Something NA owners have known for a long time.
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I’ll make sure I glue 2 on and grease the other 2! Haha
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So I’ve just spoke to DVLA about my v55 application and it has been rejected only on not proving the age of the vehicle sufficiently. I enclosed a Japanese de registration form showing it was made in April 1992 but apparently this is not good enough.
I contacted Mazda UK to try and get further info from Mazda Japan to no avail.
Does anybody know any other option to prove manufacturing age of an Eunos Roadster or another source to get more info off the chassis number as the engine number as we know is difficult to read?
Who would have the database to show month/year of manufacture from a chassis number?
Regards
Anthony
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You could try here? Might be of some use? 
https://www.japan-partner.com/check-manufacture-year.html
Barrie
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Just spoke to Auto link uk and they think this was a bit harsh as well as many depend on the de registration form for manufacture year.
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Perhaps appeal? or at least speak with someone with some common sense at DVLA.
Barrie
Tried common sense. ‘Computer says no!’ Such a shame. Cars desperate for a spin!
Part of the letter talks about an owners club giving authenticity to the age! Really!
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I had an old Ukrainian motorcycle that had a chassis number irregularity and needed to have a DVLA inspection. Can’t remember the exact details, but a letter from the Owners Club stating that some were produced without numbers in the usual places and verifying that the issues with mine were not uncommon for that particular year put everything to bed. Took a few weeks though.
The angle DVLA were coming from was that if the chassis could not be verified, they would go on the engine number; but this then implied a frame/chassis change and they then wanted to go down the SVA route. Owner’s club ‘certification’ saved my bacon.
Who fancy coming to see a nice little Roadster! 
I’ll see how I get on with Mazda Japan and a few other options but thank you. This car was on the road in Japan for 3 years so can’t see the issue of proving age! Just the right form
Cheers
After all the hard work and then hitting a bureaucratic brick wall! I can understand the importance of getting things right but blimey! Oh well, fingers crossed you can get it sorted 
Barrie
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Just found an article I wrote on the Dnepr after the DVLA shenanigans. Bit old now, but might be of interest, please ignore any weird cut and paste formatting.
DVLA Dnepr.doc from 2008:
When you last bought a bike, did you check the paperwork? Thoroughly? Well I guess I’m guilty of never looking too closely, and it bit me. Fortunately everything worked out in the end – but I won’t be doing this again!
*The bike in question is a Dnepr MT11. When I first saw it, it was a non runner – not taxed or MOTed, but it was very tidy, and looked to be in pretty good condition. I checked the VIN plate and this looked absolutely genuine – not that I knew what it should look like, but it had Russian writing on it and everything…. The Engine and Frame numbers were also there and they matched what was stamped on the engine and the frame. There was a stack of paperwork including the V5 and a previous V5 that must have been a duplicate copy, and some old MOTs – so what’s to worry about? So I part with my drinking vouchers and take the old girl home. *
In the months that followed I did the decent thing and registered it in my name, treated her to some new bolt on shiny bits and took her to see my friendly local dealer who examined her and gave me a nice MOT certificate. I joined the Cossack Owners Club (seemed rude not to) and had a lovely year of pootling around the lanes of Surrey.
*The fun started the next year. It started with the MOT…. *
The Dnepr sailed through another inspection and I had a new certificate issued – but a week or two later a letter from the DVLA arrived in the post pointing out the there was an ‘irregularity’ between the details on my V5 and what my local dealer had entered in the computer for the new computerised MOT. It asked if I could comment on this – and that they would need to rectify the situation before a new tax disk could be issued. Once all the evidence was collected a decision would be made on how to resolve the irregularities – so any information I could provide would be taken into consideration.
I looked at the paperwork, and yes there was an irregularity. The MOT said Dneipr, the V5 said Neval. Easily explained – but the V5 said the bike had matching engine and frame numbers – the engine number was correct, the frame number wrong. The MOT was accurate, and stated they were different. Not so easily explained.
So I immediately tried to re-tax on-line, and found it wouldn’t let me. The feeling of dread begins to descend. So I take all my paper work to the local Post Office and happily the computerisation doesn’t seem to extend to the counter service and they take the money and wield the rubber stamps without any concern at all – so at least I can legally continue to ride while we sort out the technicality.
I drafted a very polite letter back to the DVLA – explaining the Neval/Dneipr/Dnepr names and suggesting the numbers issue was an error that had never been picked up in the 18 year life of the bike as the MOTs were only recently computerised. The response that came back was a request for me to have the bike inspected at the DVLA in Wimbledon – and they gave me a mid week appointment to do so. I telephoned requesting a more convenient time of today as I happened to have that day off work and surprisingly they were happy to do that – so off we set on the A3 towards the big smoke.
The inspection was a bit of a formality – a good look round the bike – I pointed out the engine number, frame number and vin plate and had a bit of a laugh and chat with the inspector (call me a crawler if you will, but being polite and friendly to anyone who has the power to stop me riding is a habit of mine). He was very content that it was a clerical error and they would simply issue me an updated V5 – so off we went home, happy with our Grand Day Out.
*Around this time a mate liked the look of my old girl, and he quite liked the Dnepr too (phnaar phnaar), he also happened to have just acquired a non running Ural M66. Now, I did fancy an excuse to get the spanners out so a deal was done. I fully explained the situation and therefore why we couldn’t exchange the V5 as mine was in limbo. *
To push things along, I emailed the DVLA lady who had written to me to ask what happened next – and her reply advised that they amassed all the available information they could before making any decision. She advised that she had contacted the Cossack Owners Club and had been advised that Dneprs should have matching numbers. EEEKKK!!! What!!! I thought the inspection had been the final hurdle! Now it is looking like they believe the bike has had a chassis change, then a new VIN plate fabricated to look genuine aligned with the numbers shown on the bike, and then the registration number from the bike that donated the engine used on the new chassis. This seemed absurd to me – if anyone did have a reason to disguise the frame number, if it was a stolen chassis for instance, why would they carefully fabricate a VIN plate showing this number off? Surely fabricating a VIN to match the V5 they planned to use would have been the smart thing to do?
