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KakerMix posted:*Special mention for California here. California has strict pollution requirements for all vehicles. I’m not exactly familiar with why imported cars tend to have a hard time with Carb outside of ‘doesn’t meet the requirements’ so someone else can explain why, but it means that most kei vehicles at least are not state legal in California even though they are federally legal in the greater United States. I’ve seen a few people obtain exemptions from California to legalize their imported vehicles but it seems like that’s the exception rather than the rule. The issue with California is that direct import vehicles have to pass FTP (federal test procedure) driving cycles, just like a manufacturer does type certifying a vehicle. The testing is several thousand dollars by itself, without considering modifications to bring the vehicle into conformance. For an R32 GTR it costs something like 12-15k to modify and certify as CARB legal, which completely destroys the value of the car, you could be looking at 40k for an r32 skyline and you can buy much faster cars for 40k I was quite set on getting an R32 GTR, the performance and buildability is difficult to beat at even the inflated 20-25k you can get a decent one for now, but when I weighed up the hassle and uncertainty of having to register out of state or paying close to 40k for a 25 year old car, even one as cool and evocative, I decided against it and bought a 911 turbo instead.
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Aug 7, 2017 11:57
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DogonCrook posted:It would suck if they were excluded i was just curious if it allowed for that. The california carb registration is weird to me. I guess it makes sense on a car from the 90's but it really doesnt if its from the 80's. Kinda sucks. Pre-75 is exempt from emissions... sort of... they like to gently caress with grey market vehicles 68-75 claiming it has to meet whatever EPA standards existed at the time, I gather they only started doing it in the last decade, I found out because of angry unimog owners. Originally it was a rolling 25 year exemption, but they decided to freeze it in 1991 because it turns out cars never die in CA. There is nothing that california likes more than to tighten the screws on people with minority interests which are politically unacceptable  .
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Aug 7, 2017 21:54
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DJ Commie posted:Couldn't have anything to with having more cars than people in the biggest state or the geography contributing to inversion layers and local pollution concentration? I do agree that there should be something to make cars available, but I don't see pathways in existing legislation being a specific hindrance to JDM tyte ridez, but they are obscured unintentionally by existing law. You can register a 25+ year old import, but there's no way to plate it without the smog test for which data doesn't exist. Given the long lifetime of cars in California, I don't think continuing the rolling exemption would have had a positive effect on air quality in the areas most affected by the air pollution. I want my 323 GT-R and Cuore Avanzato TR-XX R4, damnit. I know it's not good to attribute to malice that which can be explained by cold, uncaring indifference. The burden does fall disproportionately on people wanting import cars though, with 25 year old cars as well as with the pre-76 smog testing that they started enforcing a couple of years back (so you can't import a fairlady z 72-75). CARB regulations are also used as a club to break up car meetups and impound/crush modified cars. If the state wanted to be helpful it would extend the BAR referee program to allow import cars to be included, or it could just let you register the drat car if you meet smog at the tailpipe. That's the ludicrous aspect of it, you can have a kei car that meets smog to a hilarious degree because of its tiny engine but it won't be able to be registered because it isn't in the Big Book of Engines™ to tell the smog place whether they need to visually check for an EGR hose or secondary air injection crap, even though they're going to do a sniffer test anyway.
