slate blue

One less Gt on the road

But the engine and gearbox will live on in my car, I don't think I'm a crazy driver like this fellow probably was.

kary4th

According to a book my wife bought me (since it's written in German, I can barely read it):

Euro (rest of world) VIN's
0001 - 1584 = 928 S4 + Club Sport Coupe
(Note, 10 Club Sport Coupe's went to rest of world, 2 went to USA)
1582 - 2488 = 928 S4 + GT*** Coupe

USA + CDN VIN's
0001 - 1250 = 928 S4 Coupe


***928 GT Fahrzeuge erhalten keine eigenen Fahrzeug Ident Nummern. Die Identitat eines 928 GT Fahrzeugs kann nur werksintern in den productionsunterlagen durch den Vermerk Mehrausstattung M 639 Sondermodell GT festgestellt werden.
____________________________________
A (poor) babelfish translation reads:
928 GT of vehicles do not receive an own vehicle Ident numbers. The Identitat 928 GT of a vehicle can be determined only company intern into the productionsunterlagen by the note optional extra M 639 special model GT.

If anyone could really translate this, I'd appreciate it.

I hope this provides some new information. At least, it seems to me that it may explain why some of the information on the GT's is vague..

911Dave

I don't see why there should be any ambiguity at all. Porsche AG surely must have a record of every car they've ever made, with option information. If the M639 option code means GT, they should be able to tell us in less than 3 seconds EXACTLY how many were made and to which markets they were shipped.

Cameron

I hope that there was no passenger in that car when it crashed.

928cs

An important question for me:
Are the VIN numbers different for the US&CAN cars than ROW cars?

For example:
Are WPOJBO92XKS861244 and WPOZZZ92ZKS841244 two different cars?

Thanks in advance,
Samuel

John Veninger

Don't think anyone has seen a CS in the US.

Vilhuer

Hi Samuel,

Simple answer is yes. There are at least three double VIN's in Chuck's registry where both US and Euro have same last four numbers. Because of this, 13th digit should always be included as 14-17 do not make VIN unique. It's even better when KS861244 and KS841244 model year is also mentioned.

Vilhuer

US VIN check services give 924 S details with those two VIN's but since VIN is obviously 928 they must give wrong info. Since Canada has same VIN series as USA, maybe they went there.

928cs

Hi Erkka,

In this case, there is a problem with at least one car I have seen.

It was a rare Euro S3 and the VIN stamped on the wing was like a US while the front plate was like a ROW, with the same number.
Strange, isn't it?

Samuel

AO

I'll see what i can dig up later today guys. I have a resource that lists the % of 5-speeds for 928's. The downside is that it might only list this infor for U.S. sales and not global production. I'll see what I can find. Stay tuned.

rixter

Samuel,
early cars (77-80) were designated at the factory as either ROW or US and stamped that way
later cars (81-95) were all initially stamped ROW and then given US vin when imported for sale
therefore, an 83 would in essence have 2 vins, 1 stamped into the body and another on the pillar

make sense?

Vilhuer

Not really that strange. Cars get different VIN tags at different points on production line. At some early points it's not always known if end result is going to be ROW or US model. USA is full of cars which have both US and ROW style VIN's in a way that certain chars are different in different places where number is stamped or printed.

Using your example these two are both same car:
As are these two:
So real difference is not safety equipment code (chars 4-6) or check digit (char 9) but market designation (char 13). On US cars normally number on windshield base is something else than ZZZ and it's determing data on registration. Check digit is number or X and is based on calculation what uses all other VIN chars as seed.

On ROW cars we obviously usually have ZZZ and Z filler but in US models there are almost always both VIN versions visible on same car. Since S3 was mainly done for US market it's possible your S3 example was thought to be heading there also but got diverted as ROW model while in production. Is 13th char is ROW 4 or US 6? If it's 6 then in my opinion car should be considered as US model even though it could have been delivered anywhere.

928cs

OK, thanks for those explanations to both of you.

I will modify my club register file to solve potential problems, even if US cars are very uncommon in France.
I think I only have two.

Best regards,
Samuel

AO

Here's what I found. Unfortunately the source I used (Wards Auto) does not track global fittment rates. But here's what i have.

Scott M.

Andrew;

If your source is even somewhat correct that gives some rather cool info...

1) ALL '77 US cars were 5 spds.
2) A bit more than half of 84's were sunroof cars. I highly question this one...
3) 11% of 89's were 5 spds or 109 cars. With 60 89 GT's known that means more GT's than 89 5 spds. huuummm
4) All 91 5spd were GT's obviously, so 117.44 were imported.
5) More than 1/2 of GTS's were sticks. Seems about right from my personal observations. (and most of them were black)

Kewl stuff, and thanks for the Lotus info. Tally HO!!