Dean_Fuller

Just noticed something odd on my 89 S4. As far as I know this is a US car however the passenger side fender next to the radiator overflow tank has a ZZZ number....Its the correct VIN just a euro version. Is this on all later cars??? I've have not noticed if it is....if so what is the reason to have different prefixes on the same VIN? Its the only "extra" ZZZ number I can find...all others are the same as the tag in the windshield frame ( US number)

brutus

That is normal.

WallyP

All cars start life with the ZZZ VIN. USA cars get changed part-way thru assembly.

928cs

A "Euro" (Rest of the world in fact) would have been ZKS84.....

For example, my car is wp0zzz92zks840188.

Vilhuer

When raw body was made Porsche did not yet know what kind of safety equipment they would need to put on and thus they had to use ZZZ in fender VIN. Once body is in assembly they installed what they knew was needed at the time and could put JBO in windshield plate.

Having two different VIN's for single car is constant source of problems for cars imported from US as that movable plate is not valid place to put VIN in cars in here. Since US paperwork says JBO or whatever and body has ZZZ this causes problems in yearly inspection when local US models are checked.

RyanPerrella

huh, i never knew this

interesting new fact for the day

EPMD-101

yeah when the car comes in to be federalized they probably think it's on a stolen frame

rixter

this is true for '81+ cars, pre-81 would be stamped the same since vin system was still 10 digits

pcar928fan

I did not know that either! Very interesting! Thanks guys! The things you can learn on this list! Never ceases to amaze me!

Dean_Fuller

News to me obviously...as already stated my son's 80 model does not have this. Thanks for the replies.

Vilhuer

'78-80 MY VIN do not contain anything which would tell what safery equipment they have. There weren't reason for Porsche to make several different numbers.

jpitman2

I have seen a ROW car where its clear the first stamp on the fender was messed up, covered with * and redone beside it....not in US, so no real issue for owner.
jp 83 Euro S AT 51k

928autobahndreamer

Once again I am so glad somebody asked this question. I had noticed this on my car and was worried that this meant there had been some previous unreported damage that caused that part to be replaced. Never got the courage up to ask myself. The depth of knowledge here is fantastic.

oz928s4

Yeah my car was imported from Stuttgart and it has the ZZZ in the vin number.
So the rest of world build was the start point for all of the later 928's is that correct.

Vilhuer

No, body is different between ROW and US models. At least rear side marker light holes are missing in ROW bodies. VIN is also different, 13th digit is the char to look for. ROW and US bodies have had different VIN sequence in every model year despite similar looking ZZZ stamping in fender. It was known from the start if car is going to be ROW or US model. It just wasn't known what kind of seatbelts and airbags US models would get until much later on in production line than bodyshop. US requlations require that window plate VIN says what kind of safety features were installed and thus body and window plate have different VIN's.