I just talked to my friend, who is really knowledgeable about VW's (he ran
a shop restoring euro cars, mostly VW's, and building vintage euro racing
cars for vintage racing, for some 10+ years).
He explained to me the funkiness of the VW's and date of manufacture,
registration date, over the years.
He said that sometimes they would sometimes rework a car for some reason,
and the DOM would indicate a date at which the car was not actually off the
line. An example might be, as he says, a black Beetle. He said the black
Beetles were made from a complete Beetle of a different color which was
judged to have flawless bodywork. So they would take a complete car off
the line, then send it back and repaint it, sometimes taking months, and
put it back out. The date of manufacture would indicate the date that the
car originally made it off of the line. This would explain how cars made
in April of year X might eventually arrive in the States as a year model
X+1. Same is likely true of just about any car deemed "special edition" or
whatever, and he said it's likely for GTI's and GLI's to be reworked this
way. The convertible KG's were built from coupes, hand-selected complete
coupes were converted and the DOM reflects the original car, the black
beetles, just about any special-type car might get this treatment.
Similarly, he said sometimes they would continue to make cars of year X
beyond the normal cutoff point for year X manufacturing, due to the way
they acquired and used parts. So if they changed the grille, say, between
1987 and 1988, and they still had a couple of hundred 1987-style grilles
laying around in September of '87, and if that were one of the only changes
to the car, and they had other '87 style parts, they might make a couple of
hundred more 1987 model cars which did not make it to the U.S. until early
1988. So you have an '87 model car which had a very late '87 or even early
'88 build date.
Also, he said that the length of time it took to get a car from Germany to
the US would also have an effect on the relationship between the DOM and
the year of its registration. The dealer might order a bunch of '99 cars
in mid-99, and due to delays in shipment, etc., they might actually get the
cars on the lot in late '99 or 2000, while they were built as '99 spec
cars. Might be registered either way, either as an oddball 2000 model, or
as a very late-build '99.
Anyway, seems as time goes on VW gets more and more onboard with the ways
of the global automotive community and keeps a tighter watch on it. So
late-model cars are unlikely as affected by these kinds of phenomena.
He originally explained this to me, more briefly, when I told him that the
sales paperwork from my '89 indicated it was sold in 1990 to the original
owner.
-- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Josh Karnes <>< "As long as the devil gives you slack in Austin TX
your chain, you think you are free."
- Dick Brown
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