Russian Road Safety Requirements - Stay on the right side of the Law

"Where to buy a fire extinguisher in Vladivostok"
This was something I googled both in English and Russian and then spent a good few hours trying to work out what shop carried the equipment we needed to be road legal. I found many results, none of which lead me to what we needed - a small fire extinguisher to carry in the boot of our car.

If you're in a similar situation and need a fire extinguisher or any other road safety equipment for your car in Russia you can follow this link, this is a company called Giper Avto which I think translates to Hyper Auto in English.


Giper Avto [гиперавто] is a chain of consumer automotive supply shops. For Irish or UK people think Halfords without the bicycles. GiperAvto carries all required safety equipment as well as things like windscreen washer fluid (trust me you will need this), oil, fuel tanks, car stereo components, dashcams, spare bulb sets, etc. They have stores in most major cities/towns from Vladivostok to Ulan Ude.

Recommended Safety Gear for Trans-Siberia
Along with your trusty fire extinguisher you will also need a first aid kit, tow rope and a set of spare bulbs to be road legal. All of these can be bought in GiperAvto.

If you're driving across Russia I would also recommend picking up some or all of these non-compulsory safety/emergency items:

• A small air compressor. Know the weight of your car and size of your wheels then ask the sales guys for the appropriate size. 

• A can of tyre inflation foam. This stuff is very handy and could get you to the nearest Shinomontazhe (tyre shop) without having to change your wheel so long as you're not on one of the more remote stretches of highway.

• Portable battery bank/charger. This is essentially a jump-starter kit, instead of using another car battery you use this handy battery you can keep in your boot.

• 20litre fuel tank. Get a plastic one, there will also be steel tanks for sale but these could have bits of rust inside where you can't see or bits of loose steel from poor manufacture.

• Windscreen washer fluid. There are an incredible amount and array of insects and bugs along the Trans-Siberian highway during the summer months. The windscreen washer fluid will help keep your windscreen clean. You will still need to clean with a cloth after each long drive though, many of the bug splatters are too tough for the windscreen wipers and fluid alone. You can also buy a little spray gun of windscreen washer fluid this is like a high powered household window cleaner. It's dirt cheap and you will definitely need it. 

All of these items are available in GiperAvto at very cheap prices compared to Western Europe or Australia. We carried all of the above and the most expensive item we bought on the above list was the battery bank which cost the Ruble equivalent of about US$50 and doubles as a convertor/clean power source for laptops or other sensitive electronics.

The stores are branded green as per the below image. If you don't understand Cyrillic (you really should at least take the time to learn this if you're planning to drive across Russia) the name looks like 'Runep Abmo'.

As you can see below they sell fire extinguishers.

If you're lucky you might even get there on a Casual Friday.

How to find an automotive store in Vladivostok
First go to the GiperAvto website then click on 'Magazini' [магазины] on the landing page. You will then be met with a page like the below screen shot.

I recommend using Yandex maps or Navitel to find these places in Vladivostok as Google Maps is not all that accurate in Far Eastern Russia. It may sound like I work for these GiperAvto guys, that is not the case. I have no affiliation whatsoever with them but found that they are the easiest, and perhaps only, place to find consumer automotive gear in the Far East & Siberia.

Do I Really Need a Fire Extinguisher to Drive Across Russia?
We had been warned that stops by traffic police for no apparent reason other than to check your documents are common all over Russia and that with a foreign registered vehicle we would be highly likely to be stopped at every available opportunity.

At these routine traffic stops a DPS [ДПС] (Road Traffic Police) officer may decide to check if the vehicle is carrying all required safety equipment. The RAC advise that this could lead to an on the spot fine but notes that these fines must be paid through a bank. In our experience on the spot fines are generally paid in cash and vary depending on your haggling skills. Buy a fire extinguisher, it'll cost you about US$5 which is about half the lowest 'fine' you can expect to pay.

Buying Petrol in Russia

Buying Quality Fuel in Russia - Avoiding Contaminated or 'Fake' Fuel
There are some horror stories about contaminated fuel being sold in some parts of Russia. The story goes that some petrol stations will buy cheap fuel from unlicensed sources, this fuel can have various additives and contaminants designed to increase the octane rating of poor quality fuel so that basic testing would not detect anything is wrong with it.

