North America Imports, Its Slowly Slipping Away, Spread the word, Discuss & Educate

[collector240sx]

BTW I doubt the US having a 25 yr import law will influsence the Canadian Guv. We are a sovereign country with our own priorities. Otherwise we would have been in Iraq

About sovereign country, do you know the US actually occupy part of OUR northern territory.
And by occupy I mean, it's off limit to us Canadian citizen and even off limit to our Armed Force.
But I guess out of sight, out of mind right.

And It's not the US government I'm worried about, they don't have much to gain, since they
actually mostly import from us rather than the other way around. It the big car company, and
there lobbying that I'm worried about. I can guarantee that the 15 years old rules wouldn't
be nearly has restrictive if it wouldn't be for them.

I try not to think about our government, because it just make's me so sad that people can
still believe in it. Seriously I would really like to believe in it myself, but I just can't, since
it is fundamentally flawed. Think about it for a minute, we take a person that is not scared
to lies in order to achieve is personal goal. Expect him to learn about a whole government
branch, identify problem, come up with possible solution, formulate a plan to put in place
those plan, get them approve by a bunch a people that couldn't care less for the problem
in the first place. All this while being approach by big corporation, cramming bull s**t
report down is throat and threatening to have him replace if he doesn't cooperate.
Hell at the speed these guys work, how are we even surprise they rarely ever get further
than identifying the problem before there is a new election and the cycle start over.
Then you have guy's like me who get pissed off at them because they come up with new
bogus laws to patch a failing system.

Got to love living in a so call representative democratic country. I call it so call, because
that's what it should be or at less what I have been brought up to believe it was. But
lately the more I look at it, and the more I find it looks like a Totalitarian democracy.
Well either way, one thing is certain it's all run by capitalism.

Here an old picture from 1911, made by the anti-capitalism movement of that time.



I know when I start writing It's usually long, but it's my day off, their still snow
outside, and no I didn't have anything better to do. lol

P.S. JZ do you know if it's possible to have a preview option before we post,
my window is about 5 1/2 lines. It good for most post but when it gets long
I have to scroll for ever to double check if what I wrote actually make sense.
Which at almost 3h am is a strong possibility.

[hozer]

new law will always be grandfathered anyways even if they do change the 15 year rule... Can't just ban em and take em away

[Oakville]

Not at all. The way it stands, its been the same with registering Skylines in Ontario (for the most part) since '04.

[cschepp]

My one question, will I have a problem with transferring ownership with all this going on? I have 2 cars I need to transfer into my name that are rhd!

[quadracer111]

I think us Canadians are safe for a while. From what I heard, transport canada basically told CADA to stfu and put them in their place. Now Quebec is another story, but they seem to like to do their own things (no offence intended, just the truth lol).

[Oakville]

I came here to post this, the cars in the US are illegal, end of story. Its like if a drug smuggler got caught and got his drugs taken away, because its illegal (not the same thing we are talking about obviously, but same principle, it's illegal).

exactly what I feel. Its like the cocaine lovers of the world banding together trying to fight "the man" because they are seizing their beloved drugs. Its illegal, plain and simple. While its a shame Skylines are being seized and crushed/exported, I look at it as extremely dumb to be throwing money into fighting it...when a car is illegally imported, its illegal and went against very well known government laws, how the hell do you fight that?

[JZ]

BTW I doubt the US having a 25 yr import law will influsence the Canadian Guv. We are a sovereign country with our own priorities. Otherwise we would have been in Iraq

[collector240sx]

Sorry if it's not exactly on topic, I'll try to stay close to it.

The think that worries me the most is, that we are eventually going to have a merger of the Canadian, US and Mexican rules.

If you don't believe me, check the rules on importing cars from Mexico. It's basically a count down.

It's actually a good thing for certain stuff, they already incorporated the front bumper laws making a couple of nice cars
usually only available in the state. (Evo 8-9, GTO, to name a few). But if it means loosing the 15 years import law in favor
of the 25 years in the US, it would suck really bad.

Another point is why do we have so many different standard ? Like come on I know that the current company want to
limit competition, but is this really necessary ? And if the government is so worried about safety, why don't they just
put license plate for of highway use only on those car ? It's not like they never heard of the concept.

And if I hear 1 more person say it for the environment, I'm going to loose it completely. Anyone here that doesn't have
short term memory lost here ? I can recall a certain electric car company in Quebec trying to get an approval to be able
to sell there cars in Canada. (company name was ZENN) While they couldn't sell there product in canada, they where
able to sell them in mexico, US, even Europe. Well they finally got the right to sell there car in Canada in 2008.
Where is the company now, well look at this little article.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2009/12/08/quebec-zenn-electric-car.html

And now Hydro Quebec teams up with FORD, Renault-Nissan for a pilot project on an electric car.
Wow got to love the local support here.

And if the government was just after the pollution cause by our car. Why would they want us to
get rid of it so fast. When looking at the pollution created by a car, you can't just choose to look
at the pollution it create after it leaves the dealership's parking lot. You have to take into
consideration the manufacturing process, the shipping of parts, the pollution created for the
creation of said parts. Hell right now that is the major draw back for the electric car. Has
much has I love the concept of the electric car, something has to be done about the amount
of pollution associated with building one. Which brings me to why isn't there government
grant on anti pollution accessory for our car. Hell, they build race car in japan that create
less then 1/10 of the pollution created by my daily driver, with special catalytic converter.

