at what point does a VIN get created for a truck? and communicated to the dealer? before any build? during? after?

thanks.

and or is it once the allocation has been alloted...but before the build begins.

 

Just as they are matching everything up on the computer system for the assembly of the truck.

To build a truck there has to be everything in place by what the company calls, the supermarket.

This is the hub of the system.

Picture this:

The chassis, the Painted body, the interior, the suspension, the engine, the options,are all co-ordinate to meet at the same time.
In the case of the Expedition & Navigator ;
There are 8 Expedition's & 2 Navigator's made on the line.

All these components have to meet all along the assembly line.
Every position on the asembly line has 52 seconds to do their part of the assembly as well as having quality control people over-seeing the assembly.

They make approximately 560 trucks in 10 hours with some being incomplete and have to come back for adjustment.
They prefer to detect the problem on the line because it is more efficient and cheaper to fix it there than it would be to finish building it by hand.

Last January, while touring a truck plant ,I observed a glitch at the point of the line where they assemble the engine & transmission to the chassis.
The person who does this spotted a bolt-up problem between the engine & trans. Within a 52 second time frame this person has to call a quality control person,get an assessment & get clearance ,to either fix the problem or yank the engine & trans off the line (causing mega problems), what he did was remove the bolt and put another one in its place,saving the Company thousands of dollars and have to specially assemble the rest of the truck by hand.

Is this a good emough answer?

 

yes it does help,

I am trying to figure out if my dealer is jerking me around, i ordered a truck on 11/29, I called for the first time yesterday to get a status and they told me

"they had to order the parts which just arrived at the factory"
my reply..."um isnt it a factory...dont they have parts? they dont wait for an order before deciding they need tires do the?"

response..."um no sir I wouldnt think so"

reply "do you have a VIN for me?"

response "um no not yet"

so what I am trying to understand from this conversation with my dealer is if he is out right lying to me or if his statements are legit.

I dont care if it takes 6 weeks to get here, what I care is that there is progress being made, hard to tell as an outsider

I have a build number is there a place I can call outside the dealers control to get a status on it?

 

The only people who know are at the assembly place.

As far as waiting for parts to arrive, that is possible as each company has contract companies that manufacture trim,glass ,etc

I still wouldn't put much into what the salesman said.

My question to him would be: " How do you know this ?"

 

good question I will ask them, I think I already know the response.