legalizing non-us made cars here in the us

[k1dfreeze]

well, ive been looking around at cars that wernt made here in the states such as silvia's, chasers, seras etc...and found that you can buy them for pretty cheap depending on model and year of course...so then i found how much it would cost to ship here, and even thats not too bad...so im thinking to myself, pondering as i picked my nose, that man, i should do that! wouldnt that be awesome! driving on the opposite side, only down part to that is i would never be able to go to drive thru by myself again...but anyways...i found a little bit of info on the process to legalize the cars but its still sketchy as i read it...anyone ever import a car? or know how to go abouts doing so?

[OniFactor]

if it's something that has a US counterpart (silvia to 240SX), it's not too hard, since you can swap the safety and emissions required parts over, but if it's not something that can be had here, in one form or another it takes a while to get it legalized. i remember something about motorex having to import 10 or more of each skyline they wanted to sell, and having them crash tested, to show safety...

[Dweezil]

Unless you can get the manufacturer to certify that it's the same as the car sold in the US, you have the have it crash tested, and go through federal emissions certification to be driven on public roads. That's also when a VIN gets assigned.

[Levi]

it is a huge pain in the ass, I know that much. I am sure though Ryan that you know someone with a hookup on how to do this. You could go over and disassemble it and bring it back as a "kit car" but that is a pain in the ass as well.

[OniFactor]

or you could bring it over as a 'race vehicle,' but they have to be sent back after a while..

[k1dfreeze]

oh man, im not going to bring a car over just to give to someone to crash, thats just stupid...and taking a whole car apart would suck...damn it, it was a good idea at first, not so good anymore =(

[workinprog]

it would also be sketchy passing other cars on a two lane road considering you have to go more then half way into the opposite lane to see if somethings coming

[k1dfreeze]

man this sucks...i found a 98 toyota chaser tourer v for around 7k in really good condition with low miles...and it only cost like 2-3k to ship it here...but i dont want to deal with the govt...*sigh* again...

[gpny]

I looked into importing a cut ITR, and the people were real bitches... Unless you have hookups it's going to be tough!

FYI Motorex's owner is in Jail for fraud. The cars they brought in did not have proper work done to them. Only the ones that were registered are allowed to stay... no more.

In Quebec though, it is very easy to import and register JDM cars that are over 15 years old... Unfortunatly, it appears thats the gov't is looking into closing the current loophole.

[Synth]

Swap Vin's check on freshalloy.com they have TONS of threads on how to beat the system. Several guys will pull the gone in 60 seconds method.

[OniFactor]

race/show vehicle for your shop, man! you'll just have to have a connection back in japan to ship it back to, every once in a while...

[samuraiz]

Swap Vin's check on freshalloy.com they have TONS of threads on how to beat the system. Several guys will pull the gone in 60 seconds method.

I'm sure there are plenty of illegal methods you could go through that would be pretty much bulletproof. My simplest thought is to grab a Vin from a car nobody really knows much about, something obscure and manufactured in the same country as the car in question, then go through the normal legal process of registering the car.

[civicnation425]

http://www.japaneseusedcar.ca/ucar/1971KGC10skyline.htm

there is one of these in the bellevue area... it looked fuckin hot as hell, it had a full black roll cage inside, great exhaust. It was pristine. You can always go vintage :TU:

[egriffith45]

^ that car is the shit

[DirtyDC4]

Just go backwards through the drive-thru.

[OniFactor]

Just go backwards through the drive-thru.

dude, have you ever actually tried this?? it's fucking hard as hell. :-(

[k1dfreeze]

i wanted this http://www.tradecarview.com/stock/detail.aspx?id=77664 =(

[lowbuck]

it is a huge pain in the ass +1,000,000
I was stationed in Japan for 5 years and never saw anybody do it succesfully. I looked into it a little, I was driving a low mileage 180sx turbo when I left(paid $1400), and it would have been much cheaper to pick up a 240 hatch state side and do a SR20DET swap. My buddy spent almost a year trying to get his R32 GTR back home (paid 13k) and sold it right before he left, motorex being the only option. I'm working off memory but I think it was in the 30-35k range for the GTR, with the military discount.
That said I drove a LHD 318 BMW for awhile over there and it wasn't too bad. You get used to the visibility issues, but drive thrus and toll booths are a bitch. You should see the poor bastards in Australia. They pay big money to have an old US muscle car imported and have to drive around with a big ass sign on the back identifying it as a right hand drive car, to warn the other cars on the road.