Another observation is that some fuel tanks and bowsers in some of the more remote petrol stations are so old that bits of water, dirt, rust, etc could have gotten into the tanks/hoses and can make their way into your own tank if you buy fuel there.

As we embarked on our trip across Russia we were somewhat concerned with the stories bouncing around the internet and wanted to get to the bottom of the issue as best we could to put our minds at ease that it was not going to be fuel quality that would leave us stranded on the side of the road in the back arse of Siberia.

Obviously there is no way of knowing the quality of the fuel you are buying without getting it tested. Testing is of course not practical for the average Trans-Russia driver and it wasn't practical for us. We decided to simply do what the Russians do relied on local knowledge of which petrol stations sell legitimate non-contaminated fuel.

Russian Petrol Variants
Petrol comes in 92, 95 & 98 octane, and in rural areas 80. Do not use 80 octane in a modern vehicle (anything after 1970 or perhaps even earlier) unless it is some oddball machine and the manufacturer specifically instructs it.

92 is regarded as perfectly acceptable for older vehicles. Our car is 12 years old and we started out using 92 then after a while started using 95 as the price difference per litre is usually only around 3 Rubles. It my just be petrol placebo but when using 95 or 98 I did think the car performed a bit better, particularly its response to hard acceleration.

I did not notice any difference in fuel economy, then again fuel is so cheap in Russia we did not record detailed notes of our fuel consumption along the way.

At the Pump
The system in Russia is that you pay for the fuel before you pump it into your vehicle. This is the way it is done all across the country. If you give too much cash you can get change, though sometimes the lady, if you get a gruff one, will give you that 'tourist' look.

Beware: if you pay with a card you cannot get change, you cannot even take other merchandise as change. We found this out the hard way somewhere between Vladivostok and Khabarovsk.

In the Petrol Station
Usually the fuel stations have basic driver groceries, this could be the barest necessities of water, energy drinks and chocolate or can be fully stocked grocery shops complete with roadside deli fare (hotdogs, burgers, ready made sandwiches, freshly ground coffee).

Some have toilets, though in general you are better going wild somewhere along the side of the road. As you get close to large cities, particularly the further west you get, some stations may have indoor toilets which are of acceptable standards.

Petrol Stations
Below are the 4 we used preferentially. On very rare occassions when there was no other option we did use other petrol stations but always chains, never any of the small independent ones. That may sound a bit harsh on small business but going by local knowledge we picked up from friends along the way the independent stations are the most likely to have dodgy fuel and thinking about it it makes sense. Chains are tied to one fuel source. Independents can buy fuel anywhere and a foolish or unscrupulous station owner may choose to buy the cheapest fuel possible on occasion, regardless of quality.

Rosneft (yellow branding with an image of a minaret) the cream of the crop and the one petrol station that everyone along the way agreed sold good quality fuel. This is also the one fuel company with stations the whole way across the country. You could, with some difficulty, drive the whole way across Russia only using Rosneft fuel and many Russians do this.

Gazprom (blue and white branding), stations always in good condition and usually with hot food inside. International reputation to protect, I have no fear about the quality of their fuel.

Alliance (bluish green branding), this is a company in the Far East which we used regularly and also has a good reputation locally. There is not much else in most of the Far East.

Tatneft (red and green branding), the Tatarstan version of Rosneft - we used their fuel with no issues. Stay away from the really old/dirty looking stations though. Usually hot food in the new ones.

Fuel Cards
If you have access to a Russian address for receiving post you can order fuel cards for most of the big stations. You may be able to get one posted overseas or to a hotel in Russia if you do not have a permanent address.

As a private individual (non-business entity) with one of these cards you earn loyalty points which ca be redeemed against fuel once you've earned enough.

For Rosneft's loyalty programme you must earn 3,990 bonus points (this equates to 39,990 Rubles spent with Rosneft) before redeeming this amount for 20litres of fuel.

• Purchase of regular fuel rewarded with 1 bonus point per 10 rubles spent
• Purchase of premium fuels rewarded with 2 bonus points per 10 rubles spent
• Purchase of food, drinks, groceries inside Rosneft mini-market rewarded with 3 bonus points per 10 rubles spent

You can learn more about Rosneft's programme on their English language fuel card site here. There is further information on commercial fuel cards for foreign businesses available on their site as well. If you are a small business owner you may be able to link one of these cards to your business before your Russian adventure.

