2016 FORD FOCUS ST VIN 1FADP3L96GL202686

This entry is for a 2016 Ford Focus ST, finished in black. Under the bonnet is a 2.0-litre petrol engine producing 252 hp. The drivetrain combines a manual gearbox with front-wheel drive. Details for this car come from a single data source and may differ from its documents.

The source data puts the mileage at 183,582 miles. High mileage alone does not rule a car out; what matters is whether regular servicing kept pace with it. A later figure lower than an earlier one points to a replaced instrument cluster or an odometer that has been wound back. A service book or a folder of workshop invoices is the simplest place to find past readings.

When the car was recorded, it showed minor dents and scratches. A damage entry is a starting point for the inspection, telling the mechanic where to look first. Some damage shows its consequences only later: corroded connectors and electrical faults can surface months afterwards.

No key is recorded with the car, and a replacement has to be coded to the immobiliser. Months of standing can leave a car with seized brakes and perished tyres.

The car carries a clean title. There is no salvage or similar mark, so the car was never recorded as a total loss.

A car’s history is everything logged against it since it left the factory: registrations and owners, inspections, repairs and insurance claims. The paperwork is kept by different bodies – registries, workshops, insurance companies and lenders – so the history of one car is spread across many places. Much of a car’s past cannot be seen: a good body repair leaves no obvious mark, and neither do years of hard driving.

A cold start, the colour of the exhaust smoke and any oil leaks tell a mechanic a good deal about how an engine has been treated. A petrol engine in good order starts cleanly, idles evenly and pulls without hesitation. A test drive says a great deal about a manual gearbox: listen for whining, feel for notchy changes and check that the clutch does not slip.

The ninth character of the VIN is a check digit calculated from the other sixteen, so a mistyped or invented number does not add up. This car’s identification number is 1FADP3L96GL202686. The VIN usually appears at the base of the windscreen, on a door pillar and stamped into the body, and all of them should match the documents.

What a history report can list depends on what has been documented about the car: registrations, mileage readings, damage, branded titles and theft reports. Paperwork is only as complete as the people who kept it, so a report with few entries lowers the risk without removing it. A VIN check and a physical inspection answer different questions: the first says what happened to the car, the second what condition it is in now. A history check on VIN 1FADP3L96GL202686 is the place to start.