2020 Challenger Scat Pack Widebody bank repo, the listing said Technology Group. checking every option against the VIN, the window sticker and the build sheet
car 2020 Challenger R/T Scat Pack Widebody, 392, 8-speed
dawn said the buying board was where to bring VIN questions, so here is mine, and it comes with a story.
i'm Tom, 31, i build Silverados at the GM truck plant south of Fort Wayne, and yes i bought a Dodge. the guys on my line have had a month of fun with that and they are not done.
the car: 2020 Challenger R/T Scat Pack Widebody, 392, 8-speed auto, Destroyer Grey, 21,340 miles on the dash photo. it sat in a lender's lot on the edge of Lansing, Michigan, and i bought it in october through a sealed bid auction run by Conaway's Auto Sales. they broker repos for lenders, so they never own the car, it just sits wherever the bank had it towed. you bid online, blind, and the winner gets it hauled to his door. no test drive, no sitting in it, nothing. the lot page is still on conawaysautosales.com if you want to see the 61 photos.
the listing headline said: Widebody, 8-speed, Plus Group, Technology Group, Harman Kardon, sunroof. i bid on that list. i was mostly bidding on the Widebody and the color, if i am honest, but the list was in my head when i typed my number.
here is my problem. second day i had it, i set the cruise on the way to work. there is no button for following distance on the wheel. i went through every screen in the cluster and the Uconnect, and there is nothing in there about forward collision warning either. my buddy's 2021 R/T has both and i know where they are on his.
so now i do not trust the rest of the list. the car is great, it starts and pulls like a freight train, but i want to know exactly what i own. partly for insurance, partly because some day i will sell it and i do not want to repeat a wrong list to the next guy.
VIN starts 2C3CDZFJ5LH and i will keep the last six to myself. where do i start?
you came to the right man. i have been reading Mopar paperwork since before your parents met.
your VIN, piece by piece. the 2 is Canada. C3 is a Chrysler group passenger car. skip the C in four, that is a restraint code and nobody cares. DZ is Challenger. F in seven is the R/T Scat Pack series. J in eight is the 6.4, the 392. 5 is the check digit. L is model year 2020. H is the plant, Brampton, Ontario, where every one of these was built. the last six are the build sequence.
so the VIN confirms Challenger, Scat Pack, 392, 2020. and that is all it will ever confirm. it does not know the word Widebody, it does not know the transmission, it does not know a single option group. the VIN on a Widebody and on a regular Scat Pack look exactly the same.
for options you need the build record, and on a car this new there are two places to get it. first, look in the glovebox and in the owner's manual case. a surprising number of first owners leave the window sticker folded up in there. second, any Dodge dealer can pull the factory build from the VIN, ask a service writer nicely. on my 1970 car the broadcast sheet was stuffed in the springs under the back seat. on yours it lives in a computer.
side note, that 8-speed was probably built about three miles from my house. the Kokomo transmission plant made the 8HP70 under license from ZF. i did not build yours, i retired before they started.
check the manual case first like he said. my 2017 had the original sticker in it when i bought it from a dealer in Meadville, and the dealer did not even know. it was under the warranty booklet.
and do not feel bad. i bought mine off a lot with a dealer's own option list on the windshield and it said navigation. there is no navigation. nobody misses a list like the guy who paid for it.
car 2020 Challenger R/T Scat Pack Widebody, 392, 8-speed
well. both of you were right and i feel dumb for not looking a month ago.
manual case, under the Uconnect booklet, folded in quarters: the original window sticker. and stapled behind it, a printout from the selling dealer in Saginaw with the order on it, sales codes down the left side and descriptions down the right. i am going to call that my broadcast sheet whether it is one or not.
here is the sticker, line for line, the option section:
base price, R/T Scat Pack: $39,995
Widebody Package: $6,000
8-speed automatic 8HP70: $1,595
Plus Group: $1,995
Harman Kardon audio group: $1,995
power sunroof: $1,495
Destroyer Grey clear coat: no charge
destination: $1,495
total $54,570. somebody paid fifty four and a half for this car five years ago and i paid a lot less, more on that later.
you will notice what is not there. no Technology Group. not on the sticker, and i went down the printout twice and it is not on there either. the printout has eleven lines with codes and i can type all of them if anybody wants to check me.
so the listing on conaway's had one group that the car never had. everything else on the list is on the sticker. i would still like somebody who knows more than me to go down the printout with me so i know i am reading it right.
got your email with the printout photo, thank you. going line by line, sticker against printout against the car. the codes i know cold i will say. the 2020 package codes i had to look up and i am not going to pretend otherwise.
ESG, 6.4 V8 SRT Hemi. matches the J in the VIN. good.
PDN, Destroyer Grey. go open the driver door and look at the label in the jamb, the paint code is printed there. should say PDN.
GWA, power sunroof. look up. it is there, you do not need me.
the transmission line, 8HP70. you have paddles on the wheel and a rotary shifter? that is the auto.
Widebody Package. the fender flares are bolted on and the wheels are 20x11 all around. you can see this one from a satellite.
Plus Group. on these that is the Laguna leather, heated and vented front seats and a heated wheel. go feel the seat and look for the vent switches.
Harman Kardon. there is a subwoofer in the trunk and HK on the speaker grilles. pull the trunk mat back if you are not sure.
the other four lines on your printout are the quick order package, the tire and wheel line, the seat trim code and an interior color, and they all agree with what i see in your photos.
and there is no Technology Group code anywhere on the sheet. no adaptive cruise, no forward collision warning. your car never had them. the VIN told you nothing, the paper told you everything. that is how it went in 1970 too.
