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The mkiv Supra Owners Club

Your TT purchase story!


Conrad
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I had a really bad/expensive experience with a GT4 I bought in the past where by I took a chance on buying it with a boost problem (thinking I knew the cause) only to find NOBODY on the planet knew the cause including Mr T.

 

It cost me over a grand trying to fix it and after I gave up lost even more when I sold it! This in turn has scared me off complicated Jap turbos. I'm swaying towards a manual Aerotop N/A. Mainly to have a little more re-assurance there's less to go wrong. I only wanted to sepnd 7k - 8k on a TT (not bothered if Auto) and even though there's loads about I'd be worried I was buying a dog - I'm not what you'd call a competent mechanic

 

Anyone on here bought a cheap TT? Did you get what you paid for? Or even worse, anyone pay good money and still get done?

 

What I'd like to hear is somebody bought a black 6 speed TT from Keighley Trade Centre for £6000 and it's been superb ever since! ;)

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To be honest mate, noone is goin to post adulation of Keighley trade centre!

 

its an ages old case of you get what you pay for. the cheaper cars are (generally) cheaper for good reason.

 

i think the most sensible message i have seen on this forum is 'if you are looking for a cheap car, then the MKiv supra isnt for you'

 

its an expensive car, with quite high running costs.

 

drive a few, take a local forum member with you, and maybe get an inspection done, i think i would be correct in saying that generally the 2jz gte is a strong engine.

 

7 - 8k on a TT is a little low. maybe a little more money would help find a decent car. how about speaking to Jurgen to look for a fresh personal import? the NA aerotops are nice, but if your heart is set on a TT, would you be wishing you had waited?

 

Rob

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I have done a search on Keighley so know their reputation. It's just when you see soooo many TT supes under the 8k you know you can have one. There's 7 TT's within 60 miles from me in this weeks Trader under 8k (even a manual). Anything above 8k is kinda out of budget.

 

Surely all of these motors aren't dogs? That's why I was wondering if anyone had paid that kind of money and did Ok.

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Here is my story:

 

As Im from germany I wasnt able to come and just look at some cars. So I had to trust the seller or get it checked by a third person. Saw a car advertised here on the forum which seems to be a bargain and was totally standard. So exactly what I needed to get it registered over here.

 

Got in contact with the buyer and like he told me everything was ok. Somebody from the board went over there and took the car for a spin and said it was ok too. So yeah just a week later a mate is over there with the money and fetches the car for me.

 

Some hours later I get a call from my friend still in the uk: The wipers are totally shot and it rains like hell but he will try to drive to the ferry. Ok so far so good. Some hours later I get a call again from my mate. Now in france he tells me that the car is shaking like crazy when he brakes and it seems like the front brakes are totally killed.

 

Ok many hours later he arrives here and I start to check out the car:

- pads all around totally shot

- discs on the front are shot too

- old japanes tires on the car (dont you need uk legal tires in the uk too?)

- Front lip + bumper is damaged

- left door was repainted but throws little bubbles all over it (like 300-400 bubbles!)

 

So a big chunk of many later (discs and pads all around, tires and all these stuff) I know have car that I can drive and get registered.

 

My conclusion:

- dont trust anyone you dont know

- safe up and buy a good car in the end it will be the same price as a dog

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What? A mug like me you mean? :tongue:

 

Lmao :rolleyes: Dont discredit yourself mate, you're a modern day arfur daley if there ever was one :)

 

Shockingly someone in the trade has told me that if it werent for the UK,US and Australian import industry for supes, then supes would be effectively worthless in Japan going for no more than 1k in auctions as there isnt much demand for such a mega performance and mega petrol drinking car in japan anymore?? I dont know how true this is, but I certainly cant see a Supe getting used much in a traffic density zone such as Tokyo etc

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Your probably not far out there. The current race and tuning scene in Japan seems to concentrate on the Skyline.

 

I talk to the biggest trade importer of Jap cars for the UK and he tells me that he is getting asked for more and more N/A's as the traders can sell them all day long but to find a decent amount of good qulaity TT's is getting harder all the time.

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I had a really bad/expensive experience with a GT4 I bought in the past where by I took a chance on buying it with a boost problem (thinking I knew the cause) only to find NOBODY on the planet knew the cause including Mr T.

 

It cost me over a grand trying to fix it and after I gave up lost even more when I sold it! This in turn has scared me off complicated Jap turbos. I'm swaying towards a manual Aerotop N/A. Mainly to have a little more re-assurance there's less to go wrong. I only wanted to sepnd 7k - 8k on a TT (not bothered if Auto) and even though there's loads about I'd be worried I was buying a dog - I'm not what you'd call a competent mechanic

 

Anyone on here bought a cheap TT? Did you get what you paid for? Or even worse, anyone pay good money and still get done?

