Petition to import cars 15 years or older

[Chris V]

https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petition...years/L50BZzwj

"The Department of Homeland Security spends a shockingly disproportionate amount of its budget not on security initiatives, but on customs seizures. In particular, importers of grey-market vehicles have been targeted by monies taxpayers have intended to be used to secure our country against terrorism and terrorist activity. We call upon the Executive Branch to immediately cease this wasteful activity, and furthermore to change the DOT/EPA exemption time on grey-market vehicles from 25 years to 15 years (to match the vehicle regulations of Canada), recognizing that the 25-year rule was enacted due to support from special interests such as Mercedes Benz North America."

[tyndago]

Thanks for posting. 25k signatures is not the goal, it is the start.

http://www.2009gtr.com/2011/11/petit...-year-old.html

[Moppie]

Hi Sean, good to see your still around!


Are you still playing with GTR's?


The older ones are still reasonably common here, and quite affordable, but are of an age where keeping them running is getting harder so we're seeing fewer on the streets.

[tyndago]

Moppie,

Still around. Not as much with the older GT-R's, but I have been doing a bit with the R35 since it came out. I work for STILLEN, GT-R part sales mostly.

Although I do have an RB26 that I am working on now.

This weekend I am also working on a car running in the 25 Hours of Thunderhill - http://nasa25hour.com

[Moppie]

Originally Posted by tyndago

I work for STILLEN, GT-R part sales mostly.

Although I do have an RB26 that I am working on now.

This weekend I am also working on a car running in the 25 Hours of Thunderhill - http://nasa25hour.com

Working for a Millen almost makes you an honorary Kiwi

Steve Millen recently ran an R35 here in the Targa NZ, for an old guys he's still very, very fast behind the wheel.

[tyndago]

Originally Posted by Moppie

Working for a Millen almost makes you an honorary Kiwi .

I don't need to be an honorary Kiwi - I was born in the CHCH. Spent most of my life here in the US, but still have some roots in the South Island.

[Moppie]

Originally Posted by tyndago

I don't need to be an honorary Kiwi - I was born in the CHCH. Spent most of my life here in the US, but still have some roots in the South Island.

LOL, that explains so much!

Have you been back since February?


Any chance of taking some video or stills at the 25 Hours of Thunderhill?

[tyndago]

Originally Posted by Moppie

LOL, that explains so much!Have you been back since February?

I have not. Its all pretty sad. I was down there a couple years back, the square, the Cathedral... Had a family friend from CHCH just here this week. My parents and grandparents were all from the CHCH area.

Originally Posted by Moppie

Any chance of taking some video or stills at the 25 Hours of Thunderhill?

No GT-R, a Scion tC of a friends I have worked on a few years.

http://www.nasa25hour.com/
On Facebook - Under DG Spec Scion.


http://www.gtrusablog.com/2011/11/dg...announces.html

[Moppie]

Originally Posted by tyndago

No GT-R, a Scion tC of a friends I have worked on a few years.

http://www.nasa25hour.com/
On Facebook - Under DG Spec Scion.


http://www.gtrusablog.com/2011/11/dg...announces.html

You mean TC's can go fast?

[Moppie]

Originally Posted by Chris V

https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petition...years/L50BZzwj

"The Department of Homeland Security spends a shockingly disproportionate amount of its budget not on security initiatives, but on customs seizures. In particular, importers of grey-market vehicles have been targeted by monies taxpayers have intended to be used to secure our country against terrorism and terrorist activity. We call upon the Executive Branch to immediately cease this wasteful activity, and furthermore to change the DOT/EPA exemption time on grey-market vehicles from 25 years to 15 years (to match the vehicle regulations of Canada), recognizing that the 25-year rule was enacted due to support from special interests such as Mercedes Benz North America."

Sorry Chris, we managed to drag this completely OT!


Here in NZ, we used to have very, very strict car import laws. At one point you had to own currency from the country you wanted to import from, so we had this strange mix of English and American cars in the 30s and 40s.

Then Americans stopped making RHD cars for export and everything for several decades was English.
It was either imported at great cost, or made locally. Then the Australian car industry took off (Ford and Holden) and so we could have English or Australian cars, and then in the 80s plants that had made English cars for British Leyland started making Honda's and a plant opened to make Toyota's.
Ford/Mazda also started assembling here along with Nissan.

Then we opened up our import laws to allow a flood of used Japanese vehicles into the market.

You could buy a NZ assembled Toyota collora, or a used Japanese one.
The NZ new one had NZ tuned suspension and was nice to drive, the Japanese one had soft suspension and a smaller engine with 20,000ks on it.
But it also had climate control, electric windows a fancy stereo and it cost 1/8 as much.

The rush of used imports killed our local car assembly industry.
My better half has one of the very last cars made here, a 1996 Honda Accord (actually built from parts made in the US).


What does this have to do with the US and it's "silly" rules around used vehicle imports?

It is purely economic protectionism, and the US has some of the strongest and most protectionist laws in the world.
But, with out them, the US car industry would be in an even worse state than it currently is.
There is a good argument that opening it to competition would have saved it, and it might have, if union laws had also been changed to allow the American industry to compete on price.

[Chris V]

Interestingly enough, our current importation laws were enacted when Mercedes decided they didn't like competing in the US against their own grey market imports. We COULD bring in anything, so long as it was converted to meet our DOT and EPA regs. After Mercedes whined in the '80s, the US government outright banned any importation with VERY few exceptions, moving the exception date back 25 years so that the new car manufacturers didn't have to compete against other recent cars (including their own). It was BS lobbying that did it to us, and this petition would hopefully at least bring us up to a more modern view of the importation world.

[Moppie]

Originally Posted by Chris V

Interestingly enough, our current importation laws were enacted when Mercedes decided they didn't like competing in the US against their own grey market imports. We COULD bring in anything, so long as it was converted to meet our DOT and EPA regs. After Mercedes whined in the '80s, the US government outright banned any importation with VERY few exceptions, moving the exception date back 25 years so that the new car manufacturers didn't have to compete against other recent cars (including their own). It was BS lobbying that did it to us, and this petition would hopefully at least bring us up to a more modern view of the importation world.

Ahhhh, it was during the 80s that used Japanese cars began to become available on the international market.