Jump to content

Understanding a German certificate of Conformity


weldted

Recommended Posts

Hi, I have just recived my certificate for my Burstner.

 

Under information end des Fahrzeuges der vorangegangenen Stufe

 

Typ. 250

Variants. 250

Variante M8 ABU

Version GYCSA

 

MIT DEM IN DER AM 30.10.2017

 

 

At the bottom

 

Kehl. (ort). 26.06.2018 (Datum). A signature (Unterschrift)

 

Just wondered what the two dates are.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I believe the model of motorhome you now own is as shown on this advert

 

https://www.southdownsmotorhomecentre.co.uk/2019-burstner-ixeo-i-736-fiat-150-automatic-a-class-motorhome-n101444.html

 

Your Burstner motorhome should have two Certificates of Conformity (COC) - one produced by Fiat and the other by Burstner - and there might be a 3rd CoC if the motorhome has an AL-KO chassis.

 

If you want to know when the Fiat base-vehicle was completed, that date should be shown at the foot of the front page of the Fiat CoC just above the signature. (The Fiat completion-date for my Rapido is 10/01/2015)

 

It’s reasonable to assume that the completion-date for the Burstner conversion is 26 June 2018 (26.06.2018) as the date at the foot of the front page of my motorhome's Rapido (French language) CoC is 25/02/2015 and I took delivery of the vehicle on 22 April 2015.

 

As Spirou and Robinhood say, the earlier date (30.10.2017) relates to the motorhome’s Burstner ECWVTA ( European Community Whole Vehicle Type Approval). My motorhome’s Rapido CoC has an ECWVTA-related date of 30/12/2014.

 

If you trot along to a Fiat Professional agent with documentation proving that you own the vehicle, you may be able to obtain a print-out relating to the Fiat base-vehicle. The print-out provides useful dates (like the date recorded for when the Fiat warranty commences) and indicates the ‘options’ that were fitted when the Ducato part of the motorhome was built.

 

(Time to modify your Profile to show that your Elddis has been replaced. 2019 Burstner Ixeo I 736 should be sufficient.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thank you for your replies. If I see a Motorhome advertised as a new 2019 one view it pay for it in September 2019 had it delivered then recive the COC from DVLA and it has 26/06/2018 am I buying a van that although first registered 18/09/2019 is in fact over a year old?
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ted,

 

You can 'Date' a lot of parts of the Fiat side of your MH quite easily.

 

Look for a manufactured date on Seat belt labels, I believe it is a legal requirement!

 

Tyres will have a week/year date code so look out for those.

 

Also look at the rear of plastic mouldings such as ashtrays, trim parts, interior lights, etc for date codes, they will often be clock style with an arrow pointing at a month and the year as figures inside. If you can find any but can't decipher them then post a photo and we'll try and help.

 

Finally try searching for VIN lookup websites to obtain details of your base vehicle. I use two for Mercedes but don't know of any for Fiat, perhaps other forum members do?

 

Like this one... https://carinfo.kiev.ua/cars/vin/fiat

 

Keith.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

...quite possibly so.

 

Burstner change model year in mid-July, and presumably will build for/to the new year specification somewhat in advance of offering them for sale.

 

It is thus quite possible that you have bought a MY 2019 motorhome that was built (it would appear) in June 2018. (In fact, the 2019 UK brochure defines that it is valid for vehicles delivered from 12th June 2018 onwards)

 

It might be useful to ascertain whether there were spec changes for the 2019 MY 'vans, and whether yours conforms to these.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Never The less However. The motorhome can be more than a year old. When dropped off the Burstner production line. That moment is not on register to the public. For cars you can have it. It is quite common in that business. If your burstner Coc is signed by Michael Lamby Homo legation manager you can call him about this in Kehl germany, As i did before. But guarantee starts by delivery and is two years.Unless you take a longer period. Congrats whit your burstner.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

There have been reported instances in the past where a motothome sold as brand-new turned out to be over two years old and with its base-vehicle warranty having expired. The warranty issue could normally be corrected (though sometimes not easily) but it still meant that the vehicle’s ‘consumables’ (tyres, batteries, oil, etc.) could have deteriorated significantly prior to it finding a buyer. This was discussed in 2016 here