[achilles1981]

http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/cars/rules/import/

most cars that are frequently imported (ie silvia) have already been tested and only need to have the proper modifications made to comply with federal/state (whichever is more restrictive) emissions and safety regulations.
You only need to have the crashing part done if it's not on the list, and there is no US equivalent for it. Then you'd need at least 5 for all the testing, plus the one you actually want to use. That site also has a list of REGISTERED importers, so you can be sure you're getting your car from an authorized importer.

[lowbuck]

Don't forget emissions for engines that were never sold in the U.S. ca18det, sr20det, etc... none of them are actually legal here. Plus depending on year the japanese glass doesn't meet the same dot standard, mirrors, headlights, etc..... It's obviously possible but it is more than most people are willing to do. If you could easily and economically import JDM Silvia's, and such there would be quite a few on the road seeing that they sell for next to nothing over there.

[remoer]

Just go backwards through the drive-thru.
or you can go to checkers cause they have a right hand and left hand side. lol
http://www.checkers.com/images/company_overview1.jpg

[boostdeliquent]

I've imported a few cars since I started my business. The most recent shipment was a R34 GTT, S15 Spec R, and an ITR. Don't believe me, shoot me an email and I'll send you the customs form from when the cars cleared. Also if you live around Gurnee or Milwaukee, you have probably heard or seen a yellow R34 Rolling around down there. That was the one I imported. The S15 is also down around that area as well.

It's a bit of a PITA to do, but if you have the right connections it is possible. All the BS you hear about NHTSA, EPA, blah, blah, blah, is only applicable if you want the car federalized. I don't do that. I title and register the cars to be legal in all states but Cali. If you want more info shoot me an email. I can be reached at boostdeliquent@msn.com.

[k1dfreeze]

damn...i was happy til i read *all states but cali* =(

[Levi]

we always get monkeyfucked out here in California.

[boostdeliquent]

Yeah, sorry. Cali is a huge PITA no matter how you do it thanks to all the uber restrictive emission standards. I wish I could find a way around it since Cali would be a huge market for me to tap. Oh well, there's always the other 49 states. ;)

[Hellhatch]

if it's something that has a US counterpart (silvia to 240SX), it's not too hard, since you can swap the safety and emissions required parts over, but if it's not something that can be had here, in one form or another it takes a while to get it legalized. i remember something about motorex having to import 10 or more of each skyline they wanted to sell, and having them crash tested, to show safety...

I heard the same exact thing.

[OniFactor]

Yeah, sorry. Cali is a huge PITA no matter how you do it thanks to all the uber restrictive emission standards. I wish I could find a way around it since Cali would be a huge market for me to tap. Oh well, there's always the other 49 states. ;)

you can just move your physical address to AZ, and register it there, and drive in cali. :TU:

[superdewey58]

^^^ yea thats what i was thinking that as well

[boostdeliquent]

you can just move your physical address to AZ, and register it there, and drive in cali. :TU:
I've heard of some people doing that but prefer not to recommend it due to liability issues. Honestly though, from my own experience it seems like most cops don't even give a shit unless they're just trying to be a total dick. I was driving a customers R32 GTS-T up through Chicago and got pulled over for speeding. I had no plates, registration, title, or even the deregs for that matter.

The cop walks up to the wrong side of the car, kinda looks and then walked around. He ask for my license and registration. I had my license but none of the other papers w/ me which I told him. He just kinda looked, said cool car and gave me a warning for speeding. I was pretty happy on that one and def. pleasantly surprised. After that, I don't drive any of my cars until I title them though.

[boostdeliquent]

Here's some pics I found of the R34 I imported. (I thought I lost them all when my comp crashed) The funny thing is, the guy that bought it is now trying to say he imports these cars. LOL, I'm going to laugh my ass off when he tries brining in cars and the entire shipment gets seized. If I find some more pics of the S15 and ITR I'll post them up as well.