The only reason I can come up with is, they aren't interested in protecting the environment.
They would like you to believe that, but the only thing there after is keeping the big
corporation happy, so they have there backing for the next election. Even if the goal of
those big corporation is not in our best interest.

Sorry about the rant, it's just when I hear those ignorant piece of **** talk and make
decision about stuff they don't even understand, with the so call backing of group that
represent an industry that doesn't even acknowledge us unless there in deep ****. It
just drives me nuts.

I understand we need rule in order to protect the innocent. But where do we draw the line
between protection and freedom. Yes, I can build a car in my garage, after it's been approved
I can put in the road has a kit car, that's nice. Yet, I can't import a car that had to meet
crash test standard, and environment restriction, because it's not 15 years old. Wait I'll
just import it and keep it in storage, hell in my living room till it's 15 years old, oh wait that's
not legal either. Oh i see I'll modify it, now it should be legal right, NOT. Now tell me that's was
the best answer they could come up with. This can only lead to more project like a certain
white R34 (with out pointing finger). Which clearly even if legal are a far greater threat to
anyone on the road, then any unaltered version of said cars.

And for RHD car being cheap access to high powered alternative, it's true ,but is making it
illegal for EVERY ONE the only option. On the other hand, motorcycle are still legal, yet
they have a lot more limited field of view, and tell me they aren't high performance machine
with a strait face. Does that mean they should be illegal too. No, we just have to limit the
access to them, with something like a high performance license requirement (like they have
for motorcycle over 750cc).

edit

Why are these threads being repeated one after the other...I think that people understand what the government is trying to do to us car enthusiasts but seriously we need to keep all this talk in one thread. Not one after the other.

If people are really concerned about the 15 year rule chaning to the 25 year, then why get an R33 or even think about the R34 yet? Plain and simple if the car isnt legal then why do you have it? To say you have this car? And let it waste away for years in your garage? Or even get it taken away from you?

This is my opinion agree or disagree...everybody has their own i'm just trying to state mine!

When I look at a R34, I see it like a work of art, much like someone could look at a painting of Picasso.
Making it illegal to import them in the country at the place of making them illegal on the road, is a BIG
thing. Drug understandable, animal, fruit I can see why they could be dangerous. But making illegal
a piece of metal, treating it like a piece of contraband. when I grew up I was told that those where the
action of dictatorship government. I feel insulted just thinking about it. We have car museum for a
reason, do we absolutely have to wait X amount of years before a cars is worthy of being in a museum.
I think not.

If they bought a car knowingly that it was an illegal car, then they shouldn't even be surprise. BUT those
who bought there car thinking it was legal, and for all they knew it was, that's a another story. There has
to be a more ethical way to handle this, without having to reign over the population with fear.

Ok, I'll shut up now.
J-F

[quadracer111]

The events in the US have no bearing on us here. The Canadian import industry is fine. We pulled through what was arguably our toughest year (2010) since importing became popular and here we stand.

The US cars that were impounded were illegal, plain and simple. If you live in the US and the car isnt 25 years old, don't import it.

I came here to post this, the cars in the US are illegal, end of story. Its like if a drug smuggler got caught and got his drugs taken away, because its illegal (not the same thing we are talking about obviously, but same principle, it's illegal).

[leeaspin]

Why are these threads being repeated one after the other...I think that people understand what the government is trying to do to us car enthusiasts but seriously we need to keep all this talk in one thread. Not one after the other.

If people are really concerned about the 15 year rule chaning to the 25 year, then why get an R33 or even think about the R34 yet? Plain and simple if the car isnt legal then why do you have it? To say you have this car? And let it waste away for years in your garage? Or even get it taken away from you?

This is my opinion agree or disagree...everybody has their own i'm just trying to state mine!

[Phastwon]

I have to side with Matt and John right now too. There is always a rumor of RHD cars being banned, but nothing ever seems to happen. I think that the US situation is totally different than that in Canada. Regardless even if the rules do change, those of us with already registered cars will be grandfathered in anyways.

[Matty]

^^ True
Ive heard a rumor for just about every province at one point in time. This year was especially tough with the CADA stuff and the insurance crack down on RHD's (in Ontario) but we pulled through and now the industry is rebounding.

[JZ]

I agree with Matty, apples and oranges. Our cars are legal, Kaizo cars are not, plain and simple. Quebec rarely follows what the rest of the nation does and what happened there has no bearing on us. If rhd enthusiasts here are really worried, import a sh!t load of righties NOW and stockpile them for when they become 25 years old and sell them to our cousins down south lol. As well any rhd car imported when the law deemed them legal will not be taken away. The civil liberties lawyers will have a field day with that.

JZ

PS. Tyndago ftw.

[Nismo_line]

as stated above yes they were just rumors that have also been around for a long time. i think every province has there rumors about rhds

[Matty]

Quebec is a case of its own though. They do not follow federal standards, they set their own. Im not bagging on Quebec either (my last name is Lacroix ).

The Manitoba rumors have been around for ages now, as have some in Ontario. BC, etc etc. At the end of they day, they remained rumors.

There were rumors when this industry blew up back in 2004 that bans would happen and there will still be rumors 10 years from now when we are importing R34's and other cars.

If Canada was going to follow US standards, our import laws would be 25 years. Is we do follow in their footsteps now then yes there may be crackdowns, but on illegal imports.


The US isnt being harsh on these vehicles, they are being harsh on the illegal ones. Look at how many classic rhd imports there are in the US (see japanesenostalgiccar.com) and they don't get hassle because they followed the rules.


(side note: These are not the opinions of RightDrive. These are the opinions of me, Matty)