Greetings Everyone. Back in the mid to late 1990s when I started my web site (www.gti16v.com) I became acquainted with an Engineer who worked for VWoA in Auburn Hills, Michigan. This fella is a great guy and a hardcore VW Enthusiast who also happens to work for VW. At one point, I asked him if he could get me production figures by model year for the GTI 16V. He explained to me that the VW VIN number has digits that designate body and engine (ie Golf and 16V). The problem lies in the last 6 numeric digits of the VW VIN. While those digits appear to be sequential BUT they are not tied to or have specific ranges tied to the GTI 16V or any model for that matter. In other words an A2 GTI 16V could come down the assembly line and be given 000001 as it's last six digits and a regular A2 VW Golf could be given 000002 and an A2 Jetta could have 000003. By the late 1990s he was unable to find production documents that could have answered my question and he thought they had been disposed of since by then the GTI 16V was out of production for 8 years and the US plant had been closed for 12 years by then.
As a result of how VW assigned VINs it would seem very difficult to find the last GTI 16V. BTW, it turns out that this engineer rescued one of the original,surviving A2 GTI 16V engineering test mules (there were only a few 100 built) when it bought it from another VW engineer who had it stored for a number of years. The engineer I know then restored/rebuilt/modified the mule and had it for a number of years as a driver. In fact it was on my registry for a long time until he sold it. The funny thing about that GTI 16V was that it's VIN did not accurately reflect the actual vehicle. After all, technically speaking, there weren't supposed to be any A2 GTI 16V prior to 1987 unless you happened to own a test mule.That is actually how I came to know this person and who he worked for as I questioned the VIN he submitted when he joined the registry on my web site. After he got to know me, he confided in me that he worked for VW and why the VIN on his GTI 16V was odd. Larry, I do not remember the last GTI 16V was any kind of special edition. IIRC, in 1992 VW marketed many of the VW models using "Wolfsburg" packages trying to sell cars. They must have had a crap load of "Wolfsburg" crests and wanted to get rid of them because they slapped them on most VW models that year.Sadly, by the end of the GTI 16V production run VW had lost interest in this model and the whole A2 line and was moving on desperately hoping to increase sales with the new models. FYI guys, I still have my 1987 GTI 16V. Hard to believe that she is 28 years old. A few years ago I started taking her to antique car events and put her in the Historical Preservation of Original Features (HPOF) class. She qualifies for that class since she has not been modified and is in original condition. If anyone here on the list happens to be in the Hershey, PA area on the second Saturday in October I plan to bring her to the Antique Car Show being held there that weekend. Stop by and say Hi. On Saturday, August 15, 2015 at 5:19:33 PM UTC-4, Larry Velez wrote: > > Has anyone ever heard of what happened to the last Mk2 16V produced? Was > there some kind of special edition sold to celebrate? I wonder if a > collector has it somewhere… > > Would be interesting to know what happened to the first for that matter.. > > -Larry > 91 GTI 16V > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MK2-16v" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/mk2-16v. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/mk2-16v/c5e8448d-8458-434c-bb06-9b6d8aa6a012%40googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
