Influx of flood damaged vehicles on the Canadian used market?

once a car is in a flood it's branded as irrepairable

the occasional one will sneak though

but otherwise the threat of flood cars being sold from south texas to here is minimal

Wondering now if it's possible to pick up a flooded car to use as a track car...

Why would you want to do that, thats even more dangerous then using it everyday.

Think about it your coming into a turn at 170km/h you go to hit the brakes but something shorts and you blow something electrical. Now you no longer have ABS or maybe even power steering or whatever and you go into the wall.

Stock R wrote: ↑ Wondering now if it's possible to pick up a flooded car to use as a track car...

It has happened before so I see no reason flood damaged cars will not be dumped again.

sickcars wrote: ↑ Why would you want to do that, thats even more dangerous then using it everyday.

Think about it your coming into a turn at 170km/h you go to hit the brakes but something shorts and you blow something electrical. Now you no longer have ABS or maybe even power steering or whatever and you go into the wall.

Because the price is cheap and you don't need the interior/electronics. Obviously you have to pick the right one. Water doesn't just make things randomly catastrophically fail, especially after it's dried out. Why would hydraulic systems like the power steering or brakes fail? Our cars are subjected to salt and water all the time.

I'm just wondering knowing what I'd be getting myself into, how feasible or reasonable it'd be to take this approach.

well if the car gets water high enough lets say to the windows it pretty much soaked all the electronics in the car. Even if you dry it all out 100% it wont work properly. Corrosion will slowly start and may only cause issues months down the road.

The reason why hydraulic systems or brakes or other parts fail is because they are all controlled by electronics, so unless you plan on stripping out the entire car and re run all the electronics then there is a good possibility you may have issues down the road.

Just comparing it to other electronics when they get wet. You dry them off then a few months ago they start messing up and its because of all the corrosion that has started.

Stock R wrote: ↑ Because the price is cheap and you don't need the interior/electronics. Obviously you have to pick the right one. Water doesn't just make things randomly catastrophically fail, especially after it's dried out. Why would hydraulic systems like the power steering or brakes fail? Our cars are subjected to salt and water all the time.

I'm just wondering knowing what I'd be getting myself into, how feasible or reasonable it'd be to take this approach.

In the 90s and before, sure. Maybe would have been good for alot of derby cars. But today's unibody electronic heavy cars, it'll be tough for sure. The only way is through Quebec, so watch out even more so for cars with a history of Quebec ownership.

at1212b wrote: ↑ In the 90s and before, sure. Maybe would have been good for alot of derby cars. But today's unibody electronic heavy cars, it'll be tough for sure. The only way is through Quebec, so watch out even more so for cars with a history of Quebec ownership.

Can you explain the loophole with quebec? I don't know about it.

I believe you can easily import any vehicle as "Parts only". When you import like that, you can never get the vehicle road worthy but you could certainly use it on a track (or farm, etc.

Personally, I don't believe that's common for salvage vehicles (especially flood vehicles) to make it into the Canadian market - maybe it was 20 years ago but I don't think it is anymore. I believe all provinces including Quebec have very strict rules about importing branded vehicles and I don't think you can get a "flood" (which I believe are considered permanently ineligible in all provinces in Canada). Even non-flood "salvage" or "rebuilt" vehicles are not easy to import because if it's branded (e.g. former salvage vehicles that was rebuilt and re-certified for the road in the US) have to go through the whole re-inspection process to import in Canada (I.e. a US "rebuilt" vehicle is considered a "salvage" vehicle in Canada and you can't get it onto Canadian roads until it passes Canadian requirements).

As far as salvage cars, you will find some that in terrible shape and should never be on the road again but you'll also have some that are in better shape than most cars on the road. Insurance companies will often salvage vehicles because it removes their liability of putting a car back on the road.

Stock R wrote: ↑ Can you explain the loophole with quebec? I don't know about it.

I had a good link to a forum where someone explained as I bought a used car earlier, but they allowed salvaged titled vehicles unlike Ontario. There are also a bunch of other things that do not require being reported unlike Ontario. That's why a lot of damaged or flooded vehicles from the US make it to Quebec, and also why if you notice, you see used Quebec cars super cheap. Fortunately, Ontario's record keeping knows it was registered or imported into Quebec first so general rule of thumb is avoid Quebec used cars.

https://www.riv.ca/VehicleBrandingHistory.aspx

and " Salvage or rebuilt salvage vehicles can also be imported into Canada as parts-only vehicles through a Vehicle Imported for Parts Form Form 3 regardless of the source of the damage. However, once a vehicle has entered Canada on Form 3, it can never be licensed in Canada "

In before... just stick your flood damaged car into bag of rice to heal it.