[Mason]

Hey,

This has been troubling me for a bit. When i bought my car it showed 71k on the clock. The speedo has been playing up and sometimes displays MPH and other times KPH. I think the converter is lose. this isn't my main worry.

How would i check that the mileage had been converted and it is actually 71k miles and not 71k kilometers which would actually be 44k miles.

It has a BIMTA certificate.

Has anyone else had the same worries or is it just me??

Any ideas would be great.

 

[NiteskyR]

i doulbt the clock has been wound back , so it would probably be 71km (44k miles)

 

[Mason]

Any ideas on who I should contact to check it??

 

[NiteskyR]

dvla

 

[pete-flint]

No service history to fall back on ?

 

[Mason]

Its all in Japanese. but from what i can make out the last entry into the book was at 39k Kilometers.

When they are imported, who does the testing and checks? is it BIMTA? and do they keep records. Ill contact the DVLA tommorrow but i doubt they will know. Worth a try though.

 

[jamiemoles]

I was under the impression that when the speedo was converted to MPH the Odometer was converted to count up in miles but the actual readout was unchanged. So for example my car reads 72000(ish) but the initial MOT certificate reads 43000kms. If I minus 43k from 72k I am left with 29000 *miles* done and 43000 *kilometers* which can be converted to miles by dividing by 1.6.

(72000-43000)+(43000/1.6) = 29000+26875=*55875 real miles*

I think.



J.

PS. Kilometers? Isn't that french?

 

[NiteskyR]

when the car is registered , the dvla , get the jap dereg, this has the km that the car had when it left japan.

 

[NiteskyR]

jamie , ure exacly right

 

[Mason]

ah ha...so the clock shouldn't have been wound back at all?

 

[NiteskyR]

nope

 

[Mason]

Thx guys. Will call DVLA tomorrow to confirm.

 

[grebo]

Mason, I've been looking for a skyline for last couple of months and have looked through the paperwork of 30 or so.

Some of them definitely were wound back to the equivalent miles, though most were left alone after the conversion. Also all of the ones that were wound back had been in the country for some time.

Best way to tell is probably just to see when the car came over and look at the old MOT's. Sometimes whoever does the conversion sticks a sticker on the dash to say what was done and when or signs a certificate to the same effect.

 

[NiteskyR]

think that about covers that .

 

[gtirpad]

Just as a note, mine has a similar problem whereby the speedo fluctuates between reading MPH & KPH (or some other silly reading, eg 80 at 30mph!!). I am convinced that the mileometer is constantly reading in MPH since it has been converted though, as I have measured some known distances when it is playing up, so you shouldnt need to worry about the reading being wrong from here onwards....

Pad

 

[skylines'r'us]

Original Jap D-Reg documents do not have the mileage of a car on them at all and never have done.
Probrably the most accurate way apart from any service history is to see the original auction sheet, as these are pretty acurate and if there is either no service/ mileage history ther will be a question mark next to the Km mileage reading on the sheet.

As far as DVLA go, the only mileage details they will keep will be the mileage that was written on the V5 application by the UK importer, which could be dubious in some cases as they have no way in checking this out and rely on the importer being straight.

Service history is the only real way of getting a 95% idea of the actual mileage of any car, and as 99.9% of all cars at auction in Japan have service history when sold, it should come with the car unless someone is playing around with odometers and convieniently loses the history.

Most D-Reg documents from any reputable company also come with an English translation from Tokyo Land transport Bureau and with the previous owners details on this you have a good chance of finding them on the Net to verify details.

When buying any car if it does not have all the right docs, Don't buy it!