Rb Auction Rating?

[SkyHi_33]

Hi there,

Just wandering what the RB auction rating (or something like that) stands for? Got off the phone with my bro who just bought a car with this rating in japan and mentioned this.

Just wandering as ive never heard of it before

Cheers!

[Beer Baron]

Well the R usually means accident grade but means different things in different auction houses. often heavily modified cars get an R rating as they have had body panels changed or just not in top shape etc. the B is most likely the interior grade. again at most auction hoses interior is rated A-B-C from best to worst.

the only real way to get good meaning out of a grade is to look at the auction sheet. if you have it post it up and someone can explain it to you.

[SkyHi_33]

Unfortunately i don't as my bro did the transaction etc. and im away from home atm... just talked to him quickly on the phone.

Well it gives me a basic idea anyways, does this rating stop it from being able to be complied? I know cars that have been in accidents etc cannot be complied. But as you mentioned removing pannels etc. gets the R rating so is it likely that it was damaged in an accident because as far as im aware the car he bought is dead stock?

Sorry about the questions, i know its hard to answer when even i dont know the full circumstances but im just making sure my bro got a decent deal out of it hehe.

[Iron Chef]

*sigh* Ok, did your brother actually have someone check the car in the metal? Or did he just buy it by going off the pics and the auction sheet?

If he bought it in the last day or two, let me know all the details of the car it was and I will try and track down the sheet for it. But you need to do it ASAP, PM me the details if you prefer. I sincerely hope he had someone take a good look at it, someone who understands the quality of cars required for compliance under SEVS in Australia. Lucky you asked before it was sent to Australia, or you could end up with a car that gets rejected by the compliance workshop.

In some circumstances, R graded cars are ok - panels can be removed for all kinds of reasons, not just for accidents - but if the auction sheet notes more than one panel replaced, or any kind of structural damage, you're gonna be pushing sh*t uphill to get it complied, unless the repairs have been immaculately done, and decent panel beating seems to be a very rare thing in Japan.

[Beer Baron]

yep iron chef is 100% right and this is why AUCTION SHEETS ARE ONLY USEFUL TO MAKE A CHOICE ON WHETHER THE CAR IS WORTH LOOKING AT IN THE FLESH OR NOT. you should never make a decision to bid on a car just off the auction sheet. you need a physical inspection for that choice. sheets just help you decide which of the few thousand cars up for auction that day are worth seeking out and looking at in the metal. people who buy cars remotely just looking at sheets often get burned. and they generally then pass that favour on to some other unsuspecting poor person. like he said (and I said) being R grade could be anything from a smoking wreck with flinstone style rust holes in the floor, all the way to an otherwise very neat car that has just had the bonnet replaced because wifey sat on it one night and her ass dented it, or had 1 front guard (only outer guard) swapped for a new one under insurance cause someone pushed a trolley into it.

like kristian said quality panel work is not exactly common. and any kind of inner guard damage, chassis alignment, rust/rust repair or and multiple body damage will mean the car most likely would be knocked back for SEVS compliance in australia in which case you are fked. which is why it's worth paying that extra couple yen to get the good non-accident grade cars.

oh, and yes if the car is dead stock and has an R rating then yes most likely it has some kind of accident repair or panel replacement on it. we would need to see the sheet to get a basic idea of the repair, but again you need to really see the actual car to get the full picture of what has been smashed/replaced/repaired.

[SkyHi_33]

OK

well after finally getting in touch with my bro, it seems as though he bought the car off you Kristian haha... its a blue s15. he said you told him that it was all good and apparently only the guard was replaced due to something other than an accident?

are you able to confirm this for sure? oh and do you have the auction sheet for it still, id like to have a quick look at it if that's ok

well after seeing what kind of cars you bring in anyways, i have my faith in your work haha.

[Iron Chef]

Haha, ok well I'm putting two and two together now!

Yes your brother's car was physically inspected by my agent BEFORE purchase, and despite it being marked as an R grading due to the front quarter being replaced, my agent said there was no signs of any structural repairs that would cause an issue for compliance in Australia, in fact there were no signs of strutural repair full stop, so he (the agent) purchased it.

For the record, it was listed on my website as a grade RB too, with the same explanation given as above - I'm more saying this so that you guys know I have nothing to hide when it comes to listing auction gradings. If a car is a grade R, I'll list it as a grade R, even if it looks like a 4!

Shoot me an email to [email protected] Marko and I'll send you the sheet. I actually thought I'd already given it to your brother! lol

Edited August 27, 2009 by Iron Chef

[SkyHi_33]

Yeah no worries Kristian, I've sent the email through

Thanks heaps for the replies guys, much appreciated

Cheers!

