June 2010 Issue - New England Fiero Association

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The 9 th digit in the Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) is called a “check digit”. For instance, the VIN for my ’88 GT is 1G2PG119XJP224967; the “X” is the check digit. It’s that elusive digit or character which there seems to be no logic to its value. I’ve been told that the purpose of the check digit is intended to prevent “new” cars to be made from stolen ones. Every other digit in the VIN has a logical, determinable source, which is well documented and easily determined. The secrecy of the check digit came home for me when I started working on the Pontiac Fiero T-Top Registry. I had a list of all the serial numbers of the T-Top S5. Check Digit cars from Cars & Concepts, but unfortunately, they didn’t record the rest of the VIN or the model. Since I considered my documentation of the T-Tops as a service to, not only the Fiero community, but also Pontiac, I asked the Pontiac Historical Service if they could help me fill in the rest of the VIN. Well, that door got slammed really fast as they refused based on the car cloning possibility. Being an Engineer, and a numbers guy, I figured that there must be logic to it… they can’t just be random… there has to be some way to confirm a valid VIN. I tried but couldn’t seem to break the code. Eventually the solution appeared on the Internet (naturally) presumable sourced from an internal GM or Federal document. The important part is that it Works! I wound up using this formula to determine the 3 possible VINs for each T-Top serial number. I then signed up for CarFax and started searching for the VINs. Amazingly I was able determine the complete VIN for 1160 of the 1252 official factory T-Tops. Where there’s a will, there’s a way! S5.1 A check digit shall be provided with each vehicle identification number. The check digit shall immediately follow the fifth character of the second section and appear with the vehicle and on any transfer documents containing the vehicle identification number and prepared by the manufacturer to be given to the first owner for purposes other than resale. S5.2 The check digit is determined by carrying out the mathematical computation specified in S5.2.1-S5.2.4. S5.2.1 Assign to each number in the vehicle identification number its actual mathematical value and assign to each letter the value specified for it in Table IV. S5.2.2 Multiply the assigned value for each character in the vehicle identification number by the weight factor specified for it in Table V. Multiply the check digit by “0”. Add the resulting products and divide by “11”.
TABLE II Year: 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 Code: A B C D E F G H J K L M Year: 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 Code: N P R S T V W X Y 1 2 3 Year: 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 Code: 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B C D E F TABLE III Characters Used: Numbers: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 0 Letters: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, J, K, L, M, N, P, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y, Z All spaces provided for in the vehicle identification number must be occupied by a character specified in Table III. Table IV Letter: A B C D E F G H J K L M N P R S T U V W X Y Z = : 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 7 9 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Table V Character: 1 st 2 nd 3 rd 4 th 5 th 6 th 7 th 8 th 10 th 11 th 12 th 13 th 14 th 15 th 16 th 17 th Weight: 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 Note: 9 th digit is the Check Digit. Character weight is “0” EXAMPLE: Vehicle Identification Number: 1G4AH59H45G118341 VIN: 1 G 4 A H 5 9 H 4 5 G 1 1 8 3 4 1 Value: 1 7 4 1 8 5 9 8 4 5 7 1 1 8 3 4 1 Weight: 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 10 - 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 Product: 8 49 24 5 32 15 18 80 - 45 56 7 6 40 12 12 2 Sum of Products = 411; then Divide by 11: 411/11 = 37 with a remainder of 4. Therefore, Check Digit is “4”. This compares to the number 4 in the 9 th position of this VIN.
Page 1 and 2: Joint Publication by Mid-Atlantic F
Page 3 and 4: The warm and sunny weather is final
Page 5 and 6: It was a hot summer day for the NEF
Page 7 and 8: As such this car was photographed w
Page 9 and 10: ecame probably the most expensive c
Page 11 and 12: On Sunday, May 16 th , the Nutmeg C
Page 13 and 14: club’s efforts. The big thanks go
Page 15 and 16: R130 ‐ FIERO ‐ STOCK NOTCHBACK
Page 17: Shop diorama. These Fieros came in
Page 22 and 23: FOR SALE 1984 INDY Automatic, nice

June 2010 Issue - New England Fiero Association

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