Under federal vehicle import laws, cars that are at least 25 years old can be brought into the U.S. even if they don't pass all Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (you still need to be emissions-compliant, depending on region).
That means that there's a raft of cars built in the year 2000 that are going to be now importable as the year wears on. Which car on the list would you import first?
Going with the Aussie theme, the Ford Falcon XR6 Turbo can now be imported. The 'Barra' 4.0L straight six is an absolute monster. It's already seen its way into a few foxbody's, with more to come.
To your article, I thought the SS versions if the Ute and Holden Commodore VX didn't come out until '01 or '02, and I thought I read that the Morgan Aero 8 was actually sold in the US between 2000 and 2004 but was discontinued here before the car actually left production (although what I read may have been outdated and maybe there was a plan that never happened). Cool list though! I didn't know about that version of the Clio before.
Gas cars older than 1975 need to pass smog for that cars respective model year which means it needs to be brought up to compliance.
Entirely possible but an extra cost
I just looked into this, there are apparently a few carb tech places that will modify your car for you (and certify you in the process). It’ll cost a few grand and my guess is diminish some of the car’s goodness in the process. I might look into it more with an RX-7 import in the future
You’ll ruin it if you bring a turbo model in, they don’t like restriction at all, when the oem cats clog it leaves the engine running at 0psi max if it even runs at all, it won’t breathe well enough with a carb compliant cat.
Because the JDM stuff *is* the part that's illegal. California only cares about the chassis to determine the compliance year the powertrain needs to be. California is ecstatic if you want to swap a CARB Coyote into your Foxbody, the Coyote is much lower emissions than a Windsor.
California is not happy if you want to swap a Japanese 13B into a CARB FD chassis.
All they care about is the VIN. There are plenty of RX7s in California with JDM stuff slapped all over them, and no one cares. Buy a car in Japan, gray import it, then just swap everything over to yours. As far as California is concerned, nothing ever changed. If you're scared, don't mess with the drive train. The rest of it is just esthetics, and isn't regulated literally at all.
I have never lived in California and am not at all familiar with how these things are enforced. I would absolutely defer to your experience and if you think I'm wrong with how the on the ground reality is, I would agree with you.
I am not wrong with what "the book" says. I worked for an aftermarket tuning company for a long time and got very familiar with what CARB said they wanted. Again, I will be the first to tell you I am only familiar with all this theoretically and not practically.
Cries in Canadian. Most of these vehicles are somewhat affordable for until they become available to the U.S. market then they get to collector car prices really quick.
It’s an *awful* idea in the states, but I do really want a Clio, I have a thing for hot hatches. To be fair it looks like rock auto actually has parts because the car was also sold in Mexico, but it’s still a terrible idea when I could instead import a GC WRX or any other 90’s JDM car. Please someone talk me out of a Clio (please talk me into it).
How does one service a 25 year old car with nearly no support here in the states?
I get that some cars have interchangeable parts, but what if they don't?
They're not that pricey but the prices will go up as more are exported to the US. A lot of imports get more expensive once the car is eligible for US import.
Some do, many don't. I personally visited a major importer for a story and discovered they had specifically bought cars that I'd put in a list like this years ago en masse. They had bought like an eighth of the Toyota Classic production run just because I decided it was weird and cool enough to warrant including on a list. It was obvious where they were getting their intel from.
Mine kinda ended up being one by accident. It was a list of cars I found cool, not necessarily ones that would be profitable to flip (like big importers do). They bought a bunch of those Toyota Classics and god are they gonna have trouble getting the money they want for them—they're overpriced gimmicks.
I wish I could get a Kei truck but my state and county won't allow them in the roads. Some day I'll look at a Stagea though as those seem to be under the radar for JDM Nissan. Dream import car is a Pulsar Super Turbo!
If you don't mind paying a bit extra in title/registration fees you can usually get around that by titling it through the montana LLC loophole. It's usually about a $1,000 set fee for title and registration but you don't have to do yearly inspections or emissions and you can title it as a regular vehicle. That's what a lot of local owners near me have started doing due to my state changing our rules regarding them this year
Beware though, this is technically fraud in some states that levy annual taxes on cars based on where they’re garaged.
If you did this in VA you could get caught and pay taxes + fines.
Oh definitely I know MA is the same as VA with that tax, just make sure you read up on the laws for your particular state regarding taxes. I'm not advocating this to get around taxes, just to get around all of the unnecessary rules and regulations being pushed on imports, in particular kei vehicles
There's only so much grey-market that regulators will bear before the party gets shut down for everyone.
We have the 25 year rule in the first place because Mercedes was unhappy people were importing EUDM cars instead of USDM.
I doing a video about this for my channel but honestly forgot the RS4. There were some neat performance Audis and VWs we didn't get. Also remember that this year the 1999 Audi S3 can be imported, and the next year opens the door for even more S3s.
Also the Opel/Vauxhall Speedster/VX220.
And to think we are getting soooo close to the Renault Clio V6 and Alfa Romeo 147/156 GTA.
The audi S3 is my next import that I want to grab now that they're legal and I actually have some options with the 2000 models becoming legal as well. I haven't saw any come up for sale in the US yet but they seem to pop up quite a bit over in the UK for fairly reasonable prices
"There were some neat performance Audis and VWs we didn't get."
I don't know what VAG North America's headquarters looks like, but in my mind, I'm pretty sure that phrase is front and center when you walk into the building - CIA style. It's been the business model for decades.
The Renault Clio V6 is going to be a highly anticipated one among cars still illegal to import. I foresee the Class of 2001 being stronger and as such, give my personal recommendation on these posts to save up this year to import next year's lineup.
Oh for sure. Between 2001 and 2002 some true greats are gonna be eligible. Even if I can't buy any, the idea of there being a chance to see them in the flesh will be good enough.
No, you're right, I didn't forget about it. I just didn't find it during my research and didn't think to see if there was an Audi spec from this year we didn't get.
Lots of people in Canada import cars when they’re 15-20 years old, drive them for a few years, then sell them for a profit to an American once they turn 25. There isn’t a loophole that lets you legally import 15 year vehicles to the US by sending them through Canada first.
Can be easier to import a car from Canada than a car from Japan because you can physically drive it across the border, declare the vehicle and pay customs, and you typically don’t have to worry about things like getting registration documents translated.
Not particularly, it's still not a 25 year old car exempt from US standards. If you're not intending on following the rules and just want to physically get the car in America I'd imagine it's easier in that regard. You're playing Russian roulette with a car crusher and various agencies at that point though.
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This is the year we'll be able to import one of the more notable RX7 trims: the 2000 RX-7 Type RZ (which is basically a Spirit-R Type A in terms of equipment, but is rarer and only came in white).
Red Recaro seats (previous RZs had black), a really good looking set of BBS wheels, etc.
It's more of a collector car than an enthusiast car due to the price/performance disparity (it has marginally better performance than a Type-R at 2x+ the cost) but I've always thought the white on red looked awesome.
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