1978 Isuzu 117 Coupe and 1973 Isuzu Belett

[nakazoto]

Hello all, this is actually my first post on here.
The forums I usually visit have been getting more and more sparsely populated, so I stumbled across this place looking for a new forum!  I've got a lot of catching up and reading to do though, haha.

In the meantime however, I figured I'd post up some pictures of two of my cars (I currently have seven, four of which are drive-able...).  The maroon car is a 1978 Isuzu 117 Coupe and the blue car is a 1973 Isuzu Bellett.  I'll let the pictures do the talking from here!











Bellett:





117 Coupe:







Thank you for looking!

Cheers,
David

[varelse]

Welcome to the forum! A pretty good first post, I'd say.
There's a bit of everything here so I'm sure you'll find something to your liking.

I saw a couple of Bellett's a few months ago at an all J day, I'll try to remember to post the photos here when I'm not on my phone.

Where abouts are you? That terrain looks rather...Australian...

[Deleted]

Welcome. I would love to see more photos of the coupe. It's so similar to a Mazda rx2 coupe in shape. Makes you wonder who was nicking who's ideas... Hahaha

[nigelbickle]

Welcome. I too have a few Isuzu's, but mine are waiting resto. I own the 78 Uk motor show 117 coop, looks pretty similar yo yours, although my alloys are engraved 117 Coupe!
I've a Bellett, imported from Melbourne, that I got to a driveable state a few years back, but now kid up waiting for the last part of the quartet.
I've a Bellel, from California that's part sorted and am still looking for a Florian.

Happy days. Look a nice pair, look forward to the updates

[qwerty]

Ooooooh a Bellet, after a lot of Granturismo I would love a bullet!


Tom

[yoeddynz]

Aug 6, 2016 7:55:02 GMT @johnnybravo said:

Welcome. I would love to see more photos of the coupe. It's so similar to a Mazda rx2 coupe in shape. Makes you wonder who was nicking who's ideas... Hahaha

And very similar to the fiat dino coupe(also a beautiful car although I think the rx2 coupe has the nicer profile) All designed by Bertone?

[yoeddynz]

One in my old hometown...

[düdo]

Great motors and scenery!

[vulgalour]

That's two very attractive cars.

[dikkehemaworst]

Wow , never seen one of both in my live.
What a great looking cars. I have a softspot for sedans , but this coupe is beautiful. All the luck.

[nakazoto]

varelse
Thank you so much!
I'm not actually from Australia, but Texas in the US. Although, Texas and Australia do share quite a lot, haha.

johnnybravo
Thank you!
I think the Japanese tended to nick all their ideas from the Italian/British/Americans, haha.
I posted a few more photos of the Bellett below.

nigelbickle
Thank you!
That's awesome that you own the UK motor show 117 Coupe!
The original alloys are very cool, but mine has the Black Racing wheels on it when I bought it.
I would love to get my hands on an Isuzu Bellel, but they're exceedingly difficult to find. I am planning on picking up an early model Piazza (one with the G200 engine) and a Gemini Coupe at some point in time. Then maybe toss in a Chevy Luv/Faster to round out the collection, haha.

qwerty
Isuzu was never really on my radar with the exception of the Piazza, which I've always wanted since my teacher had one in middle school. Of course, after I got my hands on the Bellett, I raced it like crazy in Gran Turismo!

yoeddynz
The four door Bellett is super cool! I actually really like the square shape of the back window on 4 door Belletts, and they're actually considerably more rare than the coupes.
The Fiat Dino Coupe is such a beautiful car! I was lucky enough to see one in person (although it was a drop top) at a car meet down in Gamagori while I was still living in Japan. Here's a picture:


düdo
Thank you so much!
Although with constant 100+ F (39+ C) degree weather, Texas scenery can be a bit brutal at times, haha.

vulgalour
Thank you very much!

dikkehemaworst
Thank you!
It all depends on where you live! Here in the States, these are both pretty rare cars (like less than 20 each in the entire country would be my guess), but I picked both of these up for fairly cheap while I was living in Japan. They're common enough and not well known enough to still be pretty affordable. Well, depending on the grade, the early model handmade 117 Coupes can run upwards of 30 grand and the Bellett GT Type Rs are nearly as expensive as well.

