Honest Broker With Good Contacts

[ips]

in melbourne victoria. I am tossing up importing a 2004 4door nissan skyline 350gt sedan (not coupe) with the QV35 engine with a 6 speed or 8 speed transmission or Nissan Elgrand E51 model 2003 with a 5speed tiptronic transmission or e50 with a turbo diesel. My budget is 18k to 22k fully landed and complied. I am looking to do this through a broker with a long pedigree of importing from japan and with a qualified mechanic on the ground who can definitely do a racv/nrma type prepurchase inspection on these cars.

Can anyone assist in the decision of which model to go for taking into account the following below

1. Access to spare parts at a reasonable price in Australia. Which car would be harder or more expensive to source spare parts to do routine servicing eg. oil filter, timing belt, brakes etc..

2. Fuel economy. With petrol predicted to go to $2/L i was wondering if anyone has experience driving these cars and could give a realistic fuel economy figure for them in city driving. Is the turbo diesel much more economical then the petrol elgrande? I know sports cars perform badly in this category but i wanted to know in comparision to the weight of the Elgrande does it do better. As the elgrande is carrying alot of weight

3.Overall chances of getting dudded on a car. I am taking huge risks to import the car directly from japan and I have sought different opinions from different people and have come to the conclusion that the skyline is likely to have been driven harder with street racing and might have been crashed and the crash cleverly concealed then the family oriented car of the elgrande.

4. Build and mechanical quality. Would appreciate if anyone has experienced major faults with their cars after directly importing.

Finally can anyone recommend some major brokers /dealers eg. directimported, carizma who are honest and will not rip me off. I was thinking of using Iron Chef..but it has been 2 weeks and he has not responded to any of my emails.

Thanks All and appreciate you assistance

Regards John

[Guest]

Kristian will properly reply soon but going on your questions and models you are looking at just buy a Commodore or Falcon, V35 8 Speeds have issues, 6 speeds are rare as (I had one my self) and Elgrands are so new you might have issues getting parts and service (depending on were you live).

[Blipman]

In regards tp which car is best for parts I'd say probably a V35, though I agree the 8 speeds can be a little expensive when things go wrong since no one knows how to really repair them. I've looked at probably hundreds of V35's and it's very unusual to see anything wrong with at all, they are quite reliable, and there are now enough in the country that people are starting to stock and keep parts. Enough Elgrands are coming in that soon this will also be the case, but it will take longer.

Fuel economy: the Skyline will get marginally better economy than an Elgrand, but they are pretty close. You're looking at abour 8.7km/L for an 8 speed Skyline versus around 8.0 - 8.2km/L for the Elgrand various models. You might drive the Skyline a little harder though

Inspections from a qualified mechanic might be tricky, a lot of people here in Japan are very competent at what they do yet only some will have actual professional qualifications. For example inspect vehicles and I'd consider myself to be good at what I do, but I have a nerdy computer science degree behind me, not an apprenticeship. In terms of an RACV style inspection that's pretty unusual but (plug time!) yes, we do that. We have a network of people around Japan (including mechanics) who will go and look at cars, take a couple of hundred photos and provide a written report. Just today I spent about 2 and a half hours going over a Skyline and took about 200 pics for a customer, depending on where the car is located will depend on who we get to do the inspection. I know exactly where you are coming from however I think ultimately you have to realize that there will be some uncertainty (however small) that you won't be able to know everything there is to know about a car, and that's true of wherever you buy it from. For example you have faith in the RACV, they once came and inspected a car which I was personally selling which had one painfully obvious issue (that I'd already told the prospective buyer about) and the RACV guy totally missed it.... the buyer actually asked me if I was sure about it since the RACV guy didn't pick it up. I remember my response even today: "Trust me I know it's broken, *I* broke it!"

Which gets me onto chances of getting a dud car: very small I believe. Not only are you talking about relatively new and relatively reliable cars as a whole, but for any vehicle you import if you use someone good then relatively speaking it is a safe process... no more dangerous than buying a car yourself locally in terms of the chances of a car being good or bad.

[Iron Chef]

in melbourne victoria. I am tossing up importing a 2004 4door nissan skyline 350gt sedan (not coupe) with the QV35 engine with a 6 speed or 8 speed transmission or Nissan Elgrand E51 model 2003 with a 5speed tiptronic transmission or e50 with a turbo diesel. My budget is 18k to 22k fully landed and complied. I am looking to do this through a broker with a long pedigree of importing from japan and with a qualified mechanic on the ground who can definitely do a racv/nrma type prepurchase inspection on these cars.

