The hour meter reads half
The counter is adjusted or the whole dash is swapped, and a 10,000-hour machine is offered as a 5,000-hour one. The true figure stays in the ECU: we pull it and cross-check it against physical wear.
Inspection and verification
Nobody wires money to China blind. Neither should you.
Before you pay, one of our inspectors goes to where the machine is, measures it with instruments and files a report with photos, figures and its real condition. You have it within 24 hours.
Why this service exists
Six ways to be sold a different machine
China now holds the largest stock of used machinery in the world, and inside it excellent equipment sits next to equipment that left service for a reason. None of these six things shows up in a photo. All of them show up in the yard.
The boom is welded from the inside
The crack is cut open, a plate is welded in from within, the seam is filled, ground flat and repainted. You cannot see it. Structural strength is no longer what the factory built, and the next crack arrives on its own.
The data plate belongs to another machine
The plate is riveted on and replacing it is cheap. That is how an old model is sold as a new one, or a machine rebuilt from two donors. We run the serial number with the manufacturer and check it against the chassis stamping.
The photos are not of that machine
Images lifted from old auctions and closed listings, or retouched right over the cylinders and the pivot joints. A cold start filmed the same day and a live video call inside the yard settle it.
What ships is not what you saw
The serial in the photos does not match the one on the proforma, and that only surfaces once the machine is already on the vessel. So the serial gets photographed, written into the contract and verified again on loading day.
Everything upfront, and by tomorrow
A personal bank account, a rival buyer who appears out of nowhere, and full payment before anyone has looked at anything. Serious used equipment is bought over weeks, with payment tied to milestones: signed proforma, clean inspection, loading photos.
What gets checked
The machine, point by point
The inspection adapts to the type of equipment, but the criterion is always the same: measure what is expensive to fix, with instruments and against the manufacturer's specification.
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Engine, started cold
No pre-heating, which is when a machine cannot hide anything: smoke, noise and cranking time. The colour already tells you where to look: black is fuel and injection, blue is burnt oil, white is coolant. Plus blow-by, oil held against the light and behaviour under load.
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Hydraulics: cycle times
Stopwatch against the specification. On a 20-tonne machine the boom raises in around 3.5 seconds, the stick extends in 3 and the bucket curls in 2.5. Outside that range, the pump or the cylinders have already done more work than claimed.
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Cylinder drift test
The cylinder is loaded, the machine locked, and we measure how far it settles on its own over five minutes. More than 6 mm of rod travel or more than 10% pressure loss means an internal leak, and fresh oil does not fix that.
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Undercarriage: measured
Shoe height, chain pitch, bushing diameter, rollers, idler and sprocket tooth profile, position by position and with a gauge. On a PC200 the shoe leaves the factory near 70 mm, at 3,000 hours 52 to 60 mm remain, and past 8,000 hours between 30 and 38.
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Structure and welds
Boom foot, boom-to-stick joint, swing frame and chassis. A fresh bead or filler in a high-stress area is treated as a structural failure until a qualified technician says otherwise.
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Swing bearing and final drives
Measured play in the swing bearing, noise and knocking through the slew, swing drift with the machine at rest, and leaks at the final drives.
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Real hours, three ways
ECU readout, active and logged fault codes, and total fuel burned, which gives an independent estimate of true hours. That is then cross-checked against joystick rubber, the heel plate on the floor, the seat and the pins.
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Identity and paperwork
Data plate in high resolution, serial number run with the manufacturer and checked against the chassis stamping and the proforma. Year, model and declared hours go in writing before anyone pays.
The cost of not looking
What the miss is worth later
An inspection pays for itself the first time it avoids one of these rows. And none of these repairs happens in your city on the week your site needs it.
| What was missed | What it costs later |
|---|---|
| Undercarriage at its limit, mid-size machine | USD 15,000 – 30,000 |
| Undercarriage on a 40-tonne machine | USD 35,000 – 50,000 |
| Engine overhaul | USD 10,000 – 30,000 |
| Hydraulic pump | USD 5,000 – 15,000 |
| Leaking or sluggish hydraulics | Up to 20% of the machine's value |
| A structural crack repaired to look invisible | Certified repair, or the machine is written off |
Reference ranges from the heavy equipment repair market, in US dollars. They are here to size the risk, not to quote a specific repair. On top of them sits everything that never shows on an invoice: the idle site, the wait for the part, and a return freight that does not exist.
How it works
From enquiry to report in 24 hours
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01
You send us the machine
Link to the listing, the seller's datasheet, or simply brand, model and city.
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02
We arrange the visit
We locate the yard or factory and book with the seller. Shanghai, Qingdao, Hefei, Xuzhou and surrounding areas.
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03
Inspection in person
The inspector measures, films and runs the machine where the yard allows it: cold start, stopwatch cycle times, undercarriage with a gauge and an ECU pull.
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04
Report within 24 hours
Real condition, raw measurements, defects with photos and an explicit recommendation: buy, renegotiate or walk away.
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05
Loading supervision
If the purchase goes ahead, we come back on shipping day: we verify the loaded machine is the one in the report, photograph the serial and record the seal.
What the report contains
Raw measurements next to the factory value and the service limit, not a loose percentage: averaging a whole undercarriage into a single number is exactly what makes a report useless. Every point with its photo, defects ranked by what they cost to repair, and a signed recommendation at the end. In English, and in Spanish if your bank or your partner needs it.
Questions
What people always ask
Can you inspect a machine you are not selling me?
Yes. Inspection is a service in its own right: if you already found a machine through another supplier and want to know its condition before wiring money, we go anyway.
How do you know the real hours if the meter can be tampered with?
We pull the ECU, which keeps the original figure even when the dash is replaced, and cross it against total fuel burned and against physical wear on pins, bushings, joysticks and seat. Three independent readings: if they disagree, the report says so and gives each number.
Is a video call not enough?
It is enough to rule out the seller who does not have the machine, and you should always ask for one. It is not enough to measure a track shoe, time a cycle, run a drift test or read the ECU.
What if the seller refuses an inspection?
That is your answer. A serious yard books an inspection within days; the one who stalls or refuses is protecting something, and it is not worth finding out what.
What if the machine is in bad shape?
We tell you, with photos. We would rather lose a sale than send you equipment that will stop your site. In many cases the report also becomes the argument to renegotiate the price.
What language is the report in?
Spanish or English, whichever you need for your bank or your partner.
How long does it take?
The report is issued 24 hours after the visit. The visit is scheduled according to where the machine is; in and around Shanghai it is usually the same or the next day.
Got your eye on a machine?
Send us the listing or the datasheet and we will arrange the inspection. You will know what you are buying before the money leaves.