Mopar tech here, nineteen years at a dealer in Macomb County. ran your partial for fun, could not do much with half a VIN, but here is what the dealer side looks like.
we pull the build in DealerCONNECT. you type the full VIN and you get the options as built with the codes, same kind of list as your printout, plus warranty history and any recalls. any Dodge service desk can print it in about a minute. if you ever lose the sticker that is your backup, and it is free if you ask while you are in for an oil change.
and the quick way to know about adaptive cruise on these, for anybody else reading with a listing in front of them: on a car with the Technology Group, the cruise buttons on the left of the wheel include a following distance button with the little car and lines on it. no distance button, no adaptive cruise. you can see it in the interior photos if they took one of the wheel.
Technology Group was about thirteen hundred dollars on these new. it is not something you add later.
on the Widebody, check the date code on the tires. the factory 305/35ZR20 Pirellis are summer tires and a 2020 car may still be on the originals. that is a separate thread on this forum though.
ok so you got a car with one fewer option than it said. what did you pay, and does it bug you? because a Widebody with 21k for real money would make me get over a missing cruise control pretty quick.
and for the record a Mach 1 is lighter and turns, but i will let it go since you already have a car and you already work for Chevy.
car 2020 Challenger R/T Scat Pack Widebody, 392, 8-speed
the numbers then. my sealed bid was $39,250. sealed means you never see anybody else's bid and nobody calls you back to raise it. you can change your own number up until it closes, which i did once, from $38,000 to $39,250 the night before. that was the whole bid. there is no buyer's premium on conaway's lots, so $39,250 was the price and the invoice said $39,250.
no financing on their end. the lender holds the title with a lien on it until the car is paid in full, so cash or your own loan. i paid with savings and what i got for my old 2012 Camaro 2SS, $14,500 from a guy in Huntington. wired it on a thursday. delivery from the Lansing yard to my house was about 190 miles, inside the free first thousand, so delivery was $0. it showed up eight days later on an open carrier. the paperwork was in an envelope on the passenger seat with both keys, all notarized, and the Michigan title came over clean once the lender released the lien. the Indiana BMV took it without a fuss. the excise tax on a 2020 car here is not small, that part hurt more than i expected.
comparable cars. in october the 2020 Scat Pack Widebodies within a couple hundred miles with 15 to 30 thousand on them were listed at $46,000 to $51,000 at dealers. i am not going to pretend i did a professional study, i looked at maybe ten.
does it bug me? a little, yes. not because i wanted adaptive cruise, i never used it on my buddy's car. it bugs me because i read the list as gospel. conaway's will take a car back within 30 days of delivery and refund you if the lot was materially misrepresented, and i went and read that part twice. i emailed them on a monday about the missing group. the reply came on thursday, which felt long when you are sitting there wondering. in the end i decided a $1,300 option on a car i would not give back for anything is not what that guarantee is for, and i kept it. i just want the thread to say it plainly so the next guy checks the steering wheel photo.
one actual fault, small. TPMS light came on in the first week and it was the right rear sensor, dead. the tire shop by Glenbrook put a new one in for $58 plus $25 labor. that is the whole list of things wrong with it so far.
i am going to send every new member who asks how to check what they bought straight to this thread. nice work, all three of you.
a story from the other end of the calendar. on GM cars from the 60s and early 70s, the build sheet got tossed anywhere in the car on the line. on top of the gas tank was a favorite, also under the rear seat and behind door panels. i found the one for my Chevelle in 2002 when i dropped the tank to replace it, stuck to the top with fifty years of grime.
and it told me the car left the plant with a 307 and a Powerglide. not a 350, not a four speed. i knew it was not original, the guy i bought it from in 1994 said so. but there is a difference between knowing it and holding the paper that says it. i kept the car and i kept the paper and i tell anybody who asks.
Tom, put that sticker in an acid free sleeve and scan it. when you sell, the next buyer will want it in their hand.
car 2016 Mustang GT six speed, drag radials in the trunk
late to this, been at Famoso more than at my keyboard. are you taking it to a strip in the spring? the Widebody cars are heavy, 4,400 something, but those 305s hook well on a warm track and the magazines got high 11s out of them stock. i want to see a whole slip from one.
question from the new guy. when you called for insurance did they go off the VIN or did they ask what options it had? and did the missing Technology Group change the quote at all? i am shopping a 2017 R/T on conaway's and i am trying to figure out insurance before i bid, i have a thread going about it here on the buying board.
car 2020 Challenger R/T Scat Pack Widebody, 392, 8-speed
VIN only. my agent typed it in, the system came back with 2020 Challenger Scat Pack, and that was it. nobody asked about options. a full coverage six month policy came to $1,310 for me, 31, clean, garaged.
the funny part is that some companies give a small discount for forward collision warning. so the missing option might have cost me a few dollars a month in insurance on top of everything. i am choosing to laugh about it.
@drag_strip_fridays yes, Muncie Dragway, whenever it opens in the spring. you will get the whole slip.
car 2020 Challenger R/T Scat Pack Widebody, 392, 8-speed
update, almost four months in. 22,180 miles now. it has been parked since the first real snow in december on a tender, under a cover, because these Pirellis and Indiana salt are two things that should never meet.
i took it in to the Dodge store on the north side for an oil change before i parked it and asked for the build printout like reggie said. the service writer printed it without blinking. it matches my sticker and the old dealer printout code for code, and there were no open recalls. so that is three papers that agree and one listing that did not.
the sticker is in a sleeve and it lives in a folder with the title copy, the notarized bill of sale and the tire receipt. the 6 month warranty runs out in april and i have not needed it.
if i bid on another one through the conaway's listing pages, i would do one thing differently: email first and ask for a photo of the steering wheel switches and the door jamb label before bidding. that costs one email. i never sent it.
the guys at work still call it my Chevy with a Hemi. i have stopped correcting them.
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