Why can't i extract the Date Code from the Chassis Number?

For example, on my car, the sticker on the door jamb is long gone. But shouldn't i be able to extract the Date Code from the Chassis Number?

CN: #3329543

According to the CN decoder, that means my car was build in Week 33, Day 2 of 1970.

Hence, the Date Code should be 08/70 ...

Yes?
Andy

Maybe, but not necessarily.

As I understand the chassis code, it is" the date that the chassis bgan production". As an aside, I do not know if that means the code was stamped into the first piece of sheetmetal that began the chassis fabrication process, or if it indicates the date a completed chassis began to have more parts installed to make a completed vehicle.

More to the point, the chassis code indicates week, day, Karmann Factory and 3-digit sequential number, but it does not indicate year. So the same chassis code exists for multiple vehicles produced on the same date in different years. Note that the code format changed in 1975 to begin the sequential number in '5'.

Also, especially if the chassis code indicates a day late in the month, the date code mon the safety compliance label at the rear door jamb, may indiacate the following month after the chassi code month. The reason is that from teh dates/codes I have seen (see teh LE Registry), it took anywhere from a couiple days to a couple weeks to 'complete' a vehicle. Its easy to understand that a chassis starts down the line and is compelteedd relatively quickly, but maybe there is an issue requiring re-work, hence a delay of a few days or more. I am guessing, but it seems to me that the safety compliance label with the date code on it may have been the very last item installed on the car...it would correlate to the day or month it passed a safety inspection. Its the only label on the 914 with a date code.

Mhmmm ...

The year is no problem, as i know the VIN of my car.


I guess that makes sense. If the chassis number had been added during the end of assembly, there would be no writing under the dash or painted over stamping in the rear trunk.
So the CN was assigned at the *beginning* of the assembly.

And the Date Code sticker was US only, correct?
Andy

Your 'date code sticker' is what I call the safety compliance label. The wording on the label attests to that vehicles satisfying Federal safety standards...on that date, or at least during that month and year. So that label is only for USA market cars...not ROW cars, if you don't count a label in the same place on Japanese market cars.

Another aside, I have a couple of COAs on the website that indicate a completion date or 'birthdate', which if compard to the chassis number for that same vehicle indicates a start to finish production time of only a couple days. They were cranking them out as fast as they could make them.

I believe that the body #/chassis # was assigned between the completion of welding, and the paint booth until the stamping of the number in the rear trunk was replaced by the tag in the front trunk. The stamping in the rear trunk is painted over, so I infer it was stamped prior to painting. When they went to the front tag, it was riveted to an already painted body. The Karmann tag with the body # & paint code was also riveted to a painted body; sometimes the wrong tag was applied to a body.

Note that the VIN stamping in the front fender was done in an unpainted rectangle. Not having looked at one closely in a long time, I don't know if a clear wash was painted over it to prevent rusting.

I believe that the VIN was assigned fairly early in the final assembly process. Stamping the VIN in the fender would be easier without the suspension in the way, and riveting the tag onto the windshield frame would have to be done before the glass was installed.

The dash was scribbled with the body #, not the VIN, so I'd guess the dash was installed before the VIN was known. This is not exactly the case with the 914/6 where the dash got its own serial number. The 914/6 dash # always had the year digit whereas the 1970 914/6 bodies did not have a year digit.

Jeff is correct, and as I stated in my PM to Andy, duplicate body numbers are not only possible (one each year), but I do have such a pair in my database. Jeff is also correct that the car would be completed later than the body and by several weeks in some cases. So that certainly means that the completion date could always be the next calendar month. Using my database I can usually guess the month of completion by the VIN, but would use the body number to help refine the guess.

The compliance decal was only for North America AFAIK. Some other countries may have had their own version. I really need a lot more data.

that would be August 11, 1970

funny, I thought the model year ended in July

Gustl

Not the case in 1970. They made about 1200 cars after Andy's. I have several examples of Aug production in my database.
1971 production did not start until September, but does appear to end in July.
1972 production did not start until September, but does appear to end in June.
1973 production started in August and does appear to end in July.
1974 production started in August and does appear to end in July.
1975 production started in July and does appear to end in June.
1976 production did not start until September and ends in December.