 

https://forums.outandaboutlive.co.uk/forums/Motorhomes/Motorhome-Matters/Hymer-perhaps-not-what-it-seems/41435/

 

As Keith says, there should be physical clues as to the age of the Burstner’s Fiat Ducato chassis, with the tyres’ date-code probably being the simplest check to make. But a Fiat Professional agency should be able to provide the specific date when the Ducato chassis was passed to Burstner and also confirm the warranty start-date recorded on Fiat’s database. Obviously, if Burstner completed the conversion in late-June 2018, the motorhome’s Ducato chassis-cowl unit would have been built before then. The Ducato received Euro 6 powerplants in the latter half of 2016 and I don’t think there have been any changes since, with Euro 6d-TEMP motors only being fitted very recently.

 

As far as I can make out Burstner introduced the Ixeo I 736 model for the 2018 model-year (beginning in mid-2017 and ending in mid-2018). As Robinhood has touched on, it’s the norm for motorhome converters to make some changes to a model’s specification for each new model-year (eg. revising upholstery and/or furniture colours) so it might be practicable to identify from Burstner brochures whether Ted’s motorhome is a very late-2018 MY version or a very early-2019 MY one.

 

If Ted’s Burstner’s conversion completion-date is indeed 26 June 2018, it has to be asked where the motorhome has been since then...

 

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is, of course, the possibility that the 26.06.2018 date on the Burstner Certificate of Conformity (CoC) is incorrect and (perhaps!) should read 26.06.2019.

 

Establishing the build-date of the Burstner’s Ducato chassis-cowl unit (either accurately by contacting a Fiat agent and providing the vehicles VIN-number or by referring to the Fiat CoC, or by inference through checking things like the tyres’ production-date) should give a good idea of how ‘right’ the 26.06.2018 date is. If the completion-date of the Ducato chassis-cowl proves to be after the 26.06.2018 date, then the latter date is wrong; if the completion-date of the Ducato chassis-cowl precedes the 26.06.2018 date, then the latter date is probably correct.

 

Ted really needs to take up the Burstner ‘age issue’ with the vendor as soon as possible as, although there is bound to be a delay between when a Burstner motohome’s conversion is complete and it being delivered to a retailer/buyer, a 15-months delay is excessive.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The construction of a coachbuilt motorhome involves two stages

 

1: Construction of the base unit including rear chassis.

2: Conversion into the completed motorhome.

 

or three stages

 

1: Construction of the base unit without the rear chassis.

2: Addition of an AL-KO rear chassis to the base unit.

3: Conversion into the completed motorhome.

 

For a type-approved motorhome, after each stage has been completed a Certificate of Conformity (COC) should be produced relating to that stage. So a 2-stage motorhome should have two CoCs and a 3-stage motorhome should have three CoCs.

 

My Ducato-based Rapido is a 2-stage motorhome and I have two CoCs for it.

 

The first CoC is in Italian and was produced by Fiat. It has two dates on it, with the 1st date (20/12/2013) referring to the type approval and the 2nd date (10/01/2015) being more significant as it indicates when the base unit was signed off after its construction was complete and the base unit was transferred to Rapido.

 

My motorhome’s second CoC is in French and was produced by Rapido. It also has two dates on it, with the 1st date (30/10/2014) referring to the type approval and the 2nd date (25/02/2015) indicating when the completed motorhome was signed off at the Rapido factory at Mayenne. Then there was a few weeks delay transporting the motorhome to a UK Rapido dealership, with me taking delivery in April 2015.

 

Now, I’m guessing that you only have the Burstner CoC, but (as I’ve suggested several times) even if you don’t have a Fiat CoC, if you contact a Fiat agency you should be able to identify the build-date of the Ducato chassis-cowl that forms the basis of your motorhome.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Unless the vehicle proves to be MY18, rather than MY19, and assuming the vehicle was bought from stock, rather than to order, I'm not sure what is trying to be achieved here.

 

The circumstances outlined are far from uncommon in the UK, though the particular intervals are probably greater than the average.

 

Burstner will buy in the base vehicle, it may have to go to Al-Ko, and then it will have to wait for a build slot. All of this eats time, and may be exacerbated by the restricted slots scheduled for RHD vehicles.

