USED MOTOR PARTS

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 93, 14 January 1935, Page 11

USED MOTOR PARTS

Importation From United States CARS LIVE LONGER HERE The trade in used motor-car parts which exists between the United .States of America and New Zealand has been brought vividly to light by the publication in a Los Angeles newspaper of a statement that nearly a hundred tons of “junk automobile parts” had been shipped to Australia and New Zealand by the Monterey when it left there in November, and a similar shipment was to be made by the Mariposa next voyage. Regular shipments were forecast. This was stated to be new business for Los Angeles motor wreckers, whose establishments, the largest in the country, were being combed for spare parts of models still in common use in Australia and New Zealand, but regarded in America as so old that manufacturers had long since ceased making spares. According to the newspaper, the parts were for the immediate needs of cars eight, ten or 12 years old, vehicles that had run 200,000 miles being common in these countries and being regarded as only middle aged 12 years after manufacture. The trading-in of a car for a new model was a virtually unknown procedure, it was stated, owners not caring what their cars looked like and running them until they would run no more. Wellington dealers in cars and second-hand parts consider it improbable that such a large shipment as 100 tons of old parts wou’.l come to New Zealand, although it is possible that they were destined for Australia. There is, and has been for years, an importation of second-hand spares to New Zealand from the United States of America, but the details as stated by the American newspaper seem to be exaggerateil. at least so far as New Zealand is concerned. Car’s Life Short and Sharp in U.S.A. Cars traded in which dealers consider not worth rehabilitating are sometimes worth so little that almost the entire car goes to the tip, but if a car is too old to rehabilitate and sell again, it may be pulled to pieces and certain parts sold to those owners who desire to avoid the expense of new parts and do not mind making an old part serve. This supply of secondhand spares is not sufficient for the Dominion market, apparently because cars reach the stage at which they have to be wrecked sooner in America than in New Zealand. Cars are much cheaper to buy and to provide with petrol, oil and tires in America than in New Zealand, for which reason the Americans use their cars more freely than they are used here. The statement that cars 12 years old are in common use in New Zealand, and that that is the reason for a heavy demand on the American stocks of spares appears/to be an exaggeration, when it is remembeied that the agents for one of the most popular makes of car guarantee to supply spares for a model until 12 years after they have sold it and similar service is probably necessary for all makes that command a wide sale. Even at the end of tlrnt period the dealers, still have the parts in stock, and they can bo obtained for a further period from the wreckers, but there are many “orphans”—cars for which there is no longer an agency in the country. Hundreds of Makes "Orphaned.” The orphans are more often the products of manufacturers who have gone out of the business than former models from factories still producing ears. Out of the several hundred makes of ears the production of which has been commenced in the United States of America, only about thirty remain in the field. However, the owners of one of these cars would be in the same embarrassing position in America as in New Zealand. The manager of one of the largest of agencies, while not claiming to have knowledge of comparative American conditions, informed “The Dominion” that he found New Zealanders fastidious over the appearance of their cars and were becoming more so, the higher cost of cars in New Zealand inducing an owner to value his possession more highly than in places where they were cheaper.