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[sips]

^ ^ It's not that importing a JDM car into the US is costly or difficult. It is impossible to import an entire car legally. The only avenues available are 'non-legal' ones.

The easiest and cheapest way is to have a US titled Celica the same color as a GT4 in canada. Drive the Celica across to canada, swap the VIN plates onto the GT-4, send the celica to the scrapmetal yard and drive your GT4 home. Don't forget to pray on your way across the border.

[CastrolCelica]

^ ^ It's not that importing a JDM car into the US is costly or difficult. It is impossible to import an entire car legally. The only avenues available are 'non-legal' ones.

The easiest and cheapest way is to have a US titled Celica the same color as a GT4 in canada. Drive the Celica across to canada, swap the VIN plates onto the GT-4, send the celica to the scrapmetal yard and drive your GT4 home. Don't forget to pray on your way across the border.

I thought '94s were legal though to have here.

[nics]

i dont trust canadian XD lol j/k i feel confortable it coming from japan

correct me if im wrong but i do believe all celicas are assembled in japan.

uhhmm, how long will it take you to save $12k?

the gt4's in canada are coming from japan (or if not directly from japan , would be from japan orginally), or did you mean coming straight from japan?


as long as the chassis number starts of E-ST20...etc then its japanese




or you could move to NZ

what i meant is i believe that all the celicas in our planet came/made/maufactured in japan and nowhere else

[yarik83]

Let me shed some light on this.

Since I spent 6 months in 2009 seriously researching and considering a gt4 importation....

I am an advocate for taking matter into your own hands and doing all the things NECESSARY to get your goals accomplished.

Cheapest option right now is buying a gt4 from canada for around 9000. At that time you have 1 major problem. How do you bring it over the border? Trailer vs vin swap vs other options.

Allegedly you can put gt4 on a trailer and drive it straight over the border here. You basically have a 50/50 chance of being told that you are not allowed to bring it over. You also have a 50 percent chance of driving this baby right under their nose and customs not really paying much attention to the car. You can also drive a same color hatchback celica to canada do a vin swap and obviously licence plates, rip the gt4 tags off just in case and again take a 50/50 chance.

Lets say that somehow you can get the car over the border (which you potentially can) .... there is 0 chance for this car to be legal in the statess until 2029. So right now you can say good bye to staying legal. While most people highly discourage aspiring gt4 owners from doing that... this is your only option.

Insurance/vins/registration/etc.

99.9% of cops in usa would not be able to tell a difference between a gt4 and a regular hatchback celica. Like others pointed out your RHD car will be sticking out like a green hat in an orange field. Trust me... if you are driving by a cop who is having a really bad day.. he will eat your heart out and invite other cops for lunch. At that point you can kiss your car goodbye. And no there is no law out there that protects your illegal private property from being sent to a crusher.

You inquired about RHD to LHD conversion. While that can be done... trust me for amount of hassle you will be spending just as much money on that as you would on the car itself and meanwhile jeopardize structural stability. Also while there are shops in usa that would even consider helping you out.. they often have to report to legal agencies and document changes so unless you want to do it yourself, using a shop can only accelerate someone tracking you down.

Before I lose you let me recap. Right this very second you can buy a gt4 from canada for around 9 grand. You can (although taking risk) get it over the border bypassing the law and while you do have an option to convert it to LHD it will be very expensive and hard to do.

To drive the car here you have 2 choices. Drive it completely illegally ideally not drawing too much attention to yourself or buy a mule hatchback celica of the same color and swap vins and tags, remove badging from gt4 and appreciate the car for what it is.

Now with that said let me explain why I chose to buy an evo (which I will hopefully the sooner the better) vs proceeding with a gt4 purchase.
#1 car is 15 years old. It may have 50,000 miles on it but you are buying a cat in a bag that has been driven somewhere in japan then traveled to canada then for whatever reason is being sold (likely because some parts of canada outlawed gt4). This is not a 1972 GTO that has been garaged for 30 years. You are taking a huge gamble buying an old car.
#2 Other members will not appreciate your purchase as much as you will. While being legal is morally and socially acceptable... deviating from the norm often invokes feelings of resentment.
#3 You will be spending 10 grand on a 15 year old car that only you can recognize for what it is. While most people can probably recognize a ferrari if they saw one, regardless of the model... you will not be getting a pat on the back as you drive around.

