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Thread: In Defense of VIN Counters

  1. #21
    Senior Member
    Join Date:  Sep 2011

    Location:  Middleburg Heights, OH

    Posts:    1,939

    Agreed on mostly accurate numbering. It's about 9,000 made, give or take a few hundred.

    As for 501 being an automatic, that doesn't require a frame swap. Read more about the 500 series here, and note the gaps, they are due to zero information being known: https://www.pjgrady.co.uk/500-series-chronology

    The guys at Crawford are quite overprotective to the point of decay. If we can't get them to agree to let us fix it for free (I have tried too, not just DPI Josh), I can't fathom how they would be willing to let us put in a snake cam that they surely feel could destroy their "investment".

    Although let's be serious, the value has tragically plummeted on account of it not running anymore. They dolly it around inside, it does not appear in their annual "run 'every' car in the inventory" warm-ups, not to mention they stopped showing it years ago. Crawford hosted a "stainless cars of history" display 3-4 years ago at the Autorama and 500 was a no-show. I have pics of this event I will dig out if anyone's interested. Almost a diversion, but likely the exact time when they realized how far gone it was. $20,000 for a historic beast would be seriously pushing it. And that's sad.

  2. #22
    Nit-picking customer(as seen on TV) Iznodmad's Avatar
    Join Date:  May 2011

    Location:  Lexington, NC

    Posts:    790

    My VIN:    #5000 (Grey, manual, SS chassis, intercooled twin turbo), #16128 (Grey, auto, efi twin turbo), #888

    Club(s):   (DCVA) (SEDOC) (DCUK)

    I think you may be interpreting the history incorrectly. There was a certain story that was circulated for a very long time that was more recently changed with the publication of a book of a former high ranking employee. 500 had superficial damage on the day/night before JZD was supposed to be inspecting "Job 1" as it was referred to by the inner circles. Rather than not have something for him to inspect, they simply substituted 501 as *the* car to go over with a fine toothed comb. That is why the term "swapped" is being used. I don't think the term swap is to be used in a sense of swapping VINs or parts from one car to another. This is the way is written by Barrie Wills who was there that day and appears in the historical pictures. It has been a while since I read his book and my memory of the details may be fuzzy. Regardless, it is believed that 501 was one of many early cars to be scrapped. Also, I've never personally swapped a transmission either way (auto to manual or manual to auto), but the hole in the frame where the gear selectors go through are different. There are apparently very few owners that give a crap about any of this stuff, but I find it fascinating. Also sad that 500 is decaying. I saw it in the year 2000, which is also the one and only time I got to meet JZD and get his autograph.

  3. #23
    Senior Member
    Join Date:  Sep 2011

    Location:  Middleburg Heights, OH

    Posts:    1,939

    I apparently wiped out the "typo explains the transmission mistake" (remember 559's officially a manual, but has never been), but more than anything my info is outdated. I didn't even know Barrie had a book out! Nick Sutton's book release was the last book I knew came out.

    That does explain the unique things only 500 has. Blackout HVAC being one of them, I have always questioned how a last-minute swap would have that result.

    500 is still around, it may be worth asking if DPI Josh can make the offer again. He was still McFly Motorsports when that conversation happened (showing my age here!!!) and I'm sure the name led to it not being taken seriously.

  4. #24
    Nit-picking customer(as seen on TV) Iznodmad's Avatar
    Join Date:  May 2011

    Location:  Lexington, NC

    Posts:    790

    My VIN:    #5000 (Grey, manual, SS chassis, intercooled twin turbo), #16128 (Grey, auto, efi twin turbo), #888

    Club(s):   (DCVA) (SEDOC) (DCUK)

    The black out Hvac panel shows up on some pilot cars as well, maybe even a few more really early 500 series cars. That explains why the lights behind are always lit, all the way through the production run. It was decided that it was difficult to see when the sun was shining in and this started the run of at least 6 different versions of the decal. All later versions are able to be seen without being illuminated from behind.

  5. #25
    Member
    Join Date:  Jul 2014

    Posts:    38

    My VIN:    16306

    Quote Originally Posted by citizen View Post
    Those comments written by Shannon are from some years ago. I know there has been at least one found (with a VIN plate photo as verification) that was not in Shannon's original count. Yes, we should update the comments section of the Registry information page accordingly.
    That'd be great if you guys could update that, would love to know what new information has been found in the last few year.

  6. #26
    Senior Member
    Join Date:  May 2011

    Location:  Northern NJ

    Posts:    8,570

    My VIN:    10757 1st place Concourse 1998

    As sad as it is to hear they are letting the car get run-down, as long as it is kept inside it will never get so bad as to not be restorable. The only thing that could prevent that is the unavailability of certain parts. That may already have occurred and the way around that is to just make custom parts for anything that is missing and unique to the car. Be happy the car is still around and available to the public at all. Look how they took care of the BTTF "hero" car till they did something about it.
    David Teitelbaum

  7. #27
    Senior Member
    Join Date:  Sep 2011

    Location:  Middleburg Heights, OH

    Posts:    1,939

    Completely agree. It's not too far gone, it will never get that bad. But I truly think they would be far more receptive to the idea now that they realize it doesn't comfortably run anymore. Last I saw it the headliners were sagging also. It doesn't take much to convince them we're onto something, and it's been years since anyone last offered.

    I do think if we ask now, they'd at least be convincable. Before they just flat out found it offensive to ask. Given the BTTF resto (thanks for reminding me on that one), I think it won't take much for them to let us.

    If we can manage to get an original DMC employee to show up to talk about 500, help out, maybe be there for candid pics, I don't think it would be hard at all to have them let us do it. Barrie might provide a lot of insight as he's there in original pics of 500's finishing touches too (as Darren mentioned), and that kind of reunion is sure to get them to hold onto the car for a very long time and be far more open to us tuning it up every now and then.

    I mean hey, we're here to preserve history here, that's it.

  8. #28
    Senior Member
    Join Date:  May 2011

    Location:  Houston

    Posts:    706

    My VIN:    16113

    Club(s):   (SCDC) (DCUK)

    Back in 2010 I wrote a paper on the production of Deloreans. At that time I came up with 8,975 cars. What I wrote can be found at this link:
    http://www.citizenkidd.com/dmc/pages/vin.asp
    The article probably needs to be updated due to additional information uncovered since it was written but it should be fairly accurate.

    Thomas Kidd has pulled together a lot of great statistical information that is posted at that website.
    Shannon

  9. #29
    Nothing witty here lest it offend
    Join Date:  May 2011

    Posts:    990

    Interest in the details of individual cars and numbers relating to the marque has spawned a few published books and websites in the last handful of years. There are yet mysteries to be untangled. Just the other day I was messaged about claims about former celebrity owned car -- which are not substantiated. Other times people have sold cars unaware of a direct connection with JZD and factory employees. Efforts have gone into uncovering the story behind the Saudi cars now floating around Europe. Reasons abound.

  10. #30
    Member
    Join Date:  Sep 2016

    Location:  Cardiff

    Posts:    93

    My VIN:    11789

    Did somebody mention Saudi cars? Now that's an interesting story

    If you want to see some Dubai sand go here.

    http://dmctalk.org/showthread.php?15...260#post226260
    Currently resurrecting Vin # 11789 - One of the batch of 50 exported to the Middle East in 1982.

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