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Aug 8, 2017 04:59
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I've been watching the PacificCoastAuto youtube channel for a couple of years now, there are a fair number of repeats (people sure do like mitsubishi delicas) but also lots of really interesting examples, like the tiny camper vans. There are canadian imports now and again, lots of envy. The guy runs a car export business and most of the videos are post-purchase inspections of customer cars that the buyers have consented to allow on youtube, so you get a really useful comparison of the auction sheet and the cars, he goes over the blemishes as described on the auction sheet and if anything got missed or exaggerated, so you get a really good idea about what a 3 or a 4.5 look like on the outside and what you should expect from an interior grade B vs D. Tiny fire engine Autozam AZ-1 Watch a gangly man fold himself into a tiny car with high sills. 1990 Toyota Century Intensely velour Really awesome tiny RV Nissan Match Super Turbo Twincharged! The time they accidentally bought the worst camper van in Japan of course there are skylines and skylines and skylines and skylines and skylines and sky...lines *ahem* edit: they also have an auction search tool that has a guest login if you just want to see auctions/sold without registering http://auction.pacificcoastjdm.com/auctions/?p=project/searchform&searchtype=max&s&ld keep in mind it's a pain to link the auctions though, since the links need the guest login to view. edit2: the guy is also very upfront about the shady poo poo car exporters sometimes do, for example: Marking up sale price which is possible because of auctions that hide sale price, and since USS has just started hiding sold prices that's going to get a lot lot worse. Charging customers the use tax which is refunded on export astropika fucked around with this message at 19:24 on Aug 9, 2017 |
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Aug 9, 2017 10:49
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It's going to be really interesting seeing what happens with the Japanese import/export business after all the cool cars can be sold in the US. I imagine the next 5-10 years represents a golden era for JDM vehicle export/import, it'll be interesting to see if people start importing manly minivans after that. Lots of interesting kei cars continue to be made, although they're mostly all cubes now, but that would be perfect for NYC or similar crowded cities with terrible parking. Being US importable clearly has a huge impact on demand for the cooler cars, as evidence by the insane price hikes. As I understand it Japan is a huge source of normal everyday vehicles for east asia (and new zealand? I think Australian grey market laws are worse?) so it probably won't have a huge impact on the Japanese used car industry as a whole. astropika fucked around with this message at 19:47 on Aug 9, 2017 |
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Aug 9, 2017 19:44
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kimbo305 posted:The thought that Shaken can take reasonably conditioned cars off the road has me thinking that looking for a European car in Japan through established importers instead of buying in the US or looking to European importers. It really depends, Japanese auctions seem to place a huge premium on lower mileage cars, the mileage drives most of the value, so higher mileage cars that seem to have been well maintained can be a good deal. I'd be very concerned about rust with 80s euro cars, particularly Lancias. Japan is a rusty country, just ask anyone who's imported an AE86. Most of the delta integrales I've seen recently have been near 4-6 million jpy, they've shot up since they became US importable. I've also looked at 911s and in general they're not far off US prices, 40k+ for a 964. Bringatrailer is expensive compared to what you can find for sale on forums, it's very tempting but you rarely get a good deal on BaT. If you notice a really large percentage of the fancy 80s euro cars on bringatrailer were sourced from japanese auctions, sometimes they even reuse the auction photos! These are the people you're competing against on bids for those cars, people looking to flip them. There are good value euro cars in japan, generally you'll want to be looking for things that are hard to find in the US in good condition, or in any condition in the case of alpinas, so many alpinas in japan. edit: in some ways I'm glad californians can't import these cars, it'd drive up prices even more. If people are even aware they can't register them before they bid. edit2: the shaken doesn't really take premium cars off the road, the great majority of the auction cars you see for > 1,000,000 jpy have a valid registration (with the notable exception of some 'boy racer' type cars, but those are dicey propositions anyway, you really have to be S rank at japanese auctions to go there). It's more about the really cheap cars, since you can fail for having ripped seats and it becomes silly to repair things like that when the car is worth 200,000 jpy. Then the problem with cheaper cars becomes that it costs $1500 or so to ro-ro a car to the west coast and most exporters charge ~ 100,000JPY, so the sweet spot becomes cheap cars in good condition say 500,000 JPY so you're not taking a wash on the shipping/export fees. astropika fucked around with this message at 20:18 on Aug 9, 2017 |
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Aug 9, 2017 20:01
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BlackMK4 posted:Hell yeah, is there a way to see what bidding got up to, or did it not even get a bid? There used to be, but USS have stopped letting 3rd parties poll their auction results.
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Aug 25, 2017 21:30
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Olympic Mathlete posted:Also I forgot the Toyota Bb Open Deck was a thing. I want one so someone else can drive it and I can sit in the the little seats in the back facing traffic. I believe these (or a slight variation of) were eventually sold in the US as a Scion of some sort? The youtube guys I posted about before bought one of those as a company car a while back, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PCT7BPdW7M The bed seems remarkably useless, maybe it was intended for surfboards? skis?