[Beer Baron]

For the record, it was listed on my website as a grade RB too, with the same explanation given as above - I'm more saying this so that you guys know I have nothing to hide when it comes to listing auction gradings. If a car is a grade R, I'll list it as a grade R, even if it looks like a 4!

and they often do. how many times do we see a grade 4 that is rubbish and probably had more hits than elvis? and at the same time I have seen plenty of cars graded R that just had say a front guard replaced due to a superficial dent (more economical to just repalce outer guard than repair the dented one). or some other small cosmetic repair.

this is why like I said it doesn't matter if it's a 4.5A or a RB they need to be inspected in the flesh. grade tells you nothing. there is nothing more frustrating than when I'm selling a car in aus and the bloke is standing right in front of me with the car looking at it and he asks me what grade it was.... lol. what does that matter? LOOK AT THE BLOODY CAR! the auction grade doesn't help you. look at the physical car and you can tell me what grade you think it is... again, grades are only used to give an idea if a car is worth checking out, after that it's all up to what you can see/touch/hear when personally checking a car. I have seen plenty of awesome cars in amazing condition that were accident graded and seen plenty of rusty, nasty POS that were grade 4 or better.

[Iron Chef]

and they often do. how many times do we see a grade 4 that is rubbish and probably had more hits than elvis? and at the same time I have seen plenty of cars graded R that just had say a front guard replaced due to a superficial dent (more economical to just repalce outer guard than repair the dented one). or some other small cosmetic repair.

this is why like I said it doesn't matter if it's a 4.5A or a RB they need to be inspected in the flesh. grade tells you nothing. there is nothing more frustrating than when I'm selling a car in aus and the bloke is standing right in front of me with the car looking at it and he asks me what grade it was.... lol. what does that matter? LOOK AT THE BLOODY CAR! the auction grade doesn't help you. look at the physical car and you can tell me what grade you think it is... again, grades are only used to give an idea if a car is worth checking out, after that it's all up to what you can see/touch/hear when personally checking a car. I have seen plenty of awesome cars in amazing condition that were accident graded and seen plenty of rusty, nasty POS that were grade 4 or better.

Richard, remind me to tell you the story one day, of the rusted Evo 7 GT-A we took a punt on - 4.5A out of f*kuoka, no rust mentioned on the sheet....good old USS...went straight back through auction at HAA the next week.

[Beer Baron]

yeah it's not often they take the trouble to mention 'cancer'.... how many times have you seen nicely graded cars that you could just about flinstone to work they have that must rust in the floor. especially years ago when buying lots of cars for LVIS and 15yo rule the amount of grade for+ cars that were rusty was annoying to say the least. they should have been grade R for Rust.

years ago I have too bought cars purely off description and years ago I knew importers that ONLY bought cars sight unseen. they were guys who had no partner in japan to inspect for them so had to take the word of either the jap dealer or places like isibike etc who only relay to them what's written on the sheet.

it's just sad that here in aus people place so much stock in auction sheets. so much so that like I said you can have a bloke with the car in front of him and he's asking me what bloody grade it was when it put through auction in japan 2 years ago. who farken cares?!! the car is right here in front of you. auction sheets are for people who can't physically see the car. if you can see the car what does the sheet matter? look at it!!! give it your own bloody grade. call it grade A for awesome or grade S for shithouse but the last thing a buyer in aus should be caring about is what an underpaid overworked USS worker thought about it 2 months or 2 years ago. apart from the fact that looking at the car tells you far more, the fact is anything could have happened to it since the auction. it could have been left in 'storage' in knee deep snow for 6 months. or drifted into a pole on it's way to the compliance shop and hastily repaired after.... I cannot stress enough to people treat each car on it's merits. forget the sheet. that's for the buyer in japan to worry about. once he's looked at the car it's the inspection that counts.

[Iron Chef]

Hahaha so true. Not sure if you spotted it, but at USS Tokyo yesterday there was an R33 Autech GTR sedan given a grading of 2! It was a Flinstones car and the owner had sprayed over it all with black paint to cover up the rust and make it look nice haha.

Someone give that USS vehicle inspector a payrise!! +1 for truth in auction gradings!

[Beer Baron]

didn't see it but I did see another R33 autech GTR 4 door come up about a week or two back. I think USS chiba as well from memory. silver one. I've even seen one in the flesh on the street in chiba of all places! oddly enough the guy was parking it in the carpark of a hotel I was staying at. first real one I saw in the flesh. lol, grade 2, you don't see that too often.

[mxfly]

Hahaha so true. Not sure if you spotted it, but at USS Tokyo yesterday there was an R33 Autech GTR sedan given a grading of 2! It was a Flinstones car and the owner had sprayed over it all with black paint to cover up the rust and make it look nice haha.

Someone give that USS vehicle inspector a payrise!! +1 for truth in auction gradings!

I saw that GT-R sedan the other day and thought wtf, I hadly ever seen any grade 2 cars before, even 20-30 year old cars dont get a grade 2! lol

And it sold for a pretty penny as well.

[Beer Baron]

yeah they are pretty rare. so even a shit one should still hold some value. well to someone who likes R33s. AND 4 doors...

[Iron Chef]

I sniffed around them a little for a while for a daily, and ended up with an Evo 8 haha