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/R34GTT.jpg

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/R34GTT2.jpg

[95 R-81 Cx]

^^^ That's Badass how much do those things run shipped, registered basically after everything is said and done?

[boostdeliquent]

I found some more pics of the S15 and ITR as well as one of the R32 GTS-T I got pulled over in. Here they are.

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/r32.jpg

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/dc2.jpg

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/dc21.jpg

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/dc23.jpg

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/b6.jpg

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/b9.jpg

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f126/boostdeliquent/b14.jpg

[boostdeliquent]

^^^ That's Badass how much do those things run shipped, registered basically after everything is said and done?

I can probably do one for around 25-27k titled and registered. Maybe a little less but you get what you pay for and I prefer not to sacrifice quality. Not that that matters too much. As long as I have the part # I can order any oem JDM part and don't have a mark-up on them for customers that have bought cars, well other than shipping from Japan that is.

[lowbuck]

Looking good. I was under the impression that since Motorex paid for federal crash testing that they retained exclusive rights to the Skyline for a certain period of time? Obviously they are now facing major legal issues so I don't know what's changed with that. You're not including the purchase of the car for that 27k ballpark are you? I would think you'd have your door beaten down.

[boostdeliquent]

The 27k includes the car, shipping to the US, titling, and registering of the vehicle. The only thing that is not included in the price is delivery to my customer. For that, you can either come pick up the car yourself, or I can have it shipped to you.

It cost me around 19k per shipment so if I have 3 cars on the shipment it cost roughly 6,033 per car and 4,325 if I have 4 cars on it. Then there are a few other expenses but I keep my prices reasonable since I don't believe that my customers who are working to buy these cars, should have to sell their left nut on the black market to get one. They don't really cost that much in Japan, so it doesn't make sense to me to charge 30k+ for a fairly low mileage R32 GTR, w/ a 3.5 auction rating, that can be had in Japan for roughly 7-8k.

As for things w/ Motorex, the only thing they had exclusive rights to was the crash testing information since they performed modifications to the cars prior to the crash testing. As a result of that, the modifications they did to make the cars "legal" was considered proprietary information. Technically speaking though, since they only crash tested R33's those were the only ones that should have been able to be imported.

From what my understanding of it is, they misled NHTSA to think that R32, R33, and R34's were all basically the same. As a result of that, R33's are currently the only Skylines that have had crash testing done and can legally be imported under federal guidelines. That in itself still doesn't do much though, since they never developed an actual OBD2 compliant emission system for the Skyline. I did some research on that and to design the OBD2 system, you're looking at paying around 250k for the OBD2 systems development by an approved firm. That's if you want it 50 state legal. IMO, fuck that. Who cares if it's 50 state legal when I can make it 49 state legal for under half the cost.

[OniFactor]

it's even NYS emissions legal?

[boostdeliquent]

I only title and register the cars. Considering that virtually no one I know or have talked to that would buy these cars is going to keep them stock, it makes no sense for me to guarantee that they'll pass emissions. Not to mention the state I title and register them in doesn't do testing anyway. For emissions though I recommend picking up a high-flo cat and tuning the A/F ratio for the test. I mean if people can tune to pass in Cali w/ hi-comp B's, aggressive cams, and no cat, it shouldn't be too hard to do.

Ultimately though, if you want these cars to truly be EPA emissions compliant, feel free to pay X amount for the OBD2 system development. On a side note though, my old supplier before I started importing myself, has sold to NYS and he never mentioned his customers having problems. Plus if you really want, I can title it as a kit car instead of the actual car and I think that exepmpts it from emissions.

[civicnation425]

When I get my next vehicle you may be hearing from me boost

[lowbuck]

Boostdeliquent, thats very interesting information. I think the sticking point with the military was that upon transfering the Navy pays to have personal cars shipped into California. And as you stated individual shipments (to one of the other 49 states) are not cheap, and it would be tough to get a GTR off the boat in cali without proper documentation. The 180sx I had was not even close to being worth the trouble, and my BMW was a left hand drive that seemed to be built of a mix of German, American and Canadian standards making it a total nightmare.