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Sep 1, 2017 05:52
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TadBradley posted:How bad of an idea is importing an old Toyota Century? Please tell me it's a terrible idea because I have been looking at pictures the last two weeks and it has completely colonized my brain. I'll never pass California emissions, right? No, you won't. People living in California don't get to do this stuff legally unless they're rich. It doesn't matter if you sniff right at the tailpipe, the car needs to be certified in the FTP drive cycle by a testing lab. You could swap in a USDM engine of some kind and go to the referee, keep in mind it needs to be a direct swap: same pre-cat exhaust headers, same fuel system (whether it has a return, EVAP etc) as the donor vehicle, anything that can be said to be involved in emissions.
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Sep 20, 2017 20:05
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Lord of Garbagemen posted:Ya "r" stands for repaired(s), but repairs in Japan does not mean something was just broken, modifications could also trigger an R. Basically R is a crap shoot. I recall being told that modifications can never cause an R grade, that it's a common misconception and it always means an accident. Consider the cars a lot of people are looking at and the japanese equivalent of the gen 4 v6 camaro owners who previously owned them, accidents are inevitable. If you're buying a 25 year old car with the intention of modifying it in any serious way I wouldn't shy away from an R grade that looks decent. Particularly not an RA. You're more likely to get some interesting mods too, I think it was an RA R32 that pacificcoast did a video on once that had a full VCAM system installed, not mentioned in the auction info at all. edit: found it, it was an R https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xItluNFN6E astropika fucked around with this message at 21:16 on Jan 17, 2018 |
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Jan 17, 2018 21:07
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French Canadian posted:How are diesels treated in California? When I got my Sprinter in 2010 I just had to get a visual check that it wasn't belching smoke and modification inspection. I imagine if it's a turbo diesel it's not that risky. I don't know if non turbo diesels would pose a bigger challenge to the smoking issue though. Its complicated? Pre-97 diesels (light duty only?) don't need to do emissions testing, but post-68 direct imports they've been generally hostile to. Its apparently luck of the draw as to whether they catch on with pre-97 diesels. If you get flagged to get a vin verification from the CHP you might be out $8k or something to get a DPF added at G&K. People suggest trying to bring in cars already registered in other states. The delica forums have a lot of this stuff: https://delicaforum.com/index.php?threads/california-chp-vin-inspection-tips.1384/ https://delicaforum.com/index.php?threads/deli-dream-dead-for-california.78/page-2#post-2625 I've never seen any policy documents about any of this, as I understand its entirely down to the discretion of CARB. On the plus side, if you do get lucky you never have to do biyearly smog testing because pre-97. The vehicle is also safe after it has a CA title, because theres no emissions testing to get it flagged when its sold within the state. Krakkles posted:Also worth saying, CA is an additional special case here - on top of the tax issue, you will get hosed HARD on trying to circumvent CARB. It exists for a reason. CARB absolutely exists for a reason, and I doubt there are all that many people in CA who would want a world without it, but it does rather rub people up the wrong way when you can register an incredibly polluting 70s domestic truck without any problems but if you try to import a 90s 600cc kei-truck from Japan you're going to be out thousands for testing and modifications. astropika fucked around with this message at 17:05 on Jan 3, 2020 |
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Jan 3, 2020 16:35
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Fauxtool posted:
Don't bother trying to reg in CA, it'd cost you more than the car is worth. Even bringing a car in from another state you still need an EPA sticker or else you have to go the same nightmare FTP testing and modifying at G&K route. Diesels older than 97 (doesn't need smog) you can often bring in from other states if the DMV person doesn't get suspicious, but gas engines post 75 need a smog before reg can be completed and the smog place is going to tell you to go away after they realize the car isn't in the Big Book of Engines that they refer to for the mandatory visual inspection for aftermarket parts. As far as keeping Texas registration, keep in mind there's a CHP program to encourage Californians to rat you out, it's called CHP REG now and the rhetoric has softened a lot, but it used to be called CHEATERS, they even had a telephone line for snitching on your neighbors at one point, now it's just a website. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2njEGRAMvc It's unlikely to happen but it can be used against you if you piss someone off enough. Also, if you get pulled over by the CHP and have a California license and out of state plates then you're definitely looking at a no-registration ticket, if you keep the license and plates in-sync and don't say anything dumb (like "I live in California") then you're ok. astropika fucked around with this message at 23:46 on Feb 7, 2021 |
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Feb 7, 2021 22:00
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