R
rogtwo@aol.com
Guest
The discussion of VIN numbers got me interested in my own VIN Number -
100167.
First, let me make it absolutely clear that I'm new to Amphicars, and know
nothing about VIN numbers except what I just read on this list.
But, I decided to take a look at the VIN numbers listed at:
http://www.amphicar.com/members/members.html
I looked at all the VIN numbers, but (due to my own interest) I will deal
here with only 6 digit VIN numbers that start with "1". I recorded 43 of
these.
I then looked at the third digit in these 43 VIN's. In all cases, the third
digit (from the left) was either a 0, 1, 2, or 3. The following shows how
many of each of these I found:
0's - 20
1's - 11
2's - 1
3's - 11
IF the 3rd digit were just an additional sequential number, then I would
expect to see more 2's. That is, if the last 4 digits were all sequential,
then we would know that there were 1000 "0" cars produced, 1000 "1" cars
produced and 1000 "2" cars produced. We can't be sure of the number of "3"
cars produced, but I do see there is a 103934 out there indicating a least
934 "3" cars.
If this is true, it would be hard to explain the lack of "2" cars. Maybe a
statistician out there could tell us what the odds are of getting this
lopsided distribution assuming the VIN numbers are a random sample.
So, it seems unlikely to me that the last 4 digits are all sequential. I
suspect the 3rd number was assigned for some other reason, but I have no idea
if the 3rd number stands for the year or not.
I agree it seems unlikely that Amphicar would have started out with an
expectation of producing less than 1000 cars a year. But, it seems possible
that after the first (or maybe second) years production, someone came up with
the bright idea of rolling the 3 digit up by one for the next years
production.
Anyway, back to my car - 100167 - Am I correct in assuming that a car with a
number this low was almost assuredly manufactured in 1960?
Maybe we can all get our Amphi's carbon-dated.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
100167.
First, let me make it absolutely clear that I'm new to Amphicars, and know
nothing about VIN numbers except what I just read on this list.
But, I decided to take a look at the VIN numbers listed at:
http://www.amphicar.com/members/members.html
I looked at all the VIN numbers, but (due to my own interest) I will deal
here with only 6 digit VIN numbers that start with "1". I recorded 43 of
these.
I then looked at the third digit in these 43 VIN's. In all cases, the third
digit (from the left) was either a 0, 1, 2, or 3. The following shows how
many of each of these I found:
0's - 20
1's - 11
2's - 1
3's - 11
IF the 3rd digit were just an additional sequential number, then I would
expect to see more 2's. That is, if the last 4 digits were all sequential,
then we would know that there were 1000 "0" cars produced, 1000 "1" cars
produced and 1000 "2" cars produced. We can't be sure of the number of "3"
cars produced, but I do see there is a 103934 out there indicating a least
934 "3" cars.
If this is true, it would be hard to explain the lack of "2" cars. Maybe a
statistician out there could tell us what the odds are of getting this
lopsided distribution assuming the VIN numbers are a random sample.
So, it seems unlikely to me that the last 4 digits are all sequential. I
suspect the 3rd number was assigned for some other reason, but I have no idea
if the 3rd number stands for the year or not.
I agree it seems unlikely that Amphicar would have started out with an
expectation of producing less than 1000 cars a year. But, it seems possible
that after the first (or maybe second) years production, someone came up with
the bright idea of rolling the 3 digit up by one for the next years
production.
Anyway, back to my car - 100167 - Am I correct in assuming that a car with a
number this low was almost assuredly manufactured in 1960?
Maybe we can all get our Amphi's carbon-dated.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
