VIN is a unique vehicle identification number, which encodes full information about its technical characteristics, year of production, manufacturer, brand, model and much more. This code consists of 17 characters, which are structured into 3 parts – Worldwide Manufacturer Index (WMI), Descriptive (VDS) and Distinguishing (VIS) parts. It is very useful for motorists and can tell a lot about a vehicle if you use the best VIN decoder.
Where is the VIN of the car:
As a rule, most often this code can be located on the front left pillar of the body, under the floor trim near the driver’s seat, on the engine itself, on the partition between the engine and the passenger compartment, on the dashboard on the driver’s side.
Manufacturers duplicate the code in different places so that the buyer can identify the vehicle without much effort and involving unauthorized persons and minimize the risk of acquiring a stolen car.
You should also be aware that the identification number is almost always located in hard-to-reach places in order to minimize the possibility of changing it. Therefore, if you are choosing a car for yourself, carefully inspect all the places where the VIN is applied and compare the identity of the codes. Pay special attention to the areas of the body where the nameplate is attached – the number plate on the rivets is very difficult to replace without traces, so there may be welds, scratches, dents and other damage or traces of fresh paint.
In addition, the VIN code must be written in the documents for the car. When buying a vehicle, you should compare the VIN stamped on the body and the VIN found on that passport. In both places, the cipher must be completely identical. If this is not the case, then feel free to refuse to purchase this copy.
What information can a VIN give about a car:
In order to carry out a complete check of a vehicle with only an identification number, you will need the best VIN decoder. This is a special program that can tell you almost everything about the car in a couple of minutes. With its help, you can quickly find out all the necessary data about the selected instance, which will help you make the right decision: buy a car or give it up? When using such services, you will not need to go somewhere and go through many bureaucratic procedures in order to simply see the history of the vehicle. Everything you want, you will find right at home. To do this, you just need to write the VIN code in a special line on the desired site. After that, you will find out the following information:
- Real car mileage. Very often, owners twist the mileage and thereby try to inflate the cost of the copy. With the help of best VIN decoder, you can easily find out the real mileage of the vehicle, which will be a great opportunity to bargain and try to reduce the price.
- Legal problems. This may be a ban on registration or an arrest. If you buy such a car, you simply cannot register it. The VIN decoder can help you avoid such nuances and show you all the legal problems of the vehicle, if, of course, there are any.
- Information about whether the car is wanted. The acquisition of such a copy is fraught with the fact that it will simply be confiscated from you and given to the owner from whom it was stolen, or delivered to a special parking lot.
- Number and nature of accidents. If the owner hid the fact that the car was in an accident, you will definitely find out. A high-quality VIN decoder will show how many times the car has been in an accident and in some cases even show the damage itself. If you do not find out this data before buying, then after that you may reveal hidden defects that have not been fixed or have been fixed poorly. In the worst case, you may end up with a vehicle with damaged body geometry or a poor security system. You can’t ride it in any way, because this is a very strong risk to your life.
- Exploitation information. The decoder will show if the car was in a taxi or leasing. If so, then it is better not to purchase such a copy, since it most likely has many malfunctions, which are costly to fix.
- Number of owners
- Equipment
- Brand, model, year of manufacture
Spending a few minutes on all the manipulations – entering the code, waiting for a report that comes 5-15 minutes after the request – you will save yourself several days of time compared to independent trips to various authorities and learn the true history of the car. This will allow you to make the right choice, as well as bargain with the seller if you find any minor problems that he did not mention.
How to find out the make and model of a car using the VIN:
When a new car is purchased from the salon, the buyer does not have a question about how to find out the brand of car by the VIN code. This is clearly indicated by the nameplate and the company logo of the manufacturer. But in the secondary transport market, some cars change over time so much that it becomes difficult to determine its brand at first glance. Moreover, there are situations when owners modify their car in such a way that its brand becomes difficult to determine. Most often, inexpensive vehicles are subjected to such tuning, which, after transformations, become similar to sports cars or a business class. Some sellers deliberately omit the real brand in order to confuse the buyer. This often makes it impossible to understand the market value of the car or may even lead to the fact that you buy a completely different car than you wanted. Moreover, owners often change the look of the car in order to sell it for the highest possible price. In this case, even documents are forged. To find out the truth in such situations, you have to personally go to a meeting with the seller and conduct a thorough inspection of the selected copy. However, you can do everything much faster without spending a lot of effort. To do this, you just need to write the car identification number in a special field on the best VIN decoder website and after a couple of minutes you will already know the whole truth.
If you are going to buy a used vehicle, be sure to check its make and model using the VIN decoder. Such manipulations will save you from unnecessary problems in the future and will allow you to choose a really high-quality copy of the vehicle that will delight you for many more years.