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RHD Lupos made in batches. But when?


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Had a chat with someone the other day who says he used to work with VW Belgium in one of the production facilities. But not when the Lupo was rolling off the lines. So we got talking about Lupo related things.

Apparently the UK/Ireland and Jap market cars were all made in smallish batches for only a few months at a time. Many more LHD cars were made compared to our RHD versions. He thinks that there were only 6 runs for the RHD market, the last being 2004 (one a year?!), which I find very hard to believe, as I've seen date stamps all over the place. But I can confirm that my 2003 and my 2001 SDIs must have been the same batch as the date codes are almost the same on most components.

But it could just be that once built, they sat on a remote airfield ready to be shipped out to the next dealer. Poor stock management means you could potentially have received a car that was built maybe two years earlier.

Anyone have any further insight? I'm sure Gtis are different.

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My Brussels-built RHD Gti's VIN includes Model Year = 2005.  (Car built for Japan market).  

Your comment about time lapse between build/first registration was quite generally applicable in earlier times when the Industry mostly used a push manufacturing model.  I worked for three manufacturers over the 70s/80s/90s where we sometimes had cars sitting for a couple of years in Northern France, waiting to be called over.  In the early/mid 70s the fuel crises extended this period out to three years and more! And that was the era when galvanised  bodies were only slowly coming on-stream, so no wonder we had the odd corrosion 'challenge!'

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My GTI is a 05 for sure. I can even date mine. When i first got the car I found a sticker on the slam panel. It said alignment issue Feb 05. So mine went off the production  line that month to be corrected.

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My 2003 GTI was built 24-1-2003 and registered 3-3-2003. ETKA tells me the build date, so if anyone does want to know the actual build date of their GTI, PM me your chassis number and I can check it for you (I feel I may regret this decision!)

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I think all GTIs were built in Germany, with the other variants in Belgium? And Seat had their own Arosa thing going. No Arosa GTI I believe. Apparently Arosas rolled off the Lupo production line before the first ever Lupos were assembled- in Wolfsburg.

I wonder how different build quality is depending on where they were made....

All the engines were from Czech republic I think.

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