VIN Assignment

[Laurie]

I finally received my VIN number for my V10 which I am very excited about, but I'm not sure where that puts me in production. I assume they assign a vin before they actually start building the car. I am trying to determine my delivery timeframe here to Orlando. I ordered through the military overseas sales, so they aren't very familiar with R8 productions. Any info on production process?

[smoothy]

My dealer didn't get the VIN until after the car was built and in transit. From that point, they told me it would be a couple of months for transit (ship from Europe to Halifax, truck from there) but they were off by a month- car was already 1/2 way through it's sea cruise and dealer thought it hadn't even left the factory yet...

[ignomini]

Laurie,

When did you place your order. My dealer has been completely unhelpful. They keep saying they'll "let me know" and then disappear until the next time I bother them.

[ianerrid]

I am not convinced it is 'necessarily' your dealers fault - it is pretty common for wait-wait-wait-wait-the_cars_here to happen - I waited 14 months and chased when I could be bothered and within 48 hours of them telling me it was coming I had it on my drive FWIW

[Laurie]

I ordered mine in February.

[cavaret]

Hey Laurie,
I think in some places it depends on dealer allocation. Your dealer may have taken your order, but did not receive their allocation for your car yet. Some times they can be sneaky to keep you from going to another dealership that has an allocation. After your order has been put in it should take 10-12 weeks in the states.

[dominicR8]

One tip: I have been told that the more "Audi Exclusive" options you go, the faster it comes out of production; apparently, when you start choosing specific colour for external and sideblades, it goes out of the regular production queue. Same for Audi Exclusive leather choices... mine will be fully customized colors (in and out) - and apparently never been made before ? - is annouced for March 2010, ordered early november.

[Davey_Dee]

One tip: I have been told that the more "Audi Exclusive" options you go, the faster it comes out of production; apparently, when you start choosing specific colour for external and sideblades, it goes out of the regular production queue. Same for Audi Exclusive leather choices... mine will be fully customized colors (in and out) - and apparently never been made before ? - is annouced for March 2010, ordered early november.

I doubt exclusive options guarantee a faster production, just doesn't sound right to me, unless someone else can say otherwise?

[willyjp]

based on my recent experience (and also in accordance with common sense) I believe the VIN # is assigned when the car is place in the production queue.....obviously they couldn't assign it a # until it was in line); to give you a recent example: my (4.2) 2010 spec'd order went in about Apr.1/09; about a month later I was told it had "been scheduled for production"; IN#;

my order was FOR a 2010, so there may then have been some delay, because 2010 production did not begin until about Jun. 1; my serial # was 551 and production was projected to start about Jul.1 but in fact did not begin until Jul. 21; based on what I've learned, my theory about that is that the early 2010 production was NOT in strict order by serial # but rather the v10 serial #'s were moved to the head of the queue to get a bunch of v10s "out there."

I base this on comparing serial #'s and build dates with SBFv10 who's order was through the same dealer as mine. His serial # is just a bit before mine, but his build date (based on 20-25/day) was earlier than one might have expected, given a Jun.1 start, and mine was quite a bit later; I think they "bunched" some v10s in the early production, regardless of serial #s (which are sequential without regard to engine option)

anyway, the point I would make is that now that you've got a vin#, an assignment to production date and projected completion date; shipping date, arrival date, etc., etc.; all follow in fairly short order; ALL OF THAT is available to the dealer via Audi's (dealer only) online order website and your dealer should be willing to give you a printout showing all those dates....some of which are projections subject to change; my dealer gave me 3...original projection and 2 updates....during my wait from order to delivery; I guess some dealers just don't want to be bothered, unfortunately!

I think some dealers are perhaps purposely vague because they are playing games with the slots they have available, but once you've got a vin#, that means you've been assigned a specific car within the sequence of production and its dates are definitely then subject to prediction, subject to delays, etc.; and those predictions have been made and are on Audi's web site where your dealer can access them for you!

You can even attempt some rough predictions yourself, based on reasonable assumptions. The build rate of R8s is probably ABOUT 100/week....likely with some substantial variation.....; 2010 production began in week 23 (June 1); my car's serial
# (last places of the vin) is 551; so one would expect that it should have been built in week 29 based on 100/wk; the original projection I was given was week 28; but as it happend, it wasn't built until week 30, inspected and released for shipping in week 31 and shipped in week 32 to Houston; it was delivered to me in Portland week 37; incidentally my "assigned to production" date was week 23 and I was given my vin# week 27, even though the car wasn't actually built until week 30.

using that example you can make some rough estimates yourself; if someone else on here is willing to give you a 2010 serial # and build date from a more recent car, you can correct the dating to the # they've actually been building/week instead of using 100.

[peterh]

My "order" was placed in early November. "Allocation" occured at the end of Nov and expected delivery will be in middle February - I was assigned Build Week 6. This will be a full Audi Exclusive exterior and interior build. The AE process is not supposed to either delay or speed up the process so I am told by my rep at Audi Exclusive. We shall see.