Watch out for Clipped cars out of Texas

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johnparts

johnparts

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Well since I work at a body shop I will throw this out there. A customer just brought his 2010 Lexus in for a front bumper and it turns out it has a complete rear clip hacked on. No inspection stickers to say it was rebuilt and very bad welding holding the rear clip on. Make sure you check your body seams when buying a car.
 
I imagine there are several states that make this kind of thing easy. I "heard" some rumor about it getting changed, but I believe Idaho is one
 
Wow. Im a Mid-Tech Bodyman for a Ford dealer.

The only time I hear about clipping is when old guys talk about it.

I really thought that was over by the mid 70s.

I can't even imagine doing it to a modern car while maintaining the manufacturers occupant safety level.

Did your shop total the car? I know mine would.
 
Nope-still happens they still come through the insurance pools
 
They go thru Houston daily on car haulers. Totalled cars on the way to Mexico. I bet they fix them with cheap labor and send them back.
 
Around here in NC you hear the "Cut two wrecked cars in half and weld them together into a good car." From pretty much any mechanic old enough to be retired. But yeah, I didn't think they still did it. Especially with the oem's lightening and heat treating subframes and whatnot, hoping to save money on steel. Worst part is, I don't know of anything that makes it illegal to do so.
 
Doesn't matter if we like it or not-a bunch of our classics have been halved-quartered and are still in the big shows.Everything from Lamborghini's to the little pedal cars have been hooked back together.Bought a light hit escalade last year-needed a fender and a spindle,looked at the rear door noticed it had a wierd gap finally had to scrap it.Welds were terrible.All you can do is watch out for them-they are sure out there.
 
Here in WV they get a salvage title, and yes it is legal but you have to go thru a WV state inspector at the DOT instead a regular state inspection station.
To provide proof of repair you have to take alot of before and after photo's.
You can pick up a fairly new repaired car here for about the 1/3 the cost of a comparable no-wrecked one.
 
We had a Honda accord in our dealership for an alignment. Could not get it in Spec then realized it was 2 cars welded together. Ended up where it wouldn't wear tires but ran down the road like a 78 Nova X-Frame.
 
"That's about 5 K-cars in todays currency and exchange rate..."
 
My wife's uncle actually worked selling for a used car dealership in Pa. that specialized in wrecks that were repaired. He made no bones about it, was up front about the cars and according to her uncle, had quite a loyal clientele and a decent reputation.
 
Clipping cars is alive and well up here in Wa state as well. Had the pleasure of trying to "fix" a couple of them, not a single one was right. Left my last work place over one actually, long story, boss was trying to sell a clipped car as if nothing had ever happened to it.
 
I got one for you, a friend of mine 10 years ago bought a trans-am from a local dealer that had 9 miles on it. It was pulling to the right shortly after he got it and I pointed out to him that it looked like the paint had been blended on the rear quarter. Long story short he ended up finding out from an employee in the body shop that someone pitched it sideways on a test drive and put it in a ditch. They sold the car to him as new and didn't take it back after he raised hell. Big law suit to make things right. Gotta be leery when you buy stuff
 
I drive about 40,000 miles a year here in Florida and more than a few times a year I am driving down the road and the car in front of me that you can clearly see the tires do not alinge up from front to back...Even better when they go through water driving straight and they leave 4 SEPERATE Tire marks....One of my customers in Pt. Charlotte the late 90's drove a Mazda 626 that was two cars welded together...
:wack:


OwdKasd said:
We had a Honda accord in our dealership for an alignment. Could not get it in Spec then realized it was 2 cars welded together. Ended up where it wouldn't wear tires but ran down the road like a 78 Nova X-Frame.
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We did a title search and it has a rebuilt texas title BUT the Illinois title is clear. Clear case of title washing the Police will be here today to inspect the repair because there is no Texas State Police inspection sticker stating it is a rebuild so they need to get the Illinois State police to issue a safety sticker or give it a thumbs down.
 
It used to be more common here in Manitoba. We actually towed an old Dart home to strip off after one of those "Beat the beater for a buck" at our local autorama years back, and when we put it up on the hoist we laughed at how poorly it was done.

Not long after that, a front page picture of a Firebird that split in half after hitting a pole brought about some changes to this practice.

Now, anytime frame work is done, the car must pass a frame integrity check by our provincial insurance carrier to be insurable.


Grant
 
abodyjoe said:
and i'll bet they all have clean carfax reports too..
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MANY cars that have been in accidents from minor to major have clean carfax reports. A lot of shops dont report them, and I have heard cases of insurance companies not reporting them so they dont have to pay the customer a claim on "vehicle depreciation". Nothing beats a trained eye and being able to put a car up on a lift before you buy it.
 
there are millions of "composite cars " out there the insurance companies are part of it , they know when a car they wrote off in one state is moved through 6 others to wash the title ,after all State farm is still State farm no matter where you go . Florida auctions are famous for it as are many of the other southern states , Michigan was real deligent about it when I lived there in the nineties , we swapped a box on a pickup and had to send the truck in for a composite title inspection after we got pulled over for it not matching the cab .Now thats not saying they were anywhere near as picky about cars that were always there ie the 69 charger I saw on I 96 that I could see the feet of the driver and passenger through the bottom third of the doors eh lol.
 
There is nothing wrong with clipping a car "IF" done correctly, even on modern cars. The problem is there are a lot of people out there that do it wrong!
 
Clipping a car is cutting 2 cars in half and welding them together to make one.

Yes, everything is wrong with that.

Correctly repairing a wreck is not clipping. Some of you are confusing, using used parts, even structural parts, to make a large repair, with clipping. They are not the same.


If you have used a large section of another car in a repair, drilling spot welds, re-welding, and assembling the car as the factory did, that is a repair.

Clipping disregards correct repair procedures.
 
1968FormulaS340 said:
Clipping a car is cutting 2 cars in half and welding them together to make one.

Yes, everything is wrong with that.

Correctly repairing a wreck is not clipping. Some of you are confusing, using used parts, even structural parts, to make a large repair, with clipping. They are not the same.


If you have used a large section of another car in a repair, drilling spot welds, re-welding, and assembling the car as the factory did, that is a repair.

Clipping disregards correct repair procedures.
Click to expand...

That is what I am referring to as the correct way to clip a car, take the pillars apart and weld each layer in and out then weld the outer skin back on, deconstruct the rocker panels, weld all the layers together, overlapping when possible then weld outer skin on, take floor apart at a seam and weld it back just as the factory did. If you follow those steps your "clip" is just as good as any other car out there. Its the people who cut the pillars and rockers and just but weld them, and whack across the floor willy nilly and but weld it, that are the ones that have ruined this repair for those of us that do it correctly, I have seen cars that we have done come back after being in another accident and showing no sign what so ever of any stress on our repaired area. Also I personally bought a car that we "clipped" 4 years and 150,000 miles later when our customer traded it in, and I drove it on my mail route for 2 years and 37,000 more miles, the quarter panels were rusting off it when I sent it to the junk yard but the areas the we repaired we just as good as the day we did it.
 
This car was Hacked together from 2 different cars. They have rivets holding things together in spots. Illinois gave it a thumbs down.
 
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