Others have offered an evo or sti... that would be a wise choice.. one that is hard to make but its a logical choice. They are legal, later models are even better than a gt4 and they are available here in the states and very much legal.

[pittfirefighter]

i didn't read all of the last post but it is possible to get a real GT4 in america legally... there was one for sale on here just a little bit ago in ohio for 25k.... its not IMPOSSIBLE so don't say that

[yarik83]

Definition of what a kit car is has been redefined by NHDOT. Kit cars that do not feet their expected profile can be impounded if they do not meet the regulations. More importantly ST205 model is not on approved importation list so "legal" is actually illegal.

Also... do you remember companies like evolution imports who were allegedly importing gt-4's into usa? Well they got busted because what they were doing was illegal (kit cars that did not fit regulations).

There are only three legal ways to drive a gt4 here in the states. One is when you are on vacation from Canada and obtain proper paperwork and bring the car back with you and 2 is if you have official racing license and car was built as a race only car (and not a road car made into a race car). In the latter you have a limited amount of miles that you can drive and even more limited amount of time after which you have to ship the car back to where it came from. Also you can import a show car but there are so many restrictions and regulations that you will actually have to provide evidence of attending events and car has to be of historical or innovation importance.

All required info could be found here.

http://204.68.195.151/cars/rules/import/

[sips]

I thought '94s were legal though to have here.

No. In Canada they are legal if 15 years old. In the USA they are legal after 25 years old.

i didn't read all of the last post but it is possible to get a real GT4 in america legally... there was one for sale on here just a little bit ago in ohio for 25k.... its not IMPOSSIBLE so don't say that

No. It is not federally legal. In order to do so, they need to have crash test data, and Toyota will not supply that. So they need some cars to crash; you willing to import enough cars for that (I hear numbers between 6-15 are needed)?

This is what Motrex went through when they legalized the R33's. It cost them a ton of money.

This post has been edited by sips: Jan 7, 2010 - 6:20 PM

[Rusty]

what i meant is i believe that all the celicas in our planet came/made/maufactured in japan and nowhere else

yes only if they start with an E, otherwise they are not

[1994Celica]

I want a gt4 so bad to but my plan is to find a junker 6gc and find a way to make on myself. I know it will be costly and hard to but I'm going to find a way to make it haappen.

I want a gt4 so bad to but my plan is to find a junker 6gc and find a way to make it myself. I know it will be costly and hard to but I'm going to find a way to make it haappen.

[nics]

what i meant is i believe that all the celicas in our planet came/made/maufactured in japan and nowhere else

yes only if they start with an E, otherwise they are not

huh

[Mstoochn]

lol ur pricing blows.... Oh btw...

http://jdmtunersinc.com/galleries1.html

GT-4 wrc 7600

[richee3]

what i meant is i believe that all the celicas in our planet came/made/maufactured in japan and nowhere else

yes only if they start with an E, otherwise they are not

huh

The chassis number. ST20x. If it starts with E, the car was assembled in Japan. (ex. e-ST205.)

[nics]

what i meant is i believe that all the celicas in our planet came/made/maufactured in japan and nowhere else

yes only if they start with an E, otherwise they are not

huh

The chassis number. ST20x. If it starts with E, the car was assembled in Japan. (ex. e-ST205.)

oh that one, i think i saw it somewhere in the firewall

[yarik83]

This is why there is hope out there:

http://forums.evolutionm.net/evo-x-show-sh...pportunity.html

I dont know if this guy is a member here but yes ladies and gentlemen he is here in the states

[richee3]

^^ Very surprising that those Evo guys respect the GT4 so much.

[nics]

^^ Very surprising that those Evo guys respect the GT4 so much.

except for one douche there.

[1994Celica]

screw the sti and the evo. if there is a will there is a way. if you want it bad enough you will get one. look at pipes. he has a "gt4" in america. there's a real one in philly too. DO YOUR RESEARCH!

Pipes had to make his own he took his celica and made his own gt-4 as you notice its lhd and 2 diffrent colors so thats the only legal way to get a "real" gt-4 here its techinaly not real but it still is

[Ruroniarc]

Now may I ask, how did the guy from Utah get a GT4? Did anyone ask him?

[yarik83]

You dont have to ask.

He either paid a broker to import it to canada or bought it from a person in canada.

He then snuck it through the us-canada border and or drove it straight through customs probably swapping some vins prior to the crossing.

[Toyota_Celica_97]

let us know how your import turn out cheers.