I explained this logic in an email, enclosing a photo of the VIN plate to back this up. I then contacted Peter Ballard at the owners club explaining the situation, and asking if he could clarify what had been said the DVLA, and if he could comment on the DVLA’s understanding that all Dneprs had matching numbers. I also surfed the web and posted some questions asking for other’s input to my quest to prove my Dnepr was genuine. This was almost fruitless – one person replied saying their bike was like mine. This was in a raft of other posts that didn’t help – including one American trumpet saying he didn’t have matching numbers, but that his bike had been through two chassis and three engines in the time he had owned it. Mmmmm, keep taking the tablets I thought.
This was around the time of the Cossack rally in the midlands, and Peter responded after that saying that he had now seen other bikes like mine – and he believed that around a certain vintage, c.1990, Dneprs stopped having matching numbers, and the VIN plate style changed to the design on my bike. So I assembled all the evidence I had, info from the web, Peter’s updated Dnepr history info, and all the documents and history for my bike – past MOTs, old V5s, everything, and sent it all to the DVLA. As you can imagine, I was very confident that they would see all this as corroborating their own inspection information and send me a nice new V5 by return.
They didn’t.
*They did send me a letter saying that as some doubt existed as to whether my bike should have had matching numbers or not; and as the V5 said it did have matching numbers it was likely that the paperwork was correct and the bike was wrong. Now all I need to do to resolve the situation was to have the bike go through a Motorcycle SVA test, then I need to have an insurance certificate created with showing the Chassis number, then I would need a new MOT certificate, and at this point I could then apply for a vehicle registration and tax disk – and they would provide me with a nice ‘Q’ plate. *
*I was shocked. The bike would never pass an SVA test…. Not without a lot of work. It already had an MOT, why did I need another one? Ditto Road Tax! And after all that - it would be a Q plate which is never a good idea for resale and insurance reasons. The only sensible option may be to break it for parts – a travesty. *
I am also thinking I need to swap back with my mate – and I’ve spend a pound or two on the Ural by now getting it running with new carbs and various bits and bobs, tax and MOT. It’s all becoming a nightmare.
One last roll of the dice was to take the bike to Peter and ask him to inspect it and if he felt it was ‘dubious’ then fair enough, sometime life sucks; but if he thought it was genuine – then the only reason the DVLA could justify their records were correct was undermined. It was a bit of a long shot – but worth a try.
I spoke to Peter on the day of the AGM at Popham, and agreed to bring the bike to him the next day – it would be an early start as he was leaving there mid morning and I needed to load up and trailer the bike to him from where I live in Surrey as it was no longer insured (I’d transferred my insurance to the Ural, and my mate could not insure it as it was not registered in his name…). Peter had a good sniff round it, scratched paint away from the frame number area and took a few pictures. He also advised that he believed it was genuine having now seen it himself – which is always much more credible than drawing a conclusion based on conversations and JPEGs sent through on emails. Within a few days Peter had drawn up a document including some of the pictures, explaining some of the history of the bikes, and pointing out that the vintage of my bike placed it as one of the first to be manufactured with non matching numbers. He hypothesised that this may not have been realised by the importers who had up to that point only seen matching numbers, and quite possibly the easily visible engine numbers were recorded and used as the engine and chassis number at first registration. And around twenty years later someone noticed.
*On receipt of this ‘certification’ I wrote another very polite letter to the lady from the DVLA, and enclosed the Peter’s document. I was optimistic, but by this stage resigned to failure. *
A week or two later a strange and miraculous thing happened – Michelle from the DVLA called my mobile with some ‘Fantastic News’ – her words! Her superiors had reviewed the case in light of the new information and had reversed their previous decision – a V5 and all my submitted paperwork would be returned forthwith. As you can imagine the relief was immense – and it was in some way touching that the lady from the DVLA had picked up the phone to call in person with the good news. Polite letters or not – I am happy to know that there are real people, and not just faceless bureaucrats out there in the concrete towers shuffling all the paperwork around.
I am also incredibly grateful to the Cossack Owners Club, and specifically Peter Ballard for taking the time and the professional approach to providing a free service which I greatly benefited from. This is one member who’s renewal subs are assured.
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If there is someone within the MX5 Owners Club who is recognised as an accepted authority by the DVLA, and can supply you with a letter verifying the date on manufacture, etc, that should solve your problem.
I am involved with a vintage car club, and we have had to do this before, when cars have come back to the UK, and either need to reclaim their original registration number, or be issued with an age-related number.
An official ‘dating letter’ should get this resolved.
Perhaps contact the club office to see if they have done this before?
Fingers crossed that you get it sorted soon.
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The DVLA baffle me sometimes! They are making you jump through all these hoops when my V5 doesn’t even have a valid chassis number on it…contacted them about resolving it and I too had just as many hoops to do 
Is there anything on the car that’s date related. I heard seat belt anchorage possible!
It’s going for a full polish detail etc first before I consider re spray as this car will be sold once done!
Wasn’t this auto only made for 18 months. Must of been built either late 91 or very early 92!
hi 
i was talking about the cam cover and intake ( spraying )
not the whole car 
you’ve done a great job btw 
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Thanks. Thought I was going to be ordering plates this week. What a pain! Gonna fight for that H or J plate!
Decided to keep it as original as possible with body paint and under the bonnet and let the new owner decide what they want to do!
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