Why The VIN Is The Most Important Number For Your Car
If you are interested in the history of a vehicle it is best to know its true origins. Whether you are planning to buy a vehicle and need to know its history, or you are selling your Toyota and want to give the most detailed information on it to shoppers, it's important to know where to got to find this information on the Internet.
Since the beginning of the 20th century every vehicle produced that is sold in the world includes a unique identifier called a VIN (Vehicle Identification Number). Every VIN contains vital information that acts like a fingerprint for that car or truck. Every vehicle can be identified by its VIN.
Up until 1981 each car maker was allowed to create whatever system they wanted to use to identify their vehicles. This led to mass confusion with no easy way to determine what vehicle a VIN represented just by looking at it. The problem was solved by an industry standard 17-character VIN format that was released in 1981. If you want to read the older formats there are several resources on the Internet, but only Decode This! (http://www.decodethis.com) provides a free Vehicle Indentification Number decoder that will decode all early VINs from a single source.
The modern VIN format is divided into several sections that allows certain information to be determined from the identifier. Each make, for example, is identified by the first few characters. The VIN also includes the model year, engine code, and a six-digit serial number. Taken together this code makes up the VIN. Again, Decode This! provides a detailed modern VIN decoder to allow you to automatically decode this information.
While the VIN includes plenty of information it is important to note what it does NOT include. There is no information on the specific optional equipment packages installed on an individual vehicle. Since the VIN is assigned to the vehicle at the start of the assembly line, and the options are installed later in the process, the VIN has no data on this optional equipment. This means the VIN can tell you the possible equipment that was available for a particular model year, but it will not be a vehicle history report on a particular car or truck. The original manufacturers have this data in separate databases that they license for use to certain vendors.
Online VIN decoders such as Decode This! take the VIN and using a database of information provide the information contained in that identifier in an easy to read format. Decode This! for example has an extensive on all the information available for each model year and manufacturer of cars and trucks in the US. You can get a detailed report of the information available for your vehicle.
More sources can use this VIN data to provide a way to quickly identify a vehicle. WindowSticker.us (http://www.windowsticker.us), a custom used car window sticker application, uses the VIN to determine the make, model, and year, as well as what the standard and optional equipment was available for the model year. It also can determine the possible internal and external color choices that were available.
So when you're looking for information about a vehicle the VIN is a powerful way to begin.
Article Source: http://www.search-raven.com
About the Author
The author has developed VIN Decoders that process collected data about vehicles. He's also a known expert on automotive applications such as the Custom Car Window Sticker web site known as WindowSticker.us.
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by: RichardBrown
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