Shipping Individual Car Parts Abroad

1. How to Ship Individual Car Parts Abroad
2. Drain All Fluids
3. Understand What Dangerous Goods Are
4. What to Do If Your Car Part is Considered a Dangerous Good

How to Ship Individual Car Parts Abroad

Whatever your need may be, such as if you're stationed overseas or are an expat in need of car parts from the United States, there are some rules and regulations that you should understand about shipping individual car parts abroad. Check out the following guide for some tips to make sure that your car parts arrive safe and sound to your final destination.

Drain All Fluids

With almost no exception, all international shipments of individual car parts, such as batteries or motors, have to contain zero fluids. All of the fluids have to be drained entirely, with no trace of anything present, especially any flammable substances. Not doing so can classify the part as being a dangerous good, which can cause a considerable amount of delays during the shipping process.

Understand What Dangerous Goods Are

If your car part is deemed to be a dangerous good, this means that it is considered to post a certain level of risk to property, safety, and health during the transportation process. The United States uses the term "Hazardous Material," also known as HAZMAT, to classify these dangerous goods. When transported by an international ocean freight, they are called Dangerous Goods in international waters.

So what are they? The following categories are what your auto part will have to fall into to be considered a Dangerous Good:

• Explosives
• Gases
• Flammable Liquids
• Flammable Substances (Solids)
• Substances that can emit flammable gases when exposed to water
• Toxic substances
• Corrosives
• Oxidizing Substances that bring with them the risk of fire
• Organic peroxides

What to Do If Your Car Part is Considered a Dangerous Good

Even if you drain the fluid completely, your car part can still be considered a dangerous good in some cases. If this is the particular case, you should make sure that you have the right documents in place to classify it as such. Your shipping company should inform you of the documents that you would need and make sure that you have everything in place BEFORE it is placed on the ocean freight. Otherwise, once it arrives at its port of destination, you may have to pay stiff fees and experience delays in dealing with customs.

Dangerous Goods will need to have specific shipping documents in place, not to mention certain special labeling, marking, and packing.

Each country has different requirements than the other, so you will need to do your research. Better yet, chose an auto company, such as A-1 Auto Transport, that are experts in this field and can steer you along the right direction!

A valuable research is the International Maritime Organization and their classification system of dangerous goods, which you can visit here at http://www.imo.org/blast/mainframe.asp?topic_id=158.

Good luck, and remember that shipping auto parts abroad are actually quite simple as long as they're safe. Just make sure that they're the correct parts!