US Cars to Canada

[Super_Popular]

Anyone know why a US car cannot be registered in Canada?

Several people have tried to purchase my X and take it to Canada but Tesla said no with no valid reason.

Why?

 

[Roadrunner13]

It's Tesla stating to our Transport Ministry that it's too much work to convert the Model S & X to Canadian 'standards' :
TESLA MOTORS
...luckily (for me) it was ok for the roadster!

Our Canadian standards includes software configured stuff like daylight front lights, km/h speedometer, km odometer and some (possibly?) hardware related stuff like extra vehicule immobilization protection tied to the FOB electronics, although I'm not convinced hardware is actually involved now!

 

[Doug_G]

Red seat belt buttons; bilingual notices for air bags, tire inflation, safety etc.; daytime running lights; higher standards on the key fob protocols; kph speedometer and odometer... not sure if I remembered everything.

 

[Super_Popular]

Ah ok, so it's not just about sales.....like I was told.

 

[sandpiper]

This is the type of thing that drives me nuts. Clearly US cars are safe and secure. Why we don't just adopt the bloody US standards as our own (except for the obvious mile/km issue which will increasingly be a simple software tweak), and be done with all of the headaches?

As a bonus we could likely save tax$ currently being paid to the bureaucracy that administers these regulations.

 

[agloutney]

The mile/km issue can just be reconfigured in the settings. Could one not just print out new decals and paint (or replace) the seatbelt buttons? Does it matter what Tesla says if Transport Canada approves it?

 

[mrElbe]

The importation of vehicles less than 15 years old into Canada is governed by the RIV ( Registrar of Imported Vehicles ) list available on the web. Now, the government knows nothing about vehicle specs, so they consult with the manufacturer in regard to coming up to Canadian specs. Quite a few high end manufacturers put artificial roadblocks in to prevent US cars from coming in. Like extremely high priced certificates and modifications. Another problem is warranty. Each manufacturers country operation has a fund for warranty repairs and a US car needing warranty work in Canada would dip into the local fund without initially paying into it. But as an example, Toyota is gracious about this and imported US car warranties are honoured in Canada.

That said, expanding on sandpiper's diatribe, I would like to see some of the Euro specs here like self leveling headlights and glass breakage sensor alarms. Tesla offers these on their Euro market models.

 

[hingisfan]

Red seat belt buttons; bilingual notices for air bags, tire inflation, safety etc.; daytime running lights; higher standards on the key fob protocols; kph speedometer and odometer... not sure if I remembered everything.

Canadian Xs don't have red seat belt buttons for some strange reason.

 

[HankLloydRight]

Right before I got my MS in 2014, I sold my BMW Z4 to a guy from Canada. He flew down and drove it back, no problems.

Well, except before he came down, he asked me to confirm that the car would switch into KM mode, which I went out to check. I turned it to KM mode, and everything converted to Kilometers. Immediately, the service indicator for the brakes lit up -- BRAKE SERVICE NEEDED. I'm assuming that this is an error/bug in the BMW code since the "mileage" went up, it triggered the brake service counter to be due. Even though the brakes were fine, I had to pay for a brake job (just pads) to reset the indicator, cost me about $200 I think that I didn't need to spend.

 

[mrElbe]

Usually resetting service indicators is pressing a combinations of buttons and secret incantations on most cars. Sometimes they describe this in the owners manual.

 

[Doug_G]

Canadian Xs don't have red seat belt buttons for some strange reason.

I think that rule may have recently been punted. Thanks for pointing that out.

 

[HankLloydRight]

Usually resetting service indicators is pressing a combinations of buttons and secret incantations on most cars. Sometimes they describe this in the owners manual.

I know and my mechanic could just reset them without the work, but I really didn't want the buyer to drive away back to Toronto and get another service alert right away.. And if that happened, I could not control the repair cost in Canada if he insisted that I help pay for the repair.

Being honest is expensive sometimes.

 

[Lukez]

This is the type of thing that drives me nuts. Clearly US cars are safe and secure. Why we don't just adopt the bloody US standards as our own (except for the obvious mile/km issue which will increasingly be a simple software tweak), and be done with all of the headaches?

As a bonus we could likely save tax$ currently being paid to the bureaucracy that administers these regulations.

Terrible suggestion. Not having a requirement for daytime running lights is just plain dumb. I cross the border daily and not having daytime running lights is much more dangerous in certain conditions. No reason for it.

 

[sandpiper]

Terrible suggestion. Not having a requirement for daytime running lights is just plain dumb. I cross the border daily and not having daytime running lights is much more dangerous in certain conditions. No reason for it.

And this is exactly why you have a different car in every country. In some countries you have mirrors mounted at the rear of all SUV's to allow the driver to see the rear bumper. We don't. Is it better to have? Yes... I guess.... There are infinitely many things that can be done to make a car better. And there are always compromises.

As far as I know the US accident rate isn't appreciably better or worse than our. I'd be more than happy to have the same standard across the continent, and let vehicles be bought and sold freely across the borders.

 

[skrenes]

I would think there has to be loop holes to this since people move from the US to Canada and are not expected to sell their vehicles to get a Canadian one. Most of the required stuff like daytime running lights is a software update (or setting) away. The rest are stickers. As someone pointed out, Model X don't have the red seatbelt buttons. How did they get around that? In any case, I suspect that Tesla is going to be pushing a seatbelt recall for the pretensioner and they could just as easily replace it with a Canadian part number.

 

[TrevTremaine]

This is the type of thing that drives me nuts. Clearly US cars are safe and secure. Why we don't just adopt the bloody US standards as our own (except for the obvious mile/km issue which will increasingly be a simple software tweak), and be done with all of the headaches?

As a bonus we could likely save tax$ currently being paid to the bureaucracy that administers these regulations.

This has been an issue for well over a couple of decades. If I remember correctly, there were higher standards in Canada for bumpers as well as what's been mentioned by others. It's a pain, but then again we were also getting Euro spec'd BMWs which the US weren't getting (amongst other cars from other manufacturers). Something dealers have always exploited is raising the price of Canadian cars comparative to the US (above and beyond the currency differences).

 

[sandpiper]

Yep. This is one of the things that makes for a viscous market across the border and lets auto retailers charge a Canadian premium. This also applies a mountain of other products which are controlled by Canadian specific product standards. We could save a pile of money by adopting continent wide common standards. Try to bring a used aircraft across the border. Wow.... it's absurd. And it's not like US small planes are falling out of the sky.

 

[sakimano]

Yep. This is one of the things that makes for a viscous market across the border and lets auto retailers charge a Canadian premium. This also applies a mountain of other products which are controlled by Canadian specific product standards. We could save a pile of money by adopting continent wide common standards. Try to bring a used aircraft across the border. Wow.... it's absurd. And it's not like US small planes are falling out of the sky.

To be honest there's no value in the US market anyway. Cars are cheaper here all else being considered equal.

The only benefit to shipping in the US in a market where we've gone from par to par33 is liquidity. But used cars in the US aren't any bargain. In fact Americans are trying to buy cars here and bring them down there in most marques

 

[FrederikBoivin]

But can an american buy a car FROM canada?

 

[hingisfan]

But can an american buy a car FROM canada?

Yes.