Import Vehicle

[Sammosti]

Fellows,

I just picked up my 93 SC300 last week with the plan to do a 1JZ swap.

I have been looking for a soarer front clip thinking that I might got more useful parts out of it for the $$. Not much success there!

So, I contacted my friend in Japan and see if he can find one for me. Instead of finding me a clip, he found a whole car for me that cost.................are you guys ready.....................$600US!!!

So, my question is if anyone have experience shipping/importing a vehicle from Japan? Any paper-works involved if I am not going to put it on the road? What is the shipping cost like?

Thanks

[1990LS400]

There is plenty of information on the Internet ... such as http://www.foreignborn.com/visas_imm/enter...tingyourcar.htm

It can be incredibly complicated and expensive. I knew a number of people who imported nonconforming cars into the US back in the early 80's before our government cracked down and actually started enforcing compliance requirements. I've known of at least one case where a person never was able to get his vehicle to comply and he had to ship it back out of the US to keep it from being impounded and destroyed.

[drjeckle]

Fellows,

I just picked up my 93 SC300 last week with the plan to do a 1JZ swap.

I have been looking for a soarer front clip thinking that I might got more useful parts out of it for the $$. Not much success there!

So, I contacted my friend in Japan and see if he can find one for me. Instead of finding me a clip, he found a whole car for me that cost.................are you guys ready.....................$600US!!!

So, my question is if anyone have experience shipping/importing a vehicle from Japan? Any paper-works involved if I am not going to put it on the road? What is the shipping cost like?

Thanks

This might be a little late, but when I wanted to purchase a Nissan 300ZX Right Hand drive from Canada I decided to call US customs about what might be involved in bringing the car into the US. I was told that if I intended to LICENSE the car in the US I would have to have it federalized in California. About $8000 if I remember correctly. That said. IF you are not going to license the car in the US you can probably import it. Customs told me that they do not want Japanese parts imported, but if you are going to "race" the car you are not going to license it, but you would register it.

The best advice I can give you is to call US Customs and talk to them. I might suggest you do it from the viewpoint of using this car as a starting point to build a race car.

Good luck