 

It will then get shipped to a dealer if it was ordered for stock, or, less likely, sit until a dealer agrees to take it.

 

It then marks time until someone buys it.

 

It certainly seems to me that it could be a correctly described MY19 vehicle, with a not uncommon history.

 

I prefer to buy from stock. My current van was bought that way, but, having regularly seen new vehicles on forecourts with history longer than the op's, I like to check before I buy.

 

From chassis number and Fiat build markings (I find wiring loom labels very revealing) I was able to ascertain that my current van was much younger in all respects than many I'd seen and this was subsequently confirmed by the CoC's.

 

Whilst I prefer to know the history, if I wanted a specific van and it was correctly described and hadn't been destroyed by thousands of tyre-kickers, I don't think the history as set out by op would deter me - as I say, it is not uncommon.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ted’s earlier postings indicate that he had not anticipated that the motorhome he bought recently might have left Burstner’s factory 15 months ago.

 

The forum consensus is that this is probably the case, but the logical thing would now be for Ted to contact the vendor and ask for confirmation.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think it is time to put on a tracking system on this in time. Like they have on a 40 ft container in shipping fiat to..../. alko is.....? Standing at the dealer is.....? New year drop off model start at.....? And read their paper work.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

...the VIN number is the most important determinant of that.

 

You could always put your VIN number into the checker (bottom right corner here)

 

https://www.fiatcamper.com/en/home

 

which will tell you if there are outstanding recalls for it.

 

(Unfortunately, there is a new recall hot off the press - last couple of weeks - which is flagged by this method, but there are as yet no official details - though I understand it is a brake hose/clip check, and my 'van is flagged for it).

 

However, the VOSA recall data for the Ducato is readily available, and I've extracted and sorted everything (I hope) from the start of 2017, which is attached below. (it should be readable if downloaded)

recall1.thumb.jpg.5dc494c194140a3754468bd317f73e1c.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

weldted - 2019-10-05 8:18 PM

 

Tyres week 15, 2018.

 

As in 1518

 

So the 26.06.2018 on your COC is approx six weeks on and very likely the completion date at Fiat.

 

Not good news I'm afraid.

 

Time to check a few more dates, trim, etc, and then get in touch with your selling dealer to ask them if they knew how old it really was!

 

Question, would you have paid the price you did if you had known it was so old?

 

Keith.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Keithl - 2019-10-05 8:36 PM

 

weldted - 2019-10-05 8:18 PM

 

Tyres week 15, 2018.

 

As in 1518

 

So the 26.06.2018 on your COC is approx six weeks on and very likely the completion date at Fiat...

 

Keith.

 

As the Certificate of Conformity (CoC) that Ted refers to is in German and (I assume) carries Burstner marking, it’s logical then that the 26.06.2018 date on it indicates when the conversion of the Fiat base-vehicle to a motorhome was completed.

 

If the CoC had been in Italian and had Fiat marking, the sign-off date on it would indicate when the Ducato ‘chassis-unit’ left the Fiat factory in Italy.

 

When considering purchasing a motorhome off a dealership’s forecourt, if the vehicle’s CoCs are not available, dates on plastic components and tyres can provide clues to when the base vehicle started life - but care needs to be taken.

 

Ted has said that the Burstner’s tyres have a “1518” date-code, which indicates they were made during the period 9-15 April 2018. But the date on the CoC is 26 June 2018 - within 3 months of when the tyres were made. Obviously, if the tyres were put on the Burstner’s Ducato chassis-unit in the Fiat factory in Italy this would have happened after the tyres were made, so the Fiat ‘sign-off’ date would have to have been after 15 April 2018. Then the Ducato chassis-unit would have needed to be transported to the Burstner factory for the conversion process to begin. So there is the possibility that replacement alloy wheels were fitted by Burstner during the conversion and the “1518” tyres were also fitted at that point.

 

As I’ve said above, even if Ted does not have the Fiat CoC relating to his motorhome, it should be a simple enough matter to confirm when the Ducato chassis-unit was completed by contacting a Fiat agency. As Ted wants to know about possible safety recalls, it’s the Ducato build-date that matters more than the Burstner completion date.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...