Tracing the owner of a car

[rtcosic]

Due to a fairly uncommon 3 letter family name, ownership of a long-established family business, a personal plate in that name and a female posting drivel on her blog I am now in contact of the granddaughter of the third owner of my car. She remembers her grandfather's ownership in the late '60s.
No photographs sadly.

Ain't Google and Companies House grand!

 

[armalites]

why are you guys so keen on finding past owners etc?

other than for very rare/vintage stuff, why does it matter?

For us it payed dividends, bought a car from auction without actually viewing it. It was cheap enough and I knew the risks. When I picked it it ran fine and everything worked but the header tank was full of radweld type sealer. I immediately assumed knackered radiator or head gasket issue. Previous owner had an unusual name, found them on Facebook but no response, then found the name on a dog breeders register through googling which explained why there was dog hairs everywhere. Rang the land line number and the lady answered. Had a good chat about the car, turns out the rad weld was in there because of a leaky heater connection that had been fixed. She was actually pleased to talk to me because she loved the car. We ended up replacing the heater core and then found the "repair" the garage had done. Instead of just replacing a 10p o-ring available in every generic kit they covered it all in sealer like they were icing a cake.

 

[Wedg1e]

Time for an update...
With no response from the first of the two MOT places I decided to call the other one, who hadn't seen the bike since 2019... but did remember it, and the owner. Although they turned up an invoice with the correct name on it there was no address or contact details and they couldn't find a booking diary going back far enough. So that was a dead-end, although the MOT guy said he was convinced the owner lived in that town.
Back to 192. com and I could see only one chap with the right name in that town but couldn't access the details without paying a fat fee.
My daughter put me onto the ukphonebook website which is also a pay-service but a lot cheaper so I whapped my wad and was able to find the full address.
Off to google earth and blow me, it's up a cul-de-sac that the camera car never visited so can only see an aerial view of the house with no further clues - but lo and behold, it's almost exactly halfway between the two MOT stations!
I composed a letter, outlining how I'd arrived at the chap's name and address and asking if he could help, assuming I had the right person.
Posted it Monday, 2nd Class as it was all the stamps I had, so didn't expect to hear anything till at least the weekend... but this afternoon the phone rang.
"Hello, I'm R****** J******* and I used to own a black Honda ST1300. Your panniers are in my garage, when do you want to collect them?"

Result

The full story: he was filtering through traffic (having left the panniers off to make the bike slimmer) when a pickup truck got sick of the lane he was in, swerved out and clipped our man, who veered into oncoming traffic and hit a car, bounced off that and hit a steel fence, in the process being thrown off and losing consciousness. He's given up riding as a result - as we all know, they really are all out to get you.

 

[Olderisbetter]

I still live in hope of finding history of a car i have, when i was a kid i remember seeing a picture of a well known royal driving a similar car to one i own, it might make it a bit more ££ interesting if i can link it to the person.

 

[Bobupndown]

I still live in hope of finding history of a car i have, when i was a kid i remember seeing a picture of a well known royal driving a similar car to one i own, it might make it a bit more ££ interesting if i can link it to the person.

Not Prince Andrew then?

 

[Olderisbetter]

Not Prince Andrew then?

That would affect the value..... badly

 

[RWD3M]

Time for an update...
With no response from the first of the two MOT places I decided to call the other one, who hadn't seen the bike since 2019... but did remember it, and the owner. Although they turned up an invoice with the correct name on it there was no address or contact details and they couldn't find a booking diary going back far enough. So that was a dead-end, although the MOT guy said he was convinced the owner lived in that town.
Back to 192. com and I could see only one chap with the right name in that town but couldn't access the details without paying a fat fee.
My daughter put me onto the ukphonebook website which is also a pay-service but a lot cheaper so I whapped my wad and was able to find the full address.
Off to google earth and blow me, it's up a cul-de-sac that the camera car never visited so can only see an aerial view of the house with no further clues - but lo and behold, it's almost exactly halfway between the two MOT stations!
I composed a letter, outlining how I'd arrived at the chap's name and address and asking if he could help, assuming I had the right person.
Posted it Monday, 2nd Class as it was all the stamps I had, so didn't expect to hear anything till at least the weekend... but this afternoon the phone rang.
"Hello, I'm R****** J******* and I used to own a black Honda ST1300. Your panniers are in my garage, when do you want to collect them?"

Result

The full story: he was filtering through traffic (having left the panniers off to make the bike slimmer) when a pickup truck got sick of the lane he was in, swerved out and clipped our man, who veered into oncoming traffic and hit a car, bounced off that and hit a steel fence, in the process being thrown off and losing consciousness. He's given up riding as a result - as we all know, they really are all out to get you.

Great result!

 

[Bobupndown]

That would affect the value..... badly

I remember reading an article in one of the landrover mags years ago about a guy who owned a classic Range Rover with camper conversion bought new by Jimmy Saville. This was after his death but before the revelations about his past. I'd say you wouldn't be advertising its past much now!

 

[Olderisbetter]

I remember reading an article in one of the landrover mags years ago about a guy who owned a classic Range Rover with camper conversion bought new by Jimmy Saville. This was after his death but before the revelations about his past. I'd say you wouldn't be advertising its past much now!

Did he have lots of old and new pictures of it? You know like, now then now then now then

 

[Wedg1e]

Update on the update... having got the previous owner of my 'new' bike to agree to sell (not give, alas) the panniers to me, I then tackled the problem of only having one key for the machine: it's a transponder key and it was bent/ twisted by the crash. I found a guy on ebay who can cut you a spare key from a photo (!) and it comes with a blank transponder chip - £19.50. It arrived, fits all the locks - but of course won't start the engine.
Honda's bikes with the PGM-FI engine management cleverly have a programming mode so you can clone a working key, but before I had a crack at that I thought I'd email the salvage place and see if they could advise what might have happened to the spare keys that the previous owner said he'd surrendered when he acepted the salvage payout.
I didn't hold out much hope but a few days later they replied to say they'd found the keys - and 'some documents', which they'd post me FOC.
A package arrived yesterday with the keys - and it turned out the guy had handed over literally every bit of paper he had concerning the bike since he'd bought it! The original selling dealer's document wallet is there, plus invoices, the Datatag registration, instructions for the heated grips etc.
So although he didn't get the service book stamped every time I have more or less the full history for it.
Amongst the docs was the old V5, on the front page of which they'd obliterated the guy's name and address... but missed the fact that it's printed on page 2 as well! Had they sent all the stuff with the bike in the first place I could have saved some time, effort and money in tracking the previous owner down, but it's all good - and having made up the necessary 'programming' lead tonight I coded the extra spare key and it works perfectly, giving me two usable ones plus the damaged one in reserve. One thing we always do on our Euro-trips is take spare keys but give them to a mate for the duration, that way there's less chance of losing both sets.
Need to get out and ride the thing now...

 

[Robotstar5]

One thing we always do on our Euro-trips is take spare keys but give them to a mate for the duration, that way there's less chance of losing both sets.

I do similar when we go on holiday, give Mrs Robo the spare car keys which she puts in her tardis like handbag. One day we were out walking a cliff path and I asked where her handbag was "I left it under the seat in the car" great, my car has keyless entry so the doors could be opened with the button on the doorhandle due to the fob been in range. I was fretting all the way back to the carpark.