Importing from Japan

[spiller]

Hey all,

Im looking into the possibillity of importing a car from Japan. As it would save me some coin. From what I can gather from others is it can be a bit risky, especially if the condition of the car isn't what is portrayed by the importer/auction sheet.

Keen to hear from anyone on here who has/has not done this.

Cheers!

[rallymazda]

ive imported 3 cars, no major problems, most sellers in japan are careful to note any problems with the car

http://www.tau-sales.com/

thats were I brought them from or used them to buy off other auction sites for me

[Emperor]

It's not risky at all, just ask around and get comments from people who have used certain sites..
If you can't find what you're looking for on Tau Net give me a PM and i'll try track something down.

[bluemaumau]

can you import engines? is it worth it?

[Emperor]

can you import engines? is it worth it?

Yup, you can import engines. But most of the time it's not much more expensive to import a crashed car..

Say if I was to turbo my Skyline, it'd be cheaper to import a crashed R33 GTS25T, that way I get the engine, gearbox, lsd, brakes etc

But ofcourse it depends what ya need.

[Wildcard]

I wouldn't exactly say there is no risk... one of the key risks is that Japanese crash repairs are not always up to NZ standards and if thats the case the car will have to be re-repaired which can be costly. A lot of times as with the first MR2 I imported from Japan you will never know until it lands here.

Having said that I don't beleive the risk of this is large these days but it pays to keep in mind there are no sure bets with importing - don't sink all your money into something without reserves to fix it if things go wrong.

[spiller]

Thanks for the info all.

Yeah, I had my sights set on a absolute mint one with goodies (coilovers, zorst, 17" bronze alloys)..... but it sold

Seems to be hard to find a mint one with goodies. Its probably going to come down to where I find the right one first, either here or Japan. Seems to be a helluva lot cheaper to import, all going smoothly though.

Cheers!