Here’s my Elgrand buying experience in case it helps anyone else in the buying process.
After deciding that I really wanted an Elgrand, I found a dealer quite near to me. I had already decided I didn’t want to spend time and expense trawling up and down the country looking for my new car, so some internet research led me to the more local options.
Being a novice in the import vehicle field I also decided that I was willing to pay a bit more for someone else to deal with procedures involved in bringing a car in from Japan rather than trying to do it myself. I could also be sure to see the vehicle before making my purchase.
I found a likely candidate at my nearest dealer who were advertising it as low mileage and top quality on their website and ebay. The vehicle in question had not yet landed from Japan, it was a silver Rider model but sounded from the description that it would be just what I wanted.
I visited the dealer and left a deposit on the strength of their pictures, advertisement and description. Then, whist awaiting its arrival I thought it might be a good idea to do some further research online and signed up to this club to seek advice and information about my impending purchase. Good move.
After much reading and advice from those more experienced in Elgrandery, I discovered the many ways of checking how closely the dealers spiel matched reality. As it happens I saved myself a wait for a vehicle that wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. It turns out that the dealer in question are importing low grade auction vehicles then tarting them up on arrival. Happily, they refunded my deposit without quibble when I approached them with the discrepancies I had found.
Here’s what I checked using the vehicles chassis number.
Firstly, they claimed the the vehicle had Jevic mileage certification. I checked the chassis number on the Jevic website
https://www.jevic.co.uk/index.html but it returned no results. Warning bells started to ring.
I next paid for a CarVX report at
https://carvx.jp/ costing £25 plus £3.50 for the translation of the Japanese auction sheet. The report showed that this vehicle was a low R grade auction rating, had been repaired following accident damage and had a replacement door panel which was an incorrect shade of silver. It was rusty underneath, dirty, smelly and marked inside and full of pet hair, and had numerous dings to the bodywork amongst other horrors.
On the plus side, the recall history was complete which can be checked here http://www.Nissan.co.jp/RECALL/search.html and this shows that important recall work has been carried out, most importantly correction to the over fuelling problem which adds to the premature disintegration of the catalytic converters, and also the dodgy fuel gauge issue. But even so, this seemed to be a poorly maintained vehicle and certainly best avoided I thought, and I note it was subsequently removed from sale by the dealer.
Finally, I also checked https://Nissan.epc-data.com/Elgrand/ which shows up some basic info on specification, including factory options, but doesn’t show any spec for vehicles which finished production at Autech such as Rider models, as they all leave Nissan as basic VG models before receiving the Autech upgrades. For any further information, Nissan are quite helpful and can be emailed at
postoffice@Nissan.co.jp.
Further searches found two more likely vehicles. The first I checked was a white Rider but it had not had the over fuelling recall carried out and although it showed a full Japanese service history it didn’t have Jevic mileage certification either, so I passed. It had also been pimped somewhat in Japan and I was looking for something that had not been too interfered with.
Third time lucky I found a gem from an ebay trader and Japanese import specialist in Kent. A low mileage 4x4 twin sun roof white Rider with verified Jevic mileage certificate, full service history and 4.5 auction grade shown on the CarVX report with no issues reported on the auction sheet. All recalls have been carried out and on inspection I found it had been very well looked after by its Japanese owner, modifications being to the side and mirror repeater indicators, a remapped ECU and a throttle control unit.
It is quite hard to believe that this is a 15 year old vehicle, with only 44k miles it looks only two or three years old and is in super condition. As you can tell I am delighted, as without this splendid club I could well have ended up with a lemon.
Just as an addendum, when you have acquired your piece of masterful engineering you
MUST have the secondary catalytic converters de-cored or fit bypass pipes or your lovely new Elgrand
WILL die prematurely. It's also a very good idea to have them undersealed as JDM vehicles are bare underneath, so factor the cost of these things into the cost of the purchase or risk an unnecessarily short ownership or huge expense down the line.
It's also worth checking the age of the tyres as many ship over with the original factory fitted tyres due to the much lower annual mileage that the Japanese do. So even though they have tread enough to pass the MOT they will have degraded and there have been numerous reports of blowouts due to disintegration.
I've added a PDF of this and more for download below.
Edit: Nissan Japan have now taken the decision not to offer support for JDM vehicles outside of Japan, so if you email them you will receive a stock answer telling you this.