I would be curious to know if you've had any experience importing a Civic Type-R. That is one fun, nasty little car that I would like to own.

[OniFactor]

how much would a non-GTR R32 be? like, cheapest you could possibly get?

[boostdeliquent]

Boostdeliquent, thats very interesting information. I think the sticking point with the military was that upon transfering the Navy pays to have personal cars shipped into California. And as you stated individual shipments (to one of the other 49 states) are not cheap, and it would be tough to get a GTR off the boat in cali without proper documentation. The 180sx I had was not even close to being worth the trouble, and my BMW was a left hand drive that seemed to be built of a mix of German, American and Canadian standards making it a total nightmare.

I would be curious to know if you've had any experience importing a Civic Type-R. That is one fun, nasty little car that I would like to own.

Yeah, there's alot to it, and it can be a PITA at times but it can be done for alot cheaper than other importers would lead you to believe. I won't go into too many of the details since alot of that info is highly proprietary and took me years to gain, plus it pisses other importers off when people talk too much.

N/E how, in regards to getting a CTR, I would just do it the same way I have done all my other cars. It can take a bit of time depending on how soon we can get the shipment on a transport ship, and how long it takes to clear customs, but I try to have it done in as timely of a manner as possible. As for the cost, it could be anywhere from 13-17k depending on the condition of the vehicle, whether I buy it at auction or from a private seller, and if I have 3 or 4 cars on the shipment. If you were to get a very low mileage one, the price can go up even more but off the top of my head, 13-17 sounds about right.

OniFactor:

If you were to get a R32 GTS-T Type M which comes with the RB20DET and LSD, I could most likely do that for right 9-12k with the same price variations mentioned for the CTR. I mean, it could be less but lets face it, you get what you pay for and I don't want to sell my customers a lemon.

[Dub A]

boost I was wondering what else you can import and if you had a good place to find information on getting hands on a rhd car

[Boricuanolgy]

while on the subject, I heard that Motorex were importing the Skyline from japan over here. But I also heard that there were a lot of them being stolen on japan, just to be sold here ilegaly. Has anyone herd this? Not sure if Motorex has anything to do with this, so I don't even want to say that it was them doing this and I don't know what other company was importing cars from Japan, especially the Skyline. Has anyone herd this or something similar?

[rkcarguySI]

Motorex crash tested the skylines and was approved to import them and modify them(proprietary info) to meet our standards. Then a new owner bought motorex and screwed it all up, peoples cars dissapeared that were supposed to be in a government bonded holding area awaiting their modifications, and ended up getting trashed on race tracks by friends/family etc. Then the feds shut themn down and people went to jail. I got this info because one of our Navy guys here local has one of the last Skylines to come thru motorex, and they screwed it all up and it dissapeared. He filed some sort of alert(like the car had a warrant out), and when the asshole got pulled over they impounded it and he got it back. Haven't heard anything about stolen cars, they are such a high profile car and retain the original VIN so that would be kinda stupid.

[Boricuanolgy]

thats mess up!

[rkcarguySI]

I imported engines and 1/2 clips from Japan for about 5 years, so I looked into importing whole cars extensively. To put it simply and without giving up anyones propietary info, as an individual you have some options to be able to "build" yourself a car from Japan, I have 2 of them and a couple of my friends with the fabrication skills do also. To import and sell, or import-build-sell is a violation of several federal laws. Nuff said, not taking any ?'s

[greasemonky50]

move to canada lol then it wont be such a PITA. plus that and the free health care is the only reason to move up there lol. j/k

[boostdeliquent]

How did this thread come back to life. On a side note I have a R32 GTS-T Type M I am brokering. I'll post up pics later. Oh and it's landed in the states already.

[transzex]

RHD Del Sol, added USDM front bump bars and foam, inspected, approved.

Thought it was gonna be a PITA, but it was easy for Tim/Scho

[rkcarguySI]

Trans top delsol?

[93reddelsol]

Trans top delsol?http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v324/lancerEVO272/transtop.jpg

[rkcarguySI]

Pretty tight, I imported a front and rear clip for a guy to do the B16A swap and trans-top, turned out pretty nice.