The guide

Step 1: Ask for the part the way you'd say it out loud

Type "attesa controller for my r32 under $800" instead of keywords. Portside reads the car, the part and the budget out of that sentence and searches Japanese listings in Japanese, so you find parts whose titles you could never have typed.

Worth knowing: Listings are indexed from Yahoo Auctions Japan and translated, so you're searching the real Japanese market rather than the small slice that happens to be listed in English.

Step 2: Narrow it down without retyping

Car, budget, condition, listing type, source. Every one of these is applied by the database across everything that matched, not just the rows currently on screen, so filtering never quietly searches one page.

Step 3: Scan results you can judge at a glance

Each card carries the translated title, the price in your currency, a condition grade and the chassis it fits. Auctions show their countdown, so you can see what's closing tonight before you invest any time in it.

Step 4: This is where you decide

Title and description translated, the seller's own condition rating read alongside what the photos actually show, and the price set against similar active listings. From here you can open the original, stage it for a shipment, or ask for an import quote on its own.

Step 5: Two reputations, never blended

The seller's Yahoo Auctions score is shown as exactly that: their record on Yahoo. Portside reviews are separate, and are what our buyers say about actually dealing with them. Mixing the two would let a strong Yahoo record paper over a bad Portside one.

Step 6: "Will it fit?", answered with reasons

Ask whether a part fits the car in your Garage and you get a verdict with the reasoning and the caveats, not just a yes. It doesn't appear on whole cars or manuals, because the question makes no sense there.

Worth knowing: Free accounts get 3 fitment checks a month. Pro removes the limit.

Step 7: Tell Portside what you drive

Add your car once. From then on the search box understands 'my R32' without you spelling out the chassis code, and any part can be checked against it.

Step 8: Stop refreshing. Let it find you

Save any search here and Portside emails you when something matches. Rare parts surface at 3am Japan time and are gone by breakfast. This is how you stop losing them to people in a friendlier timezone.

Worth knowing: Free accounts get 3 watchlist alerts, batched into a digest every 3 days. Pro gets an unlimited watchlist and alerts the moment a match lands.

Step 9: Stage everything, then send one request

Add parts as you find them. Sending a request asks an importer for a quote, and you're not committed to anything until you accept the quote. To have an importer bid for you, set a maximum bid on each auction and send the plan to an importer who bids: they bid, buy what's won and ship it all together. If you've already won your parts, keep what you won, drop what you lost, and send one quote request for the lot. Sold or delisted items get flagged and left out automatically.

Worth knowing: Freight is priced per shipment, not per part. Six separate quote requests means paying the container minimum six times.

Step 10: Your plan follows you around

Shipment lives in the header on every page. Once something is staged, a crate with a running count appears beside it. That's how you get back to the plan from anywhere, and the reminder that you have parts waiting on an auction result.

Step 11: Follow it from Japan to your door

One booking, with a status per part inside it. The timeline runs from quote through purchase, into the container, across the water, through customs and to your door. Each step shows when it happened. Progress emails come unless you switch them off; mail about money or a deadline always comes.