BRINGING A CAR FROM THE US TO THE UK

What sort of modifications are required? As far as I was aware, the vehicle would operate AS IS in the UK without any problems. Is this not correct?

Ignore that last question of mine. I found a great website which documents THOROUGHLY the processes required to import a car into the UK from the US.

http://www.import-car.info

What sort of modifications are required?

One of the general points of contention can be lights, but it depends where you get the MoT inspection carried out.  Some inspectors can be more flexible than others.  See my comments on the subject here:

http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=33848.0

Vehicles less than 10 years old now have to undergo a one-time Single-Vehicle Approval inspection as well if they don't have an existing European type approval.  Being interested in older vehicles I have no direct experience of that one I'm afraid.

Hi Paul Thompson !

As Paul 1966 has said, the main thing thought of to make the car UK road legal is lamps, but there are other aspects as well. As you've found an online resource, I'll leave you to read and digest that.

One thing you probably won't find mentioned too much is the ongoing maintenence of the vehicle.

There are 'tricks' to this.

As some on this board know, my bro and I have a 2003 F150 Harley Davidson truck here and went through all the 'bring a US car to the UK' thing a couple years ago. At the time I wanted or suggested we get that even quicker Dodge SRT 10 truck thingy with the 8 Litre Viper V10 engine over. All great in the 'yeh lets do it stakes' but sensibility kicked in for mainetence time. It'd probably cost an arm and a leg to get parts shipped over as no one would stock them in the UK of if anyone did stock them here they'd be at an increased premium again. Then finding someone reliable to service the vehicle would be hard, I know Viper's are in the UK and I'd then have to take it to those places and it'd cost an increased premium to look after it.

The Ford whilst in a similar position to the above is more widely known of here, plus the F150 is officially available here - result, Brake pads, in stock and £50 quid, full service £275 etc etc and so far local Ford Dealers are able to do the work.

You have a Honda, and whilst Japanese marques have slightly warmed up to imported cars, they still dont really like them. Parts for Jappy cars in UK spec are 'generally' quite expensive anyway so they do cost a bomb for imported cars. Some places will say yeh we'll service it work on it under warranty others will simply laugh and say go elsewhere mate.

Things may have changed but a couple of mates who bought 'interesting' jappy cars from japan sold them on quite quickly once it came to maintenence time and this was around 4-6 years ago. Hopefully things will have improved but I'm not optomistic !

Unless of course you are mr money bags and money is really no object for stuff like this, for which case bring it over, get the SVA work done and I'll see you at the lights some time!

Cheers!
DtM! West London & Slough UK!

From what I have researched, since I still have a loan on the car, it looks VERY improbable that American Honda Finance is going to allow the car to be taken out of state.

Btw, one little thing I did find out of interest. If I was in the military, apparently I could bring it over without having to get permission from the finance company as military orders would override that.

How amusing.

So anyhow, looks like I am back to the same standard answer most people end up at here - no bring, sell, buy a car over here (in the UK)....

The Ford whilst in a similar position to the above is more widely known of here, plus the F150 is officially available here - result, Brake pads, in stock and £50 quid,

I've just fitted new brakes all round on my 1987 Bronco II -- Front pads £29, rear shoes £35.  Oil & air filters are about £7 to £8.   All genuine made-in-U.S.A. parts, not Chinese knock-offs.

Hi Paul Thompson,

Yeh, as i've said in other posts, USA cars that usually make it over here are the 'interesting' models - of which a honda odyssey isn't I'm afraid! - there are normal 'bread and butter' USA cars here of course, but they are a much smaller proportion of the american car numbers here.

Sounds like yer best bet is to sell up over there and buy something over here - quite possibly something american again !

Cheers!

DtM! West London & Slough UK!

I've just fitted new brakes all round on my 1987 Bronco II -- Front pads £29, rear shoes £35.  Oil & air filters are about £7 to £8.   All genuine made-in-U.S.A. parts, not Chinese knock-offs.

Paul 1966 ! - You'd be rather astounded by the 'quality' of some Chinese goods! - although still unfortunatley well known for 'cheap knock offs' - I can tell you the tide is definitley turning on that!

insider tip - we import from china, and currently me partner and bro visit the largest trade fairs in the world out there 2 times a year. Many many many of the 'bottom end' quick make a doller or two manufacturers have gone out of business there becuase they can't produce goods even at insanely low prices when the 'bigger' manfacturers make much higher quality goods for not much more than they could produce! - result = higher and increasingly higher quality of goods made there at fantastic pricing which the USA (biggest market remember!) loves, which means lower in the order countries like us in the UK and Europe etc get better deals too!
We only deal with the top 10 and we aim for, the top 5 only manufacturers in our market - couple years ago it was top 15 or 20 we'd talk to. With new 'deals' (cant say exactly what they are!!)  the most prestigious western brands are using the EXACT same products made in china on their goods ( which is well known to happen) on new brands at cheaper pricing - basically it's happening more and more now.

so that 'made in the USA' feeling of buying a 'superior' product (made in UK for that matter!) is actually getting more eroded as China 'matures'...

what will happen in the long term..   interesting to see, if china continue to increase quality and pricing stays good, then they certainly have a very very bright future..

Cheers DtM! West London UK!