Keep us posted on how you get on, be interesting to see if they make it easy or hard for you. I'll be in the same position later this year, but unfortunately there's a few complications with mine that I suspect'll mean me having to put a case to them. Car was originally registered in Germany, then became a personal import to England back in the 80's. Worse than that, when it later permanently moved to N. Ireland in the mid '90's the tax people used the date of application as the date of manufacture, been on the log book as 1995 ever since. One of the things I've been half heartedly recording in anticipation is the dates I'm finding on original parts. I realise things wear out and get changed / are made in advance of assembly, but if there's enough things that can be shown to date from around the time your chassis number indicates they should it can only reinforce your case. Cylinder head - particularly good one as it gives the day / month / year - 5th June '83 Might be a similar one on the block. Intake manifold - 27th week 1983 (late June) - Auxilliary Air Valve - Uses Bosch dating system - 349 is Sept. '83 - Distributor - Bosch 349 again - Airflow sensor - Bosch 348 - Aug. '83 - Fuel distributor - Bosch 347 July '83 - Thermotime switch - Aug. '83 -
Meant to say earlier... maybe someone reading this that already has a factory certificate can cross reference the official date of manufacture with one worked out from the sticker, would give us an idea if we're on the right track or not.
All this talk had me looking into this more for my own car, which is 40 years old in Sept. of this year. Won't be road tax free until April 2024 because of the way the cut off points fall, but will be exempt from MOT in 8 months. Rang the DVA about the tax book anomalies and guess what, have to provide proof of production date from either the vehicles manufacturer or some other recognised authority... specifically mentioned owners clubs. Have seen similar posts now and again over the years on the MK1OC asking for help but the answer seems to be it isn't done. Got me thinking, might be an opening for CGTI to make some extra cash, providing official cover letters. Not difficult to decipher the VIN's and I'd imagine there's plenty of MK1's that are already 40 years old and more turning it every day, could prove lucrative! VW's own certificates are €100, so plenty of scope to undercut them.
Have a look in your boot area, mine was on the panel the tail lights sit in (on the UK drivers side), but suppose it could vary. It's a factory paint inspection sticker (MK2 had one as well) and if it's there / the same, you'll maybe see there's a date mentioned. The day of manufacture as worked out from the VIN sticker for my car is Thursday 15th Sept. '83. 'Insp. Lack 16/9/83' being from the following day would maybe suggest we're probably working out the final manufacturing date correctly (or at least very close to it)? It does however throw up a question about the model years though - If as the MK1OC seem to suggest it ran from the start of August to the end of July my car should in theory be a '84 model year and 'FW', not 'EW'. Even moving things on by a month so it was instead the start of September to the end of August, that'd still be the case. It'd need to be from the start of October to the end of September if you use my VIN sticker as a yardstick. Again pure speculation, but it being the end days of production they maybe just chose to ignore what should've been done and let the last cars continue to be 'EW's?
Judging from the responses I was getting it was looking more and more like I was going to have problems proving my cars date of manufacture to the DVLA. With it only being half a year away I just bit the bullet and ordered a VW certificate... thinking was it's official confirmation that can't be questioned, and you hopefully can't get better than direct from the horses mouth. VW were warning of two month waits, but it turned up today after about three weeks. Still galling having to pay to remedy a mistake soley made (and admitted to) by the DVLA, but if it saves me paying road tax / MOT'ing the car I'll recoup the cost several times over in the first year alone (plus not risking my blood pressure arguing with them). For what it is, there's not a great deal of info. on the certificate other than the expected. Few things stood out for me... my car is indeed classed as a 1984 model year vehicle. According to VW the date of manufacture is officially 24 Sept '83, a Saturday. That puts the production week (38 in my case) one week after that which I had self calculating it as being. Earlier I wrote that the weeks are counted starting from 1, but VW's info. indicates that's wrong and you infact begin from 0. The other difference is the day of the production week - If you use Monday as 1, Tuesday as 2 etc. then I should be Wednesday 21st whereas VW say its actually Saturday 24th. If as on my VIN, 38-4 does equates to week/day of week that'd mean the week day according to VW is calculated from a Wednesday? Million and one reasons for the differences and could speculate all day about it with no way of ever knowing for sure - only definite is that using the system we've worked out, at worst you'll only be days astray from the official date, which isn't too bad I think!
