What does the 10th digit 'K' in the VIN represent?
3 Answers
The 10th digit in the VIN being 'K' indicates that the vehicle's model year is either 2019 or 1989. In most standard VINs, the 10th digit represents the year of manufacture, cycling every 30 years. Here is an introduction to the Vehicle Identification Number (VIN): 1. The VIN, or Vehicle Identification Number, is a unique code composed of seventeen letters and numbers that provides various information about the vehicle. Due to its uniqueness, it is often referred to as the vehicle's 'ID card.' 2. The first digit of the VIN indicates the country or region where the vehicle was manufactured. 3. The 10th digit of the VIN represents the production year (the production year is denoted by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, J, K, L, M, N, P, R, S, T, V, W, X, Y—a total of 30 characters, cycling every 30 years).
Last time when I was researching VIN numbers, I found the fact that the 10th digit represents the model year quite interesting. The letter 'K' actually corresponds to 2019, but it's important to note that this coding cycles every 30 years. So if you see 'K' on some older vehicles, it might indicate a 1989 production year. Nowadays, most vehicles with 'K' in the market are 2019 models. In the entire 17-character VIN, the first three digits are the manufacturer code, digits 4-8 represent vehicle characteristics, and the final digits are the production sequence number. Understanding this is quite helpful when buying used cars as it can prevent year fraud. For instance, when I was helping a friend inspect a car, I discovered the VIN had been tampered with - the 10th letter didn't match the registration information, so we decisively abandoned the deal.
Recently, while browsing the repair manual, I came across the decoding rules for the Vehicle Identification Number (VIN). The tenth digit specifically indicates the model year, with 'K' representing vehicles from the 2019 model year. The coding system is quite interesting—it uses letters in sequential order to denote years, where 'A' stands for 2010, 'B' for 2011, and so on, making 'K' correctly correspond to 2019. In older versions, 'K' was also used to represent 1989, but this is rarely seen nowadays. The VIN is like a vehicle's ID card, with each digit holding significance: the first letter indicates the country of origin, the middle five digits are the vehicle configuration code, and the last six digits are the serial number. It's crucial to record the complete VIN during maintenance, especially when matching recall information.