Can anyone assist in the decision of which model to go for taking into account the following below

1. Access to spare parts at a reasonable price in Australia. Which car would be harder or more expensive to source spare parts to do routine servicing eg. oil filter, timing belt, brakes etc..

2. Fuel economy. With petrol predicted to go to $2/L i was wondering if anyone has experience driving these cars and could give a realistic fuel economy figure for them in city driving. Is the turbo diesel much more economical then the petrol elgrande? I know sports cars perform badly in this category but i wanted to know in comparision to the weight of the Elgrande does it do better. As the elgrande is carrying alot of weight

3.Overall chances of getting dudded on a car. I am taking huge risks to import the car directly from japan and I have sought different opinions from different people and have come to the conclusion that the skyline is likely to have been driven harder with street racing and might have been crashed and the crash cleverly concealed then the family oriented car of the elgrande.

4. Build and mechanical quality. Would appreciate if anyone has experienced major faults with their cars after directly importing.

Finally can anyone recommend some major brokers /dealers eg. directimported, carizma who are honest and will not rip me off. I was thinking of using Iron Chef..but it has been 2 weeks and he has not responded to any of my emails.

Thanks All and appreciate you assistance

Regards John

Sorry John, I've had the flu for the past few weeks (non-swine variety) and, because I insist on answering all my emails, I have a backlog of about 300 to get through! I think I saw your original email, I rummage back through and send you something today.

[_Ryan_]

A friend of mine is a Mechanic, and also an importer. Genuine guy, Melbourne based, does all the work on my car and will be bringing in my new ride. www.feeninperformance.com.au

[Guest]

The new saying seems to be "EVERYBODY IS ONE" or thinks they are.......... The way it is going their will be more experts then customers.

[bipolardragon]

in melbourne victoria. I am tossing up importing a 2004 4door nissan skyline 350gt sedan (not coupe) with the QV35 engine with a 6 speed or 8 speed transmission or Nissan Elgrand E51 model 2003 with a 5speed tiptronic transmission or e50 with a turbo diesel. My budget is 18k to 22k fully landed and complied. I am looking to do this through a broker with a long pedigree of importing from japan and with a qualified mechanic on the ground who can definitely do a racv/nrma type prepurchase inspection on these cars.

Can anyone assist in the decision of which model to go for taking into account the following below

1. Access to spare parts at a reasonable price in Australia. Which car would be harder or more expensive to source spare parts to do routine servicing eg. oil filter, timing belt, brakes etc..

2. Fuel economy. With petrol predicted to go to $2/L i was wondering if anyone has experience driving these cars and could give a realistic fuel economy figure for them in city driving. Is the turbo diesel much more economical then the petrol elgrande? I know sports cars perform badly in this category but i wanted to know in comparision to the weight of the Elgrande does it do better. As the elgrande is carrying alot of weight

3.Overall chances of getting dudded on a car. I am taking huge risks to import the car directly from japan and I have sought different opinions from different people and have come to the conclusion that the skyline is likely to have been driven harder with street racing and might have been crashed and the crash cleverly concealed then the family oriented car of the elgrande.

4. Build and mechanical quality. Would appreciate if anyone has experienced major faults with their cars after directly importing.

Finally can anyone recommend some major brokers /dealers eg. directimported, carizma who are honest and will not rip me off. I was thinking of using Iron Chef..but it has been 2 weeks and he has not responded to any of my emails.

Thanks All and appreciate you assistance

Regards John

A good mate of mine imported through Prestige Motorsport.

They seem pretty good and helped him with all the work to get it here etc.

www.prestigemotorsport.com.au

[carizma]

Dear John,

There are a handful of good brokers aroundf, jspec, prestige and us aswell. We have have contacts on the ground in Japan to do all these inspections, the owner Jon has worked in Japan doing exporting for several years while we have been importing here for 12 years.

With in your budget, we suggest you forget the E51, especially because the compliance is still very expensive however the E50 or the V35 premium are easily achieveable in your budget. Our guess is youll be able to get something really good for around the 15K mark, and that being fully complied.

Anyway, hope that helps John

Paul

A good mate of mine imported through Prestige Motorsport.

They seem pretty good and helped him with all the work to get it here etc.

www.prestigemotorsport.com.au