 

What I'd like to hear is somebody bought a black 6 speed TT from Keighley Trade Centre for £6000 and it's been superb ever since! ;)

 

I had a bad experience when i bought mine in Nov 03. I had a budget of around £12k it seemed to take months to track down a standard silver manual TT with less than 60k miles that wasn't a million miles away. I finally found one in a place called Jap village in Horseham in Kent. Their website looked very professional and they had their own tuning garage with heavily modded cars etc. Looking back now i should have never done what i did, i knew very little about these cars and hadn't done enough homework. This was the first one i'd looked at and ever driven in. I was taken back the looks alone and where as i should have walked away and looked at others to compare i started haggling over price. I part exchanged my M reg 325 coupe + £7,500 for it.

On the way home i put my foot down and thought at the time it was quick but not much quicker than my BMW. Also the same week my mate bought an M3 and after sitting in that i know it definately wasn't right. I got it rolling roaded which come out at 216 bhp - part of me was happy that it wasn't running correctly where as the other half was extremely pizzed off. To cut a very very long story short the car went back to the dealer for a month over christmas (whilst he gave me a D reg diesel Vauxhall Astra Van that had no heater and broke down twice) he apparently put 2 new turbos and a new ECU in it and was teasted and all running perfectly. It didn't feel any different than before so again i got it rolling rolled but this time it was slower. I told the dealer that if i he wouldn't let my mechanic fix it regardless of cost i wanted my money back, after a lot of mumbling he agreed. It took my guy less than 30 mins to fix it, it turned out to be a split pipe. And fukc me did it fill better, i still remember what i felt like then i couldn't stop grinning the hole way home. Apart from that the car (touch wood) has been 100% realible.

 

Its a shame because it took me a very long time to actually feel happy about owning a supra and concidered selling it on many occations as i was concerned that more things would go wrong. Now after kicking some Mitsubishi Evo & Scooby butt at Santa Pods a few weeks back theres no way i'm parting with it now. My GF says i pay it more attention than her - probably true.

 

Moral of the story is join mkivsupra.net and read as many posts as poss, get feedback from others etc and don't do what i did and let your heart take over your brain.

 

If only i knew about this website before, i would have saved myself a lot of stress.

 

anyone else bought a car from Jap village ? how did you find them ?

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:swear:

The first TT I drove was from Performance Cars Plymouth.

I thought it was real fast; the valeter came with me and looked very scared.

To my syuprise I braked hard from 90 mph and the dash lit up; NO BRAKES; the rear hoses were shot and the fluid leaked out.

 

Eventually bought from a club member; 600 mile round trip I still remeber the amazing drive home.

 

happy days

50 :thumbs:

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Yeah some new parts but for what price?

 

Discs, Pads, Tires and now the paintwork. For all that I could have bought a bargain manual or a totally mint auto with service history :/ I was told there is some service history with the car but everything that came with it was receipts for the alarm and a drive belt.

 

So yeah I must say was not very pleased with the car. Drives nice now after all the stress and money but I try to sell it and buy a nice one that I like from the beginning now.

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Well Unusually for me !!!!!

 

I had three perfect experiences at buying a Supra.

 

The First Supra I bought was from Shepperton Honda way back in 97..was £27k had 16k miles on it and full service history and it was a UK one...it was perfect.

 

The second time was when I bought my old Supra (strange I know) it only had an extra 5k miles from when I owned it and he had bought it after 6 months of sitting on a garage Fourcourt with a overpriced tag. (N730GGK if anyone has it, was sold with about 88k on)

 

I then traded my UK (owned twice by me) for a Jap Import (the one I own now) which was purchased from Pinewood Toyota in Coulsden..the aftersales service from Pinewood was second to none..even the owner Mr Lichfield phoned me once when I complained that the tracking was out when it was sold and he replaced all the tyres and gave me a free service...beat that hey...but it did cost me £21k 4 years ago and only had 4k on the clock.

 

I have to say I'm not sure who I would trust these days..

 

Edited to say...I'd rather buy from someone on here or one of the listed dealers here rather than on Ebay! ;)

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Good luck finding one of those!

 

I've seen a few, heres one: Manual Aerotop £6745

 

It is a K reg but it's cheap, looks like a reputable garage too (not that that counts for a lot).

 

EDIT:Sorry, no mention of manual box n dealers site, on autotrader it does though:link

 

jurgen: can get u a mint auto tt for 8k via the import route

 

I may very well be in touch soon Jurgen, the sale of my house is going through and I'll be ready to purchase very soon. At least you have answered my question in part, you can get a decent TT for £8k or less! music to my ears.

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