How to verify a used engine supplier before you pay
Every buyer in this trade knows someone who paid for a container that never sailed. The fraud is rarely sophisticated — it survives because buyers skip six checks that take one afternoon.
Wholesale onlyRegular orders are one full container — 90 engines in a 20-ft or 130 in a 40-ft, or with gearboxes 45 + 45 / 65 + 65. New customers can make their first purchase from 10 engines (10, 20, 30 or 40), with gearboxes and consolidated shipping, at list price, with no first-order surcharge (LCL freight quoted separately): first-order offer. A second order can start from 45 engines, also at list price. We do not sell single units.
More modelsBeyond the models on this page we hold many more — 488 engine and gearbox families in our warehouse list, always subject to inventory changes. Tell us how many units you need so we can give you the best price: full stock list.
1. A legal identity you can check, in a jurisdiction you can reach
Ask for the registered company name, licence number and registered address — not the brand name, the legal one. Then check it against the issuing registry. A supplier trading through a UAE entity gives you a jurisdiction where a commercial dispute has a route; a WeChat contact with no registered entity gives you a story.
Ours, for the record: Silkvin & Engicor LLC, operating as ENGICOR under a Sharjah Media City Free Zone (Shams) license — printed at the foot of every page of this site.
2. Video of the actual stock
Photos can be borrowed; recent video of the engines on the floor is much harder to fake. Ask to see the stock you are discussing, with engine codes readable where visible. A supplier who cannot show it is brokering someone else's yard — which is a different price and a different risk than what you are being quoted.
Our version: supervised video and photographs of the units selected for your order, filmed at the Guangzhou warehouse we work from and reviewed digitally before shipment — or visit for a Guangzhou Inspection Day (visit deposit credited to your order: USD 500 for a visit tied to a first order of 10–40 engines; USD 1,000 for container orders) and inspect your prepared lot in person.
3. Per-unit photos that tie images to engines
A quotation for '90 engines, mixed' is not evidence of anything. A photo file where every engine in your order has its own reference — Engine 1, Engine 2, Engine 3… — linked to photographs from every side, and a packing list that uses the same references, lets you compare what arrives with what was photographed. No per-unit photos, no evidence — walk away.
4. The bank account name matches the company name
The oldest red flag in the trade, and still the most reliable. If the invoice says one company and the beneficiary account says another — a personal account, a different company, a different country — stop. A legitimate supplier's payment instructions match their legal identity, every time.
5. A grade and a check defined in writing
'Tested' is marketing until it is written down. Ask what the grade means, exactly which check was done on each engine, and what — if anything — applies if a unit arrives in poor condition. Get the answers in writing, in the quotation or the Proforma Invoice.
Ours, in writing: Grade A only. Each engine is cleaned, handled and looked over, and its crankshaft is turned by hand with a tool to confirm that the mechanism rotates; it is then photographed from every side. What the check covers: a manual crankshaft rotation check and an individual photo record. It is not a compression, leak-down, bench or running test, so on its own it does not prove how an engine will run once installed. A supplier who sells only one grade and says so plainly is telling you something useful about how they work.
6. A named person who answers in writing
Fraud hides behind sales desks. Ask who owns the company, and whether that person will put their name on the quotation and the Proforma Invoice. You are wiring five figures across a border: the counterparty should be a person with a name, a licence and something to lose.
Price a container yourself
Build the mix you want in the online quoter — 90 engines in a 20-ft or 130 in a 40-ft, or 45 + 45 / 65 + 65 with gearboxes — and the FOB total reaches your inbox the same minute, at our published per-unit prices, every engine Grade A. Prefer to ask? Tell us the destination country and the models you need and we reply within one business day, usually within hours.
New customer? Your first order can start with 10, 20, 30 or 40 engines, with gearboxes and consolidated shipping available — first purchase only, at list price, with no first-order surcharge. See the first-order offer →
Frequently asked
Is an Alibaba Gold Supplier badge enough?
It is a paid listing tier, not an audit of the engines. Run the six checks regardless of platform badges.
Should I use an inspection company instead?
A third-party inspection verifies the goods on one day; these checks verify the counterparty, and both have a place. Compression, leak-down and similar tests are not available at the warehouse: no measuring equipment is on site. You or your representative are welcome to review your engines at the warehouse. Our own documentation is the supervised video, the manual crankshaft rotation check and the per-order photo file.
What deposit structure is safe?
The structure matters less than the counterparty, but the safest shape is staged: a deposit that starts preparation, per-unit documentation you can review, and the balance before shipment once you have seen it — all against a written Proforma Invoice from a verifiable legal entity. Ours is a 30% deposit of the agreed order total (starts order preparation and arranges the shipping booking), with the engines documented by supervised video and individual photographs (the Engine 1, Engine 2… file), and the remaining 70% settled before shipment. Full prepayment to an unverifiable supplier is how the losses happen.