Dear all,
Years of build and/or registration can be a tricky business. After all, a
car despatched from The Factory on -say- 2 January 1979 can be qualified as
a 1979 car, while it clearly was built 1978, just like a car despatched on
the 31st of December 1978. It just depends on how broad or narrow minded one
is.
Of course, the further away from Malvern a Morgan goes, the larger the
margin becomes. After all, a car shipped in mid or late December of any year
is not due to be registered in the USA or other non-European countries
before the following year. In those cases, checking the data with the MMC
will learn that a car dates from -say- 1966, whereas the registration
authorities don't recognise the car before 1967. So, there you are.
Then there is the question of model year. The model years in England usually
start around October, the traditional date of the Motor Show. So, if you own
a +8 built to the specifications of the +8 displayed at the 1977 Motor Show,
you have a 1978 model year +8! That means that there's some 3 months overlap
every year between model year and year of registration.
Morgan history has even seen some extreme cases of model year vs year of
registration. In these cases it was stated in their books: "see ..... before
giving date of manufacture"!
After the Morgan has become "illegal" in the USA and more work became
necessary to make it street legal, the margin at your side has even grown
bigger. So, decide for yourself which year your Morgan dates from.
Hermen Pol
Holland
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