I have been told that judging by my number plate, there is a chance my car (4x4 sapph cossie) was a press car, how can I go about finding out whether it's true or now ?

Thanks in advance

 

Ask Clarkson if he ever put it backwards through a hedge

 

See if the tappets are rattling their tits off where it got ragged from cold by a bunch of clueless morons?

 

Sometimes with the original reg plate:
FMC
PVW
PVX
BPU

 

The first owner would also be Ford

 

KNO's were sometimes press cars, as were any OO's (COO, BOO etc)

YAR were sometimes ford company cars too

Neil.

 

Mates 4x4 saff end in ATW and was an unregistered Ford demo car for 2 years, also has 2 plates on the slam panel with 'no warranty' stamped on them.

 

Neil, mine's a WOO

 

Yeah I used to have a Sapphire 2000E (on a YAR plate) that was an ex ford company car. It had the round 'no manufacturers warranty' tag, and had also had a new engine fitted by ford in the first 18 months of its life!

Frog - it may simply be that it was registered in the same area as the ford cars... The first owner will be listed as Ford Motor Company LTD

Neil.

 

J reg?????

I may have a pic of your car in one of my books..........PM the full reg if you want.....and I will see if I can find a pic or your car when it was new.

 

J plate yes, you have PM

 

Dont forget that all WOO actually means is where it was registered, so LOTS of them will have that reg that were nothing to do with ford.

Be nice if it was yours though frog and doug could find some pictures of it new

 

Maybe it was, just wanted to find out as quite a few people have mentionned it over the years...
I guess I'd have to contact DVLA to find out who the first owner was ?:

 

Sometimes theres a tag on the slam pannel near or ontop of vin plate as well i believe but not 100% on this.

 

He's got my reg number now, so fingers crossed... Pictures of it new would indeed go well with the service history

 

* ricki lake stylee *

Go doug, go doug, go doug

* / ricki lake stylee *

 

Sorry Frog, I only found one "WOO" plate and it is on an Escort (see below).....I looked in some Autocar mags from 1992 but those facelift model Saph Cossie tests were done in Spain (Spanish reg no's)

Press fleet for the launch of the new Escort model range......Spiky and I believe that the white Es Cos on the right of the pic could well be his car.......as the one in the centre of the pic is only ONE reg number away from his.......(Ford supplied approx 24 Escort Cossie's on that UK press launch):

 

More Ford press cars.....Maybe some of these are or were owned by PassFord users:







K 746 GOO:

 

Thanks for looking Doug.

Mine is pre-facelift (late J), so I guess that kinda automatically rules it out as a press car now that I think about it ?:

 

Yes, I suppose so because the only "pre facelift" 4WD saphs that would have been used at a press launch or for long term tests would have been the early ones (G reg ??)

 

wow see that 'G' plate Escos , the earliest I have ever seen is an H and that was on the Escort Cosworth story video,thought that was the 1st

Mat

 

We've got an extra slampanel under the bonnet with "nr 10 karmann" on it.
(on the right of the MD sticker as you can see on this picture).
So we were very curious aswell about the car's history 'coz we've never seen a plate like it before on another escos.

Ford Belgium was very helpful: "Yes sir, your car has been made in december '91. That's all we know. No sir, we can't seem to find the chassisnumber in our records."
Tried Karmann several times, but never got any answers.
So eventually went to see the first owner...
He said Ford had told Karmann to test the new assembly line by making 20 cars. If those cars were ok, production would begin.
Our car is the nr 10 car of that testbatch according to him.

Because nobody else seems to know anything about this, I can't really verify if it's true or not...

 

Doug ypu dont happen to have anything with J127 ATW on it, smokestone blue prefacelift saff. Was built 90 but not registered till 92.

Has a redtop engine and the 'no manufacturers warranty' stamps on the slam panel.

 

My book says:
"It was April 1989 before the pre-production programme had been approved and the first complete road car prototypes were assembled"

 

Jo, I reckon your car is one of these described/listed below:



Sorry David, I had a good look - no pics of your car at all - either in my Ford books or Autocar tests

 

Any press photos of 3 doors Doug?

 

we used to put those "no manufacturers warranty"tags on cars that we had reshelled(used to work for ford)

 

that j988 bpu looks like the one we got sent to our dealership in late 1991,came off the transporter with 2 flat tyres,buckled wheels,and scratches and dings all over it,went straight in to the bodyshop

 

Strange, but no press fleet pics at all................would have been 1985

Only these early Frod publicity shots:

 

there my car

 

mmm intresting J127 aint ever been reshelled though so any other reasons as to why it might have those stamps ?

Doug cheers for looking mate

 

Thanks for the info
Which book are you getting that information from?

By the way... my enginenumber is YBT 019 (production started at 50 or something if I recall correctly)

 

Has the number plate got raised digits, and pressed out of metal???
Alot of the press cars we used to deliver had these.
We used to deliver them between the press garage at brentford all over europe

 

Your engine is very rare indeed
Going by the dates below and knowing when your car was built (i.e. before the dates shown below), your engine is just as you said.......deffo a pre-production unit built by Cosworth to fit in to those early press/promo Escorts

The book says about YBT engines:
YBT production span: 23 March 1992 - February 1994
Total number built 5,186
1992 = 4,078 built
1993 = 788 built
1994 = 320 built to end of prod line

From this fantastic book



Available from Partick Stephens Ltd....only Ł19.98

 

 

My datapost s1 was a ex press/promo car.....ford motor co was the first owner,and it was red at time of first reg b573dev.

 

get some pics up scott,epic car

 

This is a bit of an old thread.

 

Holy thread revival only took 9 years to get a reply

 

but worth it mate lol if scott gets some pics up