About to buy a Jimny in Japan...

Good Morning.Afternoon.Evening all,

My wife and I are about to purchase a Jimny in Japan to roll about in for a couple of months in the snow where we are working, and then are planning on shipping it home via RORO ship. We have sourced a person who can organise the shipping side of things for us, the next step is settling on a vehicle!!

We viewed about 9 today in various places nearby and will view 3 more this week, all aged between 86-94, either the 550/660 turbo intercooled engine and a mix of raised, re-sprayed and overpriced! All are less than 100k and in general are rust free compared to UK cars. They have the odd bits of scab on the wheel arches, and the main concern that I have raised is on the body mounting points in the front of the rear arches, the battery tray and the body mounts just behind the front struts.

I know a little bit about cars but am a mere tinkerer at this stage as I've been travelling for ten years and never stayed put that long! The aim is to keep this one for a long time, and keep it with us in the french alps as our town wagon, i have a diesel passat estate to do the long boring toll roads.

My questions to those in the room would be the ease of sourcing the body parts that need replacing, the edges of the arches seem easy to source through googling, however the cab sections looks like a bar steward of a piece and i haven't had as much luck finding any info yet!!!

the link following is best opened in google chrome with the translate add on, its our favourite so far we have seen in the flesh

www.goo-net.com/usedcar/spread/goo/14/70...063530181212001.html

price on the road with 6 months of the japanese mot is £2400 roughly. bonnest/3 doors are perfect, the arches are a touch scabby, and some rust is showing where the cab mounts to the chassis. its got a decent interior, power steering hi/lo diff locks all worked well. it would just need wax oyling and the bits of welding done to get an mot i expect.

alternatively we spend a bit more and the following 3 look great but are too far for us to view at the moment..

green one is

www.goo-net.com/usedcar/spread/goo/14/70...080230181125001.html

white one is

www.goo-net.com/usedcar/spread/goo/13/70...109630180214005.html

and the last one is black

www.goo-net.com/usedcar/spread/goo/13/70...061030181226003.html

these are a fair bit more money but do look sorted rust wise and general condition!

any advice, tips, put downs and reality checks are greatly appreciated.

many thanks.

Errrr don't know enough about the jdm sj to offer any meaningful support sorry. I'm sure others will be able to assist.

same chassis/body, just smaller engines to duck the emissions/tax laws. the brand new 2018 jimny sports a 660cc engine too!

I have owned many SJ's of various models. Probably nine or ten..
When it comes to rust, check door sills underside/inside. Front floor both over and under side. Aft edge of the floor, and of course as you mention wheel arches. I had one SJ I should have kept but the rust in the beam across the floor and around the bodymounts in front of rear wheel and seat belt bottom of B-pillar was too severe to fix for me.
When I bought a new project few years back to fix up and keep, i used an Endoscope and a PC to check for rust inside the floor cross beam and inside the sills as this area is the most time consuming place to fix the rust..

Other stuff is driveshaft play and front axle kingpin slack but these are not expensive fixes. 5-speed Gearbox whine is a turn off maybe. 4 speed boxes are better and usually stays good. transfer seldom acts up..

Frame seldom rust, at least not here in norway. My 1987 frame has no rust at all.

The Japanese 600/660/800cc engines i have no experience with.

Keep an eye out for any changes to the chassis that might be OK in Japan but not OK in your own country. Here in Norway nothing is allowed without approved documentation. and if the car is over 30 years you sometime have to keep it original to get it imported as a historic vehicle, otherwise higher import tax. This varies between countries of course.

do not hesitate to ask more. did not have time to look at your links today, but will do later.
Good luck hunting

Oh and front windshield frame on the cab. the underside is often rotten due to bad drainage of condensation.
Also around the windshield wiper on both highroof/tintop and cab, check for cracks as there is a weak brace there on early models. and if you do not lube the wiper axle the strain is too big and the sheet metal cracks..

great info thanks kindly. The one we liked was original paint and had been stored inside as there was not even sun fade and had no rust other than the creeping in at the body mounts. the wind screen wiper is a great tip, i'll shall make sure to look at that.

the body mounts and riggers are my biggest concern at the moment, i have had sills done before on vw's as its relatively easy to obtain pattern panels and not so stressful. on this though, its the cab mount sections that scares me. i am starting to think maybe better to drop a bit more cash here to get a good one in these areas and suffer the extra duty/vat to be paid on import.