Some years ago, I added the comment to the Tech Manual that some Options on the car were not on the Card Card.
In my role as Registrar of the Registry, I have examined the Data Cards and codes for many of the cars in the Registry.
There were some cars with option items that did not appear on the Data Cards for those cars. Some of these options, I was told, were on the car when the first owner originally picked up the car from the Dealer.
My conclusion was that when a car arrived at the final destination, either the new owner or perhaps the dealer on his own initiative, added some optional items to some cars. These could have included a specific model of radio, tinted windows, Air Conditioning, fog lights, or others that could be installed by a dealer or by a nearby Mercedes Service Center.
This was confirmed to my satisfaction when I spoke to the original owner of my first 280SL. He told me that it was the dealer who installed the radio for him after the car came arrived and before the owner pickled up the car. The codes for the radio and antenna did not appear on the Data Card.
Now I did make a possibly controversial leap here. I included in the Registry as as original options, those that were installed on the car before the owner picked up the car even if they were not "factory installed options". I did this because it was well known that some "local" options noted on the Data Card were always (?) installed by the dealer not the factory. This was typically the Air Conditioner.
Even when an AC was noted on the Data Card, apparently Stuttgart did not stock or install AC's for cars destined for market areas outside Germany including the USA. Since Mercedes wanted the cars to have locally serviceable AC's, they had the local dealer install a local style and brand AC. So my thinking went, if a dealer installed the Air Conditioner, a dealer could have installed other "factory" options. These dealer add-ons would not appear on the Data Card which was created and printed at the factory.
So since the car I owned at that time had a dealer installed option that was not on the Date Card, I added the note to the Tech Manual.
This message thread (started by me) is not about options on the car that are not on the Data Card but about an option that was on the Data Card but not on the car. In this case Fog Lights and Fog Light Wiring. I guess someone could have changed the front bumpers to remove the lights and the mounting holes but what about the wiring? I do not believe that the current owner has found any evidence that the car had fogs or fog wires at any time.
I was asking about the accuracy of our Option Codes in the Tech Manual trying to find out if the Fog Light option codes could have had a different meaning on another reliable options list.
I have not looked at the other option code sources noted above but I hope to do so to help confirm that our Option Code list is as accurate as possible.
Sorry to go on about this.
Richard M, NYC
