Who's Winding Back The Odometers?

[Importwatch]

A Legnum with 110,000kms last week (see attachments) suddenly appears with 65,000kms...

http://www.tokyoprestige.com.au/car_details.asp?id=108

Edited December 22, 2009 by Importwatch

[@ndrew]

[WhitePrincess]

haha, nice find! but unfortunately at the end of the day, any of the owners can do it, and even though it's illegal, quite a few of them are wound back...

[Guest]

Must be good as you can also buy a new vanity when you pick the car up.

Edited December 23, 2009 by Guest

[Priestley]

Its well known that odometers are tampered with, which is why you should buy a car based on its condition, not how many k's it has. If you're buying a car from Japan, have someone like Iron Chef or Beer Baron organise a person to inspect it.

[Beer Baron]

well I think in this case it's a pretty safe bet as to who wound it back.... whoever bought it at auction. and if that website is listing it as their stock then that would lead you to believe it's them.

to be honest though in the past it's usually been japanese sellers winding back odometers before sale to get a better grading, or the other half were done after being bought by an exporter/importer and wound back before ending up in whatever country they were going to.

it will happen much less now that japan records mileage at shaken intervals. so at basically every 3 years the kms are recorded on the rego. as the most recent buyer you get the rego/export certificate and you can see what kms it had at the last inspection. if the car now has less then you have a problem!

like priestly said though this is the reason why you need to inspect any car you want to buy (or have it inspected). people can and do lie in car descriptions. and kms is an easy one to fudge to make the car seem more attractive.

[Iron Chef]

If you're buying from a dealer that has a freshly imported car on the lot, ask for the export certificate and/or the auction sheet - if they can't provide either or log books, walk away.

[GT-R32]

I discovered the ad for my car which had 112,000kms on it in Japan. Strangely when it appears in Canberra it has only 71,000kms on it.

But I bought it as it had no tears in any interior or bubbles in the dash etc, has never been smashed (literally), had modified parts on it (done in Japan) I wanted to do myself, plus some N1 gear, was used as a daily by the previous owner (not a thrasher) and was tight as a drum when driven. Whatever the speedo says becomes a mute point.

[Blitz]

I wonder who 'Importwatch' is?

[@ndrew]

If you're buying from a dealer that has a freshly imported car on the lot, ask for the export certificate and/or the auction sheet - if they can't provide either or log books, walk away.

Funnily enough most of there cars are around 60KM to 80KM

Coincident.....i doubt it

[08r3308]

Funnily enough most of there cars are around 60KM to 80KM

Coincident.....i doubt it

you are right they all are around that

lets say you go ahead buy the car and you can prove that its been wound back, what can you do?

how about digital odo can they be done too?

[@ndrew]

you are right they all are around that

lets say you go ahead buy the car and you can prove that its been wound back, what can you do?

how about digital odo can they be done too?

Digital odometers are apparently just as easy to wind back...

Some online store advertise their kits as 'plug & play'

Not to sure what can be done after you've discovered its been wound back...besides using the courts and so on...

[Chris Rogers]

I will say that the V series car you can tell if they have been clocked. the speed pluse and odmeter do not work. (found this out the hard way after doing cruise on one and it had NO pulse at the cluster!)

[mxfly]

I will say that the V series car you can tell if they have been clocked. the speed pluse and odmeter do not work. (found this out the hard way after doing cruise on one and it had NO pulse at the cluster!)

Trust me, the V series can be done as easily as other models.

[BigWillieStyles]

There are many cases that kms are changed for legitimate reasons in Japan. Sports cars often have their speedos changed to the 320km/h item and they will revert back to the old item when it comes time to sell the car. ie, lots of skyline owners opt for the nismo items. Also some cars have faulty speedos they a changed at some stage in the cars history. But you can usually trace the history with the shakken paperwork.

Edited December 24, 2009 by BigWillieStyles

[Brandon]

Why be that bothered if the car is in really good condition? Yes 99.999999% of cars are probably wound back but how many Ks do you think realistically has been wound back? 100,000km? Highly unlikely. A more realistic figure would be round 50,000km or less. Throw that into the odometer reading you'll still be under 200,000km. Unless you're driving a rotar, I dont think it really matters all that much if the car is in a decent condition.

[@ndrew]

Looks like its been pulled off the site

[Blitz_boy]

I saw the same thing. A car on Japan Auto Direct with 117,000kms on it and then for sale in Melbourne with 80,xxxkms. I won't mention who it was because they are a regular contributor to this section.

[Ziller]

After looking at many GTRs I'm of the opinion now that so many of them that have had the clock turned back its not funny, go for the best car I would say.

[Guest]

I saw the same thing. A car on Japan Auto Direct with 117,000kms on it and then for sale in Melbourne with 80,xxxkms. I won't mention who it was because they are a regular contributor to this section.

Was it the one on Ebay as I was emailed a few cars like that.

Edited December 29, 2009 by Guest