Moderators: IMOC Moderators, IMOC Committee Members
There will always be some risk with buying a car from photos and a serious risk of losing the car at sea. In 2003 a ship sank with 11 of my cars on it.Where would you have stood if the ship sank? 
so sorry to hear that, @ JDI, ....jrleech wrote:Julian has replied to my
He's also written a
I shall hold my breath.
... their view appears to be you either spend a lot more money and buy a dealer/stock car and get a guaranteed good car, or you buy a 'cheap' car (in their words) from auction and take your chances..... I thought that's what they went to the auction for, to inspect the car 
.. I've never like the idea of purchasing a car without seeing it. Doesn't matter whether its Julian or Miguel at Newera, i just can't do it. Although, i did once pay Miguel a thousand pound to start looking for a Rev 3 / FD3S RX7 for me, but then eventually found my current Rev 3 Tubby. Miguel immeadiately refunded me the thousand pound...and they have recommended you a poor car. I know things don't work like this, but it should be JDI refunding you and then JDI recouping off Daie. It might be worth getting an independent SVA test aswell...being a drift car...you know the rest!..£6500 should be able to get you an absolute MINTER of a Rev 3. There were a couple of Rev 3/4 Turbo TBars going in the For Sale section right here on IMOC!!!"Boxster S" ... lovely cars! 
so they should be shot for being poor at their job really[/quote]... their view appears to be you either spend a lot more money and buy a dealer/stock car and get a guaranteed good car, or you buy a 'cheap' car (in their words) from auction and take your chances..... I thought that's what they went to the auction for, to inspect the car [/quote], had their own mehcanics present at the auctions, where they inspected the car and took ten extra photos before they advised me to bid, I'd happily (well, maybe not happily) paid an extra £2-£3k if I got a proper original mint car, with 1 careful owner, and a full service history....£7,300 for a standard 1996 Rev 3 Turbo. 'Completely standard engine - unmodified performance'& air-flow meter & intake plumbing. Ill-fitting incorrect electric-aerial, the high-level brake light and rear window heater wiring had also been completely removed.(blindingly obvious now though!) I didn't become aware of the ECU/AFM issue until 5 months later. It was when I bought a Rev 3 Apexi induction kit and it didn't fit that the alarmbells rang. When I collected the car in the first place Julian briefly showed me the engine - he pointed to the dump-valve and told me it vents to atmosphere because the hose had been removed by the previous owner probably just for the sound and it doesn't make any difference. I found out that it was actually impossible for the dump-valve to be plumbed in as all of the intakes into the Revision 2 pipework were already in use! Hmmmmm, and surely someone with Julian's knowledge of MR2s should have spotted that this car shouldn't have had an airflow meter!?(as soon as I discovered the problems) he said too much time had passed (5 months) since I bought it so he wouldn't do anything about it and when I argued my case with him he started effing and blinding and he hung up on me! He washed his hands of it completely, seemingly not bothered about his customer's dissatisfaction or the fact that his cars were seemingly not being inspected properly.'As Advertised' - Rather than the hassle of legal procedures though, I decided I just wanted to get it fixed. So I sourced the correct parts and had the car put back to proper Rev 3 spec at my own considerable expense. One of my first modifications was to get rid of those JDI reg plates!*actual* experiences, I will remove 'I've heard X or Y' stories, or general comments on ANY company and their reputation. So please keep it along these lines guys.- and tbh Jon £6.5K for a mint rev3 is too cheap. I am paying way over that for my (admittedly rare yellow GT) grade 4 car with 28K miles. I went with NVI as I have decided not to import cars any more - they are never quite what you expect (the odd thing you don't see on photos and jap tyres coming to mind) and it costs more in the end than buying something you can see in the UK. [edit - also went with NVI because they had exactly the car I've wanted for a couple of years it has to be said!][edited by admin - please no pitchfork waving guys]
Andy F wrote:Ohh mate, gutted for you!!
(though only time will tell as there's no way to judge an engine/head gasket etc....).... really not looking forward to 40 hours on the concrete in this weather though.... 
- to pay the extra for piece of mind that i'd get a really fine example as this company had a good reputation with fellow IMOCers.'mechanically sound', the interior was also in good condition.(which was way above the going rate for similar examples advertised through IMOC) for an MR2 'specialist' company to get a good example of a standard Rev 3 Turbo and I got some kind of Rev 3 / Rev 2 hybrid engine-wise, i'd say that that plainly wasn't good enough. That should've been spotted and rectified before it was handed over to me, before it left Japan even.(Mine had the old Rev1/2 vent to atmosphere dump-valve hesitation symptom as well as inconsistent boosting - not to mention the fact that if left as was I wouldn't have been able to modify my car in the same way as other Rev 3 owners - £7,300 I paid for mine, then a lot more to get it put back to proper Rev 3 spec )quigonjay wrote:does anyone know julian who can point him to this thread?
- he usually is *waves at Julian* I'd searched the UK for a mint Rev 3 turbo and couldn't find anything that was good enough so I decided to go to an import company (not the same one mentioned here) and explain what I wanted. I spent an hour on the phone to them emphasising that I only wanted a truely mint, immaculate, pristine car, nothing else would do and that I'd pay whatever it took to get such a car. A few weeks went by and they phoned me up as they'd found exactly what I wanted. I paid a deposit of £1000 and waited..................... and I was able to go pick it up. There were 3 different shades of paint on it, a fist sized dent in the rear quarter, cigarette burns in the seats, overspray on the tyres from the badly refurbed alloys etc. If it was a dog then I'd have had it put down. It took me a further 5 months to eventually find my current car (yeah, ok I'm a fussy git!)