Morris Minor Owners Club

Wonder if anyone can help with this,
I have a 1958 moggy I’ve checked online date of manufacture etc that’s all in order but my log book states the date of first registration as 1979 is there an explanation for that?

There's many reasons, including, but not limited to ...

Originally exported but then imported; either exported ex-factory, or a personal export.
Was originally sent to Northern Island then brought over to the 'mainland'... these days they keep the NI registration, but that is a fairly recent thing.
Originally a Channel Islands 'export'...
A Barn Find in the late 70s, and DVLA couldn't confirm the original registration.

What does the DVLA website say, as that has a 'Date of First Registration' and 'Year of Manufacture' entries?

The V5C has Fields B and B.1, Date of First Registration and Date of First Registration in the UK. Are these the same?
I assume nothing recorded in the Special Notes on the front of the V5C?
I also assume the car appears to be a standard UK spec, RHD, etc...

B & B1 have both the same dates

Checked DVLA website year of manufacture is 1958, Date of first registration is 1978

Stevie R wrote: ↑Thu Oct 10, 2024 12:36 pm Checked DVLA website year of manufacture is 1958, Date of first registration is 1978

Sorry, just to clarify, in case you've typo'd.

Website says Year of manufacture '58, but first Reg '78.
Your V5C says '79 in both B & B1?

So they clearly knew it was a '58. Is it a 78/79 Registration, or is it an old '3+3' format plate?
It might be worth contacting them and asking them to explain it.

Date of manufacture says 1958
Date of registration says 1979

The reg plate is the old 3/3 type

Stevie R wrote: ↑Thu Oct 10, 2024 2:32 pm Date of manufacture says 1958
Date of registration says 1979

The reg plate is the old 3/3 type

That's interesting, as they didn't issue 'Age Related' plates back then. They only came about in the late 90s. Perhaps there was irrefutable documentation that showed the year of manufacture, so they issued a plate of that year.

You could get a Heritage Certificate from the Motor Museum :https://www.britishmotormuseum.co.uk/ar ... rtificates
That would indicate where it was going when it left the factory.
But for the hell of it, I'd ask DVLA what they have, just to see what their records show.

"Vehicle make
MORRIS
Date of first registration
September 1980
Year of manufacture
1962
Cylinder capacity
1098 cc "
From the DVLA V.E.D. status page for my car. My Heritage Certificate confirms 1962. Six character registration, e.g. ABC123.

There were any amount of transcription errors when the data was back-record converted from LVLA records on to the first DVLC system and they have persisted, Often in dates but just as frequently in engine sizes. 1958 - 1978 could well be such an error.

I recall that when I bought my car in 1999 the vehicle identity on the V5 wasn't correct. It was something fairly trivial - started with MA5 - which if the 5 was mistakenly used in place of S, was still wrong. Should have been MA2S, 2 door saloon. It was corrected at the time though.