C&C organizers finding a new location to continue on the tradition, but in the meantime there are still a number of other alternative Saturday morning car meets. In a life after Cars and Coffee, Tuners and Tea located in the parking lot of the West Covina Guppy House restaurant is currently in its 7th installment and has steadily attracted a C&C-esque attendance as far as show cars and spectators go.

I first touched on Tuners and Tea last January at their inaugural event hosted by DaYUUM! An event that has been held on the 1st Saturday of every other month is continuing for another year. While the focal point is the parking area in front of Guppy House, which opens early and serves specials to guests and spectators, the entire plaza's parking lot gets filled to capacity with a variety of rides. Just like C&C, this event welcomes anyone and everyone and its always a surprise to see who shows up. However, for this year the organizers are planning to have additional "feature vehicles" at each event that we can all look forward to seeing.

For the first Tuners and Tea of 2015, the feature vehicle was MB Junkies' Roland and his Rocket Bunny Mercedes Benz CLK55 that was last seen at SEMA Show last year.

Additionally, Infinite Auto Design brought out a couple vehicles to feature as well. Such as their BMW and Audi with matching paint jobs and air suspension.

But of all the feature vehicles, this one was my absolute favorite. Fresh from SEMA Show and the second to last Cars & Coffee - the Autofashion X Nitto Tire X SSA Project Rocket Bunny NSX. The first of its kind in the U.S. and possibly the entire world.

As if the blue chrome wrap with matte black finished Enkei wheels wrapped in Nitto Tires weren't attention grabbing enough, the entire Rocket Bunny project was one of the most talked about builds of last year's SEMA Show.

If the rumors are true, about 10 inches of the stock NSX rear had to be chopped off to fit entirely new Rocket Bunny rear! Now that's commitment! When there's one NSX, there's usually more to follow at Tuners and Tea...

Tuners and Tea regular, Leon Casino brought his super clean all-black NSX.

Michael Mao's NSX, which rarely sees the light of day, still has a little bit of itself hiding in the shadows.

Kris Rouse's white NSX on Work Emotions.

And of course Nilo Miranda, one of the organizers for Tuners and Tea, with his matte graphite wrapped NSX dumped on AirRex Suspension in his usual parking spot.

Of course with the first event of the year I had to show some support too. Cleaned up my tC and finally put the lip back on for this one. Still the old wheels though; I have a lot planned for this year, so hopefully I can participate more at shows in addition to shooting them. Next to me is my friend Manny and his boosted 1st Gen tC with a full Kaminari kit.

The Tea brothers took time this early morning from the busy schedule at their new shop, Autotuned. I'll be working with Young on a feature shortly, but Meng has already been featured during last year's SEMA Show.

Neil De La Cruz probably has one of the furthest commutes to come out here, but it's always a pleasure to see his support; whether he brings his classic Toyota Starlet or his track car, the Evo.

Another clean Evo in attendance was Brian Duong's - seen here kicking off the new year with a new pair of bright red kicks!

Same-Same, but different. Jill Asuncion brought her MKIII Supra as well as her fiancé, Nick Stonawski's MKIV.

Joseph Liu's Mini may appear simple, but it is super clean. The fitment of the Volk Racing TE37's is perfect and the attention to detail of the red trim around the rim to match the car is just so classy.

Towards the end of the show, we were lucky enough to witness a surprise visit by this Lamborghini Huracán. A feature spot just happened to open up a little before its arrival, which was perfect timing to park it where everyone could enjoy it. A Ferrari Italia also showed up toward the end, but I already put away my gear and just wanted to enjoy looking at it. Just goes to show that at early Saturday morning events like this, or Cars and Coffee, or anything else; you have to be prepared to see anything at any time. Can't wait to see what's next in store for the car community in a life after Cars and Coffee (for now)! Don't forget to check out the video below for a little recap of all the happenings at the first Tuners and Tea of 2015!

Tuners And Tea 7: Life After Cars And Coffee

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