Cheers,
David

[nakazoto]

I figured I should give some background on the cars, so here we go!

I live in Japan for a little over seven years and only recently moved back. Between my wife and I, we went through 10 cars in that seven years. Well, went through isn't exactly correct because I brought four of them home with me, haha.

So, the story with the 117 Coupe is, about a year before we moved home, my wife and I wanted to take a road trip down to the southern tip of Kyushu. So the hunt was on for a suitable car as I was driving a Honda Life 360 at the time (and a 360cc, 36 hp, 2-cylinder Kei car isn't exactly the best idea for a long road trip). So I sold the Honda on and picked up the 117 Coupe for cheap, but it had a few problems. After replacing the blown headgasket, replacing both upper and lower balljoints on both sides, and doing a full tune-up, we were ready! Here's a picture from our road trip!



If you want to actually read about the road trip, Japanese Nostalgic Car actually ran a series of articles about it. Here's part one:
japanesenostalgiccar.com/grand-touring-driving-across-japan-in-an-isuzu-117-part-01/
And the rest of the entries can be found here:
japanesenostalgiccar.com/?s=Driving+across+Japan

As for the Bellett, I picked it up about four years ago. At the time I had a GC10 Skyline that I was working on, but the tin worm was so sever on it, it would have been cheaper to scrap the body and buy another one. So, I struck a deal with Classic Car Nagoya to swap it and a little cash for a Bellett that they had in the back yard. Here's what it looked like the day I bought it:



And here it is mid-restoration:



(It should be noted that this was the first time I had ever painted a car myself and I didn't have a clue what I was doing!)





Here it is in Japan after putting it all back together:





And finally, here it is down here in Texas almost road ready!







If you guys are curious about my other cars or want to see more pics of these two, I actually have a website I keep pictures of everything on, check it out here:
sites.google.com/site/nakazoto/home

Thank you all so much for the kind comments!

Cheers,
David

[varelse]

Here's a couple more.

There was a couple of them there, but I liked the preloved one.
That link should take you to the start of the pics in the album. There's plenty of other cool cars, mind.
(There's one more photo of Bellet's right at the end)

And yes, the scenery can be pretty similar between the States and Australia. The fence was throwing me, though, as that's not a style one would see much here.

[leigh]

Nice work! Likewise, these are are I know through Gran Turismo but it's great to see two lovely real life examples.

[nigelbickle]

I can point you at 3 Bellels for sale in the US, if you want. 1 roadworthy, one restorable, one wreck- wants 3k for all 3, or 4K for the runner!

At that point I backed out- but if you can get there and haggle....

[düdo]

Lots of interesting stuff going on with your various projects. I particularly like the Mitsubishi van. There's a lot of J stuff that never made it out into other markets. Are you living on a ranch? I drove across Texas coming up from Mexico with a new VW Beetle.. 25 yrs ago and I remember wide open spaces

[79cord]

Hello again. Good to see how everything turned out after the 360Life adventures & the 117 & Bellet coupés make such a great (& beautiful) pair.
I'm sure you must have heard the 117 was indeed a Bertone/Giugiaro effort like Dino Coupé, Piazza & the original Mazda Lucé/1500/1800 that understandably would inspired Mazda's designers for the RX-2/Capella.
Plenty of variety, ideas & interesting projects usually about here to keep us all coming back.

[varelse]

Guh. Just read the whole story on the Mitsu 360. Cool car.

And the gentleman who imported the Carol as excellent taste. I would love one of those, myself.

[MK2VR6]

Welcome! I must admit that your 117 coupe is a proper stunner. Never heard of one in my 41 years!

[styleheck]

The lines of these cars are so gorgeous!

Can't believe I never heard of those before. If i hear the name Isuzu I think of commercial vehicles, small vans, pickup trucks and industrial diesel engines.
Never knew they used to make such cool classics.