Rosneft and/or Gazprom are the only two fuel companies that are truly national but most branded fuel stations offer them so if for instance you plan on staying in Tatarstan for a prolonged period get a Tatneft card.

Quality of Diesel in Russia
We drove a petrol car so do not have direct experience of diesel quality across Russia. We could see it was just as available as petrol along the main highway across the country. In some more remote areas there were no diesel pumps at the stations we went to.

There are some references to poor quality/dirty diesel in parts of Russia online but I have not seen anyone with direct experience authoritatively say this is the case. For what it's worth we noticed the odd filthy looking diesel pump at some of the more remote fuel stations however diesel can be dirty stuff (not evaporating off like petrol) so I don't think this can reveal much about the quality of the fuel.

Vehicle Customs Clearance Vladivostok

Intro

Bringing a car into Russia can be a bit of a daunting task. In our situation it was a car that we had just bought at an auction in Japan and were about to put offshore license plates on. The car had never been to the country it was registered in. As it turned out clearing our car through customs at Vladivostok turned out to be much easier than getting the vehicle out of Japan.

Customs Clearance Agent

I would go as far as to say that if you are not from Russia (and this may apply even if you are) you absoutely need to use a local customs clearance agent to clear your vehicle through customs once it arrives at Vladivostok Port.

For starters the customs clearance office is nowhere near the Port, it is deep into a myriad of narrow streets which seemed to be somewhere up near Eagle Nest. It would be very difficult to find this place on your own if you don't speak good Russian.

We checked online for recommendations used Links Ltd. to manage the customs clearance process as they have very positive feedback smattered across various blogs & forums of 2 and 4 wheel travellers who have made the trip. 

Yuri & Svetlana were our two contacts at Links and I cannot recommend them enough. I think Yuri owns the business though I never thought to ask him. Both speak English, are friendly and most important of all they know what they're doing and get the job done quickly.

Pre-Arrival 

In our initial correspondence with Yuri I explained that the vehicle we wanted to bring into Russia was registered offshore in a somewhat unusual location. I was a bit concerned that the unusualness of this location may cause some problems with customs clearance. Yuri assured me that this would not matter. Russian customs legislation is not concerned with how other countries register vehicles, so long as the vehicle is legally registered and you have the paper work to prove it this is all that matters.

In order for Yuri to arrange the customs clearance in advance we sent through scans of my passport, the vehicle registration documents and a picture of the VIN number on the car (we just sent one of the sticker on the door pillar and this was sufficient) and I think a front and rear shot of the vehicle. 

Arrival in Vladivostok

When we got off the boat in Vladivostok Yuri was waiting for us at Arrivals, we packed our bags into his Subaru Forester and he drove us up to the Customs Offices. Here we met with his colleague Svetlana who was waiting for us with some documents. We also bumped into two bikers we had befriended on the ferry, Marcello & Satoro (sorry if I've spelled your name wrong buddy). If you've never heard of Marcello Carucci he is a great character, an indomitable Italian school teacher who travels the world on Honda motorbikes during the summer holidays. He's been doing this successfully for so long (over 1.4 million kilometres!) that he is now a bit of a celebrity in Italy and has numerous sponsors for his trips, including Honda. He doesn't speak a word of English and we don't speak any Italian, this didn't matter at all. Check out his website and facebook page. 

Back to business... we spent about half an hour at the Customs Office, signed some forms which Svetlana pushed through the little window to the Customs ladies. Marcello, Satoro & I stood in the small waiting area with her while Yuri waited outside. The Customs ladies looked quite stern, as seemingly all Russian civil servants behind desks do, though the mini-skirts and stilettos made these particular ones a bit less intimidating. 

As the documents for each of our vehicles were checked we each moved to the window to show your face and prove you are the person in the passport picture for that vehicle. Some more forms were signed and when it was my turn Svetlana and the Customs lady had a bit of a laugh - she translated for me 'She says you look a bit better in real life'... my passport picture is a bit of a shocker so I suppose it was a sort of compliment, a Russian civil servant compliment. 

After the documents/face check we were free to go for the rest of the afternoon. Marcello, Satoro and I went out to Yuri's car where my girlfriend Ianthe was waiting for us and Yuri dropped us off to our respective hotels. He then arranged times to pick us up in the morning. He even came in to the hotel reception with us to help carry our bags and make sure we got through check in ok. Sound man, he could have just called taxis for us and given us an address to make our way to the next day. 

