Hey all,

I wanted a service history check done on a clean 1990 DX sedan I just got from a private seller and didn't want to pay carfax so I asked a Honda dealership if they could run the vin and see if it's ever been serviced at a Honda dealership in the united states. They told me the vin would not decode, so I used the decoder provided by the forum here and it also would not work. Another website would not work, carfax worked though. The dealership told me that it is probably a Canadian car. I thought that was weird since the cluster units are imperial, so I used a spreadsheet table on a wiki to deduce that the car was produced in East Liberty, Ohio, USA. the carfax carcare app states that the car has passed emissions in my state since 1998, which is when state emissions began reporting to carfax, so it would make sense that the car was bought here or in a neighboring state and stayed here since some time before 1998, I doubt someone would buy and import a Honda civic from Canada in the 90s when these things were everywhere and could be had for dirt cheap even at msrp, but maybe I'm wrong? I am in Washington so maybe.

The dealership also told me that because my vin plate is brown/bronze colored, it's a Canadian market vehicle. I thought vin plates just faded to brown after years of sunshine. They also said a part of my vin looked weird to them: the LL which indicates year model and manufacturing plant but those line up just fine according to the table I used.

Anyone else have brown/bronze vin plates or other colors? Black? Any other things that could possibly tell me the car is canadian?

 

I also own a '90 DX sedan and I have brown vin plates. As far as I know mine was sold and driven only in the US.
I've never had a problem looking up the history of the VIN on the internet, but I haven't gotten a full, official check done so I'm not sure if I'd have the same issue as you.
Idk if that helps or not.

 

Huh, yeah some people I know with similar gen hondas/acuras have brown plates too others have green/blue, idk why. I just assume it's a US car but too old to run a service check on maybe. Free carfax care app tells me its been regularly worked on at a shop in my state for over 20 years and my inspection yielded no pressing issues so the origin of it doesn't even really matter I guess. I'm just neurotic about the car lol.
Thanks man!