The Barn Find Hunter uncovers Japanese imports galore - Hagerty Media

In the world of barn find hunting, there are legions of pre-1970 cars that have been parked for one reason or another, but there seems to be a significantly smaller abandoned stash of 1970s, ’80s, and ’90s cars. Tom Cotter loves a challenge, so he decided to dedicate this episode to finding something of a different flavor—some more recent cars. A few such discoveries in this episode even came with the help of some younger enthusiasts.

First, Tom stops to see a man about a Mazda. That man is Jim Downing, the co-creator of the HANS device ubiquitous in high-level auto racing. He is also a man in love with Mazda’s rotary engine. However, his collection isn’t in a barn, and none of the cars are truly neglected like long-time Barn Find Hunter viewers might expect.

Instead, Tom finds row upon row of interesting bits of racing kit. From four-rotor show car prototypes to FD RX-7 models that will spin the tires at 60 mph, Jim has it all. The entire collection is a smorgasbord of racecars, simply because Jim snaps up just about any interesting car he can find for a decent deal.

From there, Tom returns to the bread-and-butter of Barn Find Hunter—a flock of rough-condition cars awaiting something. The cars are all Datsun Z cars and owned by Max and Clay, two young enthusiasts who run Resurrected Classics. Tom isn’t easily impressed, but the pair manages to trigger a little surprise when they walk him through the lineup in front of their shop, revealing that they have three or four first-generation 240Z examples from 1970.

Variety is the spice of life, so Tom will always leap at the chance to search out a few offbeat cars. What will he find next on this trip? Well, you have to watch the next episode to find out. If you are worried you might miss it, be sure to subscribe to the Hagerty YouTube channel to receive a notification with each Hagerty video that goes live.