Man....you guys are getting ripped off....
not only the public here buying motors and clips, but even the dealers selling them....
Holey cow I wish I knew about this market years ago....
I really hate to put a bomb in everyones hands...but I guess I will.
I worked in Japan for many years, one of my jobs that I had was working at a car recycling shop. I would show up to work, and start hitting perfectly good engines with sledgehammers and impact wrenches. My job was to get a car engine, and take it apart and sort it into 3 piles....STEEL... ALUM...and Rubber...and that was it.
We had 10 cars come in a day, and one guy would do nothing but rip the gas tank off, and another guy would do nothing but yank engines out of the cars, and then pass them on to me to destroy. And the cars that were worth anything would go into the parking lot and be auctioned off for little to no money.
Now, what does this have to do with the people getting ripped off...nothing...
Cars are thrown away over there...in Japan...for two reasons...it won't pass inspections, or the owner bought a new car.
Car's that don't pass inspection: Are cars that have been driven at insanely slow speeds for many years, and the O2 sensor was never replaced....if it throws a code...then the car get's junked. Or they were in a fender-bender...and the car is now ugly....not to many body shops in Japan...and the cost to repare is normaly more money than the insurance companies want to pay. So the car gets junked, and that junk yard is very simular to my junk yard that I worked at.
Car's are also junked because after the owner has had it a while, and he see's a new modle or a better car that he want's....welll good by old car...and it's scrapped.
hence...it goes to my junk yard, and if it was a popular car, then it would go to auction, if not, then it mad about 90 lbs of alum 2000 lbs of steel, and the rubber is just trash.
Sadly...Junk yard owners have seen the foreign markets as their newly found source of the next Saki bottle....so different countries wants these exotic car parts, and they spark of a fireworks show with a lot of money in their pockets. And now to find an RB26DETT in the states is worth thousands of dollars, when I was just pounding them into a ball of metal many years ago to make a paycheck.
Who's getting scammed? Well, everyone is. To the owner of the JDM junkyards, the car is worth only $100 to him....to the engine exporters, the engine alone is worth $1200,...to the end customers(us)......the price will go up to $5000.... and why?
DEMAND....
there is a surplus and demand system...but in Japan...the Surplus is huge, but the demand for the engines over here is normal. Importers makes the surplus numbers super small, so that the demand has to pay more....and they make more money.
And do I have the authority to say that...yes. I do.
I was working at that JDM Junk Yard, and I asked the owner if I could by a sterio from one of the cars I saw come thru...he said $100 and it's mine. I saw a set of rims....he said $100, ...then I started to see his pattern....I got brave one day, and asked him about this one engine.....yup...$100. Then I asked him about the car...any car...I saw a Skyline come thru with rear end damage...yup...$100....The I asked about a Skyline that had a blown engine....$100....
SOooooo...I sat down and talked to the owner for a while....I met a guy at a bar that wanted van's...and engines....So I jumped on this oppertunity to see what would happen. I introduced him to my boss, and they went at it. The guy had 12 huge vans, sourced out from other junkyards in my bosses connections, and 60 engines. I didn't pocket any money, because I was just helping out a freind. But his total tab for the transaction was only in the $10,000 range.
The containers to Kenya was in the area $20,000.......but the company that he worked for would strip the vans and make them into mini-buses for the mass transit system that they had, and he sold them for ooogles of money...in the $300,000 range.
So YES...Importers are a bad group of greedy basterds.
Granted, the troubles that they go thru to load up the containers, ship them, and to get them thru customs and across international borders....they do need to make money and a profit....thats understandable for any bussiness....but when the importer says that they spend $1200 for 1 engine...they are blowing smoke up your ass or they are dealing with a greedy junk yard. Engines, cars, parts.....removed from normal, easy to deal with junkyards are cheap, and the parts are in the same condition.
If I knew what I know now, about 7 years ago...I'd be the richest importer around.
. Guys, these engines are ready to go if you want one we use