Collecting the Vehicles

The next day Yuri turned up at the hotel as arranged, actually a little bit early. We first went off to pick up some third party insurance for the car. This is compulsory for driving in Russia. We were arranging insurance for our trip with a Belgian company but it had not come through yet. I had also read somewhere online that you need to buy your third party insurance in Russia and that 'green card' insurance from a company overseas is not acceptable - for this record this is wrong, you can get green card insurance for Russia from an overseas company. More on this in future posts.

We arrived at an old Kruschev-era functionalist looking block of flats, it looked like a solely residential building but it seems there is also an insurance company somewhere in there. Yuri went in, sorted it out and 15 mins later we were insured for a month for the princely sum of about US$30.

From the insurance flat we went on to the customs clearance area at the port, Here we again met with Svetlana who had Marcello & Satoro in tow. Some big steel gates were opened and we were through to where they keep the vehicles that come off the boat, it looks a bit like a multi-storey car park.

One of the customs guys drove our car down and handed me the keys, I think we signed some more papers, hurriedly stuck our number plates on with outdoor adhesive take we had brought with us from Sydney (the front plate is still crooked to this day as we didn't want to make a fuss at the customs depot and just lashed the plates on as fast as we could). 

We said our goodbyes and the steel gate opened - welcome to Russia.

Bringing your car into Russia via ferry to Vladivostok

Intro
There are two routes to Russia from Japan at present. The main route is from Sakaiminato via Donghae in S. Korea and on to Vladivostok. The ferry company running this route is DBS Ferry and the boat is called the Eastern Dream

The other route is from Wakkanai the northernmost city in Japan via Sakhalin island and on to the port of Vanino in mainland Russia. On this route you arrive from Japan to Korsakov on the south east of Sakhalin, you then need to travel across the island to Kholmsk on the south west of the island to get the ferry to Vanino. This is definitely the more 'off the beaten path' of the two routes and is served by Heartland Ferry.

Sakaiminato - Vladivostok Ferry
We took the main route - Sakaiminato to Vladivostok. The ticket prices for DBS Ferry are available on their site via the links above. For reference at the time of our trip we paid US$600 for the vehicle transport and passenger details below:

Vehicle owner tariff 13,000 jpy + fuel surcharge 2,300 jpy

Companion tariff 26,000 jpy + fuel surcharge 2,300 jpy

43,600 JPY (Economy class)

Your contact person at DBS Ferry should be Tatiana Chernysheva <tatiana.dbsferryjp@gmail.com> she is top notch - communications are always quick and professional.

Customs Clearance
This is one of the most tedious parts of the whole trip and if done wrong could have disastrous consequences. From our experience it was more difficult to get the vehicle out of Japan than into Russia.

There are a number of customs clearance agents that we found on the Japanese side. We went with a guy called Mr Shimono. Communication with Mr Shimono is very difficult, he is very slow to respond, doesn't speak English and can be a bit vague. As mentioned in the preceding post we got some much needed assistance from Graeme's team at Auto Trader Imports with the customs clearance proceedings. Tatiana from DBS also offered to translate messages for us to Mr Shimono.

In the end we did get the customs clearance done with Mr Shimono, however it was a lot harder and more stressful than it had to be. We chose Mr Shimono as he was the agent recommended by DBS Ferry so we thought this might streamline the process as there was already a working relationship there, etc.

The other option I had found online for customs clearance is an English speaking guy called Hollis Humphreys. I can't comment on the services he provides as we did not use him but if I were to go through the process again I would go with him instead of Mr Shimono.

Last Minute Problems Leaving Japan
Less than 48 hours before sailing I received an email from DBS Ferry telling me they were sorry but they would not be able to transport our car. It was explained to me at the time that this had come from a manager in S. Korea who was concerned over the license plates we were using for the car (small Pacific island).

The message was relayed by Tatiana, at this point I told them that I would sign a letter saying that if the license plates on the car caused any issues at the Russian border that I would accept all liability for the transport of the car from that point. Tatiana relayed this back to management and after a few hours waiting tensely Tatiana called to say they agreed the car could go on the ferry.

Apart from this last minute problem dealing with DBS was painless, however I get the distinct impression that this was mostly because of Tatiana rather than their management team. We had been booked on the ferry since July, it was now the end of August and we were just now being told the car could not be transported.

