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Determining Date of Manufacture from the Serial Number This page was developed by Mike Morris WA6ILQ from an email sent to Repeater-Builder.

Date: Tue, 01 Apr 2006
Subject: How to Translate Motorola Serial numbers to Determine the Date of Manufacture

> Most Motorola products follow the same serial number conventions. As 
> such, this often enables you to determine the approximate manufacture 
> date for a device. 
>
> The serial number convention follows the following general format: 
> 
> 123ABC4567 or 123ABC45678
>
> Where 123 is an unique three digit Accounting Product Code for each model 
> series, where the significance of A is unknown, BC determines manufacture 
> year and month respectively, and where 4567 or 45678 is a unique four or 
> five digit serial number for the device in question.
> 
> To determine the manufacture year and month, refer to the table below: 
> 
> Second Letter is the year: 
> A 1976 or 2000 or 2024
> B 1977 or 2001 or 2025
> C 1978 or 2002 or 2026
> D 1979 or 2003 or 2027
> E 1980 or 2004 or 2028
> F 1981 or 2005 or 2029
> G 1982 or 2006 or 2030
> H 1983 or 2007 ...
> J 1984 or 2008
> K 1985 or 2009
> L 1986 or 2010
> M 1987 or 2011
> N 1988 or 2012 
> P 1989 or 2013 
> Q 1990 or 2014 
> R 1991 or 2015 
> S 1992 or 2016 
> T 1993 or 2017 
> U 1994 or 2018 
> V 1995 or 2019 
> W 1996 or 2020 
> X 1997 or 2021 
> Y 1998 or 2022 
> Z 1999 or 2023
> 
> The third letter identifies the portion of the month in which the unit was made:
> 
> A First half of January 
> B Last half of January 
> C First half of February 
> D Last half of February 
> E First half of March 
> F Last half of March 
> G First half of April 
> H Last half of April 
> J First half of May 
> K Last half of May 
> L First half of June 
> M Last half of June 
> N First half of July 
> P Last half of July 
> Q First half of August 
> R Last half of August 
> S First half of September 
> T Last half of September 
> U First half of October 
> V Last half of October 
> W First half of November 
> X Last half of November 
> Y First half of December 
> Z Last half of December 

The following information was added by WA1MIK and was obtained directly from Motorola and sent to Repeater-Builder for inclusion in this document.

Motorola Solutions equipment serial numbers follow two standard formats.

First format: three digits, three letters, and four digits: The fifth character of the serial number represents the YEAR code and the sixth character represents the MONTH code. Example:

2 0 3 F L W 6 4 2 1

Decodes to 2010 (L), first half of November (W).

Second format: two digits, four letters, one digit, and four letters: The ninth character of the serial number represents the YEAR code, the tenth character represents the MONTH code and the eleventh character represents the WARRANTY period code. Example:

5 2 C B A C 8 D L W J

Decodes to 2010 (L), first half of November (W), 1 Year Standard Warranty (J).

The values in each position correspond to the following pre-determined year, month or warranty period codes. Note that there are two entries for every month: the first represents the first half of the month; the second represents the second half of the month.

VALUE	YEAR	MONTH	WARRANTY PERIOD
A	2000	JAN	1 year
B	2001	JAN	3 years
C	2002	FEB	5 years
D	2003	FEB	2 years
E	2004	MAR	No warranty
F	2005	MAR	90 days
G	2006	APR	N/A
H	2007	APR	3 years, Canada only
J	2008	MAY	1 year, standard
K	2009	MAY	N/A
L	2010	JUN	1 year, OEM
M	2011	JUN	1 year, OEM
N	2012	JUL	5 years
P	2013	JUL	5 years
Q	2014	AUG	3 years
R	2015	AUG	90 days, refurbished
S	2016	SEP	3 years
T	2017	SEP	OEM telephone, serviced by dealers only
U	2018	OCT	90 days
V	2019	OCT	N/A
W	2020	NOV	2 years
X	2021	NOV	5 years
Y	2022	DEC	3 years
Z	2023	DEC	3 years

NOTE: To be utilized for Subscriber equipment, Infrastructure equipment, and iDEN.

Contact Information:

The author can be contacted at: his-callsign // at // repeater-builder // dot // com.

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