How to Read VIN Plates

Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) is a serial number, unique to every vehicle, something like your "social security number." It is used by all manufacturers and all related parties such as police, insurance companies or buyers to help identify and track individual motor vehicles. The currently accepted standard was introduced in 1981, but the VIN has its roots in the Detroit's manufacturers habit of stamping serial numbers on the vehicles and parts they produced, a practice that dates back to the 1950s. Needless to say, early VIN's came in all shapes and sizes and were mostly used by each manufacturer to keep track of its own products. The standard used today came as a response to the request made in the 1980's by the United States Department of Transportation, through which all road worthy vehicles were required to have a 17 character VIN. Today's VIN systems are based on two related standards, ISO 3779 and ISO 3780, issued by the International Organization for Standardization. The two systems have been adopted by both the European Union and the United States, but as often is the case, implementation of the two standards differ in the two regions. VIN is comprised of 17 characters, divided into sections and subsection, each of them designed to perform a different role in the identification. 1. Characters 1 through 3 are called World Manufacturer Identifier (WMI) and are used to identify the vehicle's manufacturer and country of origin. The first character of the set represents the country in which the manufacturer is located, the second stands for the manufacturer's name and the third shows the type of vehicle, or in some cases, the manufacturing division. 2. Characters 4 through 8 are called the Vehicle Descriptor Sector (VDS), and are used for determining the type of the vehicle. This part of the VIN is subject to each manufacturer's interpretation. These four characters can include the type of platform used for the vehicle, the model or the body style. Most of the producers however use the 8th character to identify the engine type of the car, for those models which come in more than one engine version. 3. Character 9 is called the check digit and is a compulsory feature in North American VINs. It is an important tool used as a way to identify the accuracy of the VIN. It appears on every document prepared by the manufacturer to be given to the first owner and consist of a single number or the letter X. The VIN check digit can be used to determine whether a VIN is correct, and can even allow the determination of other digits should they be missing or transposed. The check digit can be calculated, but we should warn you, this might seem tricky. To calculate the check digit, any letter in the VIN must be assigned a numeric value, according to the following table (numbers already in the VIN retain their existing value): Note that the letters O, Q and I do not normally appear in the VIN, because they are likely to be confused with the numbers zero and one. Numeric value table Letter        A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H     J  K  L  M  N  P  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z Numeric Value 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8  1 2 3  4 5  7  9  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9