If the car did not get into Russia we had real problems as I have no doubt it would have been a nightmare to get it back into Japan and it would have been very expensive to get it shipped to Europe as freight.

So my advice if DBS get a bit squeamish about your number plates or anything else to do with your car, tell them the car has to get on the boat, it has nowhere else to go and that you will sign a liability waiver. Be insistent.

Buying a car at auction in Japan

Intro

Russia is a big place, 17 million square kilometres big. It covers 11.5% of the planet and is still growing with ice melting in the north and Crimea and eastern Ukraine in the south. To travel across in your own car you'll need to first get it to Russia and then get it back. That's expensive - roughly US$2.5 - 3k one way to get a vehicle from Australia or NZ and I would guess slightly cheaper to bring one over from the West coast of the USA.

When we did the trip we didn't own a car to begin with as I had been driving company vehicles for the last few years. The best solution for us was to buy a car in Japan and get it shipped over to Vladivostok.

Buying a Car in Japan
This sounds simple but is actually quite difficult to do as in most countries you cannot register a car there without being a resident. This is most certainly the case in Japan where not only do you need to have at least temporary residency, but you also must have an assigned parking place to park your vehicle.

There are also the importation/registration fees to consider. If you are a Russian resident and you decide to simply import the vehicle you will pay 25% of the value of the vehicle. If you are not a Russian resident you cannot get Russian plates.

You now have a dilemma, you cannot keep or get Japanese plates and you cannot get Russian ones (without residency in either country). You cannot drive a car in Russia without a legitimate number plate. We solved this problem by getting offshore registration in a Pacific island nation. More on this in future posts.

Finding a Purchasing Agent

We spent months searching online for the best way to buy a car from one of the many Japanese auction houses without physically being in Japan. There are lots of dodgy sites out their so I would highly recommend doing as much research as possible on any company you decide to buy a car with. In the past I have used Goo-Net-Exchange to buy an Isuzu Vehicross. Their service was good, I received what I ordered and the vehicle was well described with no nasty surprises. However Goo-Net is not an auction site, they sell inventory that they hold themselves. As a result you can end up paying quite a bit more than you would at auction.

I also know that TradeCarView is a reputable place to buy a car but again this is not an auction buying site, you purchase from their (and others - sort of like Amazon for Japanese cars) static inventory, so you pay more. Another thing to consider is that most of the really good stuff never hits these inventory sites as it is snapped up at the auctions.

In order to get access to the Japanese auction houses where the cars and the prices are better we neede an actual auction dealer - someone who is licensed to bid at Japanese car auctions (anybody can't just walk in and bid on a car) and provides a bespoke bidding service. After searching through google we went with Auto Trader Imports which is run by a New Zealander who lives in Japan.

I highly recommend AutoTraderImports as their service was simply top notch all the way through when we bought our car (a 2003 Mercedes S500). Communication was always prompt and professional and most  importantly they provide access to an online portal where you can trawl the listings of most of the top auction houses in Japan yourself. 

Beware that there are plenty of other sites out there which do not provide a portal which means you are reliant on the company to send you links to cars they think you might like or worse still they will simply buy something for you if it fits a set of parameters you agree with them in advance.

Buying a Car at auction with Auto Trader Imports

To purchase a vehicle through AutoTraderImports you first pay a deposit via Paypal of 10% of your maximum possible bid value in multiples of US$10k. We did not want to spend more than US$10k so we paid a deposit of  US$1k.

Once you've paid the deposit you can bid on any vehicles listed on JapAutoAuctions This page has major inventory updates daily except on weekends where updates are sporadic or not at all. JapAutoAuctions is an auction listings page and is the platform used by AutoTraderImports to allow their customers to view auction listings. 

When you find an interesting vehicle you send the URL to the AutoTraderImports team who translate the auction card and send you back the translation very quickly. Speed is of the essence here as cars are often listed just 24-48 hours before their auction date. This also means it is worthwhile checking the auction pages every day so you don't miss any vehicles that fit your search criteria.

As stated above my personal experience with Auto Trader Imports was excellent. Graeme and the team actually went above and beyond what I had paid them to do (buy a car or me at auction) and provided invaluable assistance in storing my vehicle for a few weeks then sorting out transport of the vehicle to the ferry terminal at Sakaiminato as well as customs documentation which would have been a nightmare for me otherwise as I do not speak any Japanese.

Next Post - Understanding Japanese Auction Ratings