How to prove a Morris's build date

Build and despatch dates, read from the original factory ledgers. This is an actual archive holding actual records, not a club register - and at GBP 15 for the answer alone it is the cheapest build date anywhere on this page.

issuer

British Motor Industry Heritage Trust, British Motor Museum, Gaydon

cost

GBP 52 standard, GBP 65 Premier. Postage GBP 7.50 to the USA and rest of world. A Production Record Request - the answer only, no certificate - is GBP 15.

time

28 working days

you supply

The chassis number read off the car itself, not off the logbook. They may ask for proof of ownership.

States when the car was built and, separately, when it left the factory. The best kind of document there is.

Jaguar is NOT covered here, whatever you have read. BMIHT's own FAQ sends Jaguar owners to the Jaguar Daimler Heritage Trust. Ordering the wrong one costs GBP 52 and four weeks. Their insistence that you read the chassis number off the car is deliberate: logbooks are full of transcription errors.

The single best evidence there is, and it is free. Look for it before you pay anyone anything.

issuer

The original manufacturer, at the factory

cost

Free

time

Immediate

you supply

Nothing but a torch and a phone camera.

States when the car was built. This is the date every import rule is measured from.

NHTSA puts this first: the 25-year period runs from the date of manufacture, and the agency looks for that date on a label permanently affixed to the vehicle by its original manufacturer. Everything else on this site exists because that label is missing. Photograph the driver's door aperture, the passenger door aperture, the engine bay bulkhead and the centre pillars before you conclude there isn't one.

Proves nothing about age, and is actively misleading: a CoC issued today for a 1997 car is dated today.

issuer

The manufacturer

cost

Typically EUR 100-250 from the manufacturer

time

Weeks

you supply

The VIN.

Carries no date of manufacture. Useful for other things; useless for proving a car's age.

US shipping guidance sometimes lists a certificate of conformity including the production date as acceptable. Read that clause carefully - the words doing the work are 'including the production date'. A bare CoC has no production date on it.

States first registration, not manufacture. First registration is normally later than the build - sometimes by more than a year. That gap is the whole problem.

issuer

The national registration authority

cost

-

time

-

you supply

-

Carries no date of manufacture. Useful for other things; useless for proving a car's age.

Individual member states may add national fields the directive does not harmonise, so check your own document. But no EU-wide manufacture-date field exists.