2003 Accent: old vs. new model
 

Hi all.

Looking for advice here. Thanks in advance if anyone can help.

Thanks in part to this newsgroup I've been surfing the Internet for
info on Hyundai. I still plan to seriously look at an '07 Elantra for
my next car, when the new Elantra finally hits the streets. (Should not
be long now.)

Anyway, a local reputable used car dealer has several used Hyundais for
sale. Just for fun, I looked up all the info I could find about all of
them. The 2003 Accent piqued my interest. There's at best an outside
chance I would seriously consider buying an Accent, since it's just too
small, but....how does one tell if an '03 Accent is an 'older' or
'newer' version?

It's important because the newer version gets much better marks for
safety in NHTSA crash testing. We're talking better by a wide margin
here, for reasons that are not clear to me.

The NHTSA site lists the cut-off date as Dec. 20, 2002 and Jan. 5,
2003, respectively, for the two crash test results that changed. I know
the factory sticker on the car door or wherever should provide the
month it rolled off the assembly line....but as far as I know it does
not give the precise date.

Is there any way to tell from the sticker, the VIN or whatever, just
when the car was assembled? The first few digits of the VIN on the car
in question are: KMHCG45.

Also the model I looked at from the local dealer has side airbags,
which were optional for the '03 Accent. Does that by itself mean the
car is a later release model and does the presence of side airbags by
itself mean the car gets the newer, much higher crash test scores?

Sorry if these are silly questions. I'm still feeling my around the
online world of Hyundais and cars in general.

Thanks and regards,
Eric M