Someone told me that there is a place that can make any vin tag you want for your camaro? Is this true? If so, how do people get away with it with all the other "hidden numbers" on the car?

I told him that If this were true, you would have show some sort of proof that you indeed had that vin on your car to began with.

Thanks for helping us with this debate.

Someone told me that there is a place that can make any vin tag you want for your camaro? Is this true? If so, how do people get away with it with all the other "hidden numbers" on the car?

I told him that If this were true, you would have show some sort of proof that you indeed had that vin on your car to began with.

Thanks for helping us with this debate.
Are you talking about the vin. tag or the trim tag on the firewall?

Trim tags are, for the most part, openly reproduced. I haven't seen the "good" ones advertised, but they're out there.

VIN tags are also being made, but not advertised for obvious reasons.

Vin and trim... im sure I understand what they mean but on a 67 you have the door vin number and on the firewall you have the vin number with trim on it too, right?

They dont match eachother. Just the first part?:confused:

I wouldnt doubt that somebody is doing it.It should get interesting when 2 cars show up with the same VIN both in the dash and hidden since it is fairly easy to restamp the hidden VIN# and be undetectable.I think there were some questions raised when a few of the supposedly missing ZL1 camaros that were stolen off the dealer lot when new showed up found and registered.Lots of "rare cars" that were left to die in the corn fields have had their tags removed,and applied to other cars.It should be interesting if sombody drags the rusted hulk out of the field and restores it using a repop VIN and puts the car out there for sale.Things could get ugly.

Vin and trim... im sure I understand what they mean but on a 67 you have the door vin number and on the firewall you have the vin number with trim on it too, right?

They dont match eachother. Just the first part?:confused:

The vin number in the door jam will not match the fisher body number on the trim tag on the firewall.

i wonder what the law is concerning 67 and earlier cars that really didn't have VIN numbers. I say this because most of the time the tag numbers were for warranty purposes and not referred to as VINs and weren't thought of in a legal way. I think in 68 or 69 is when the federal gov't made it mandatory to have a VIN number and started using it for legal purposes. Example is 64-67 Mustangs - Marti reproduces all of the tags with no issues. In fact, I think they are approved by Ford. Try to find a readable VIN on an old pickup or a 50s car that had them on the a-pillar sometimes. I've had several Nova's, a Chevelle, still own a Ventura, and own a 67 Mustang Convertible along with the Camaro - by far, the 1st gen Camaro VIN issue comes up more then any other car I have owned. I would think it would be a bigger deal to repop a 67 cowl tag then a 67 VIN.

A friend of mine bought a stolen recovery 67 Camaro back in 1971,it had the door pillar tag ripped off when it was stolen.He fixed it by replacing some of the stolen parts and got a govenment issued VIN for the car.He made the car into his race car and still owns it today complete with very original body panel and interior.The car was originally an RS/SS 396 4 speed car.Apparently the government thought that the tag was the VIN back then too.Another friend of mine bought a 65 Chevelle back in the early 90's,and got pulled over by the state police long after he bought it and he found out the hard way that there wasnt a tag in the doorjam.He found it easier to cut the car up for parts then to get the paperwork straightened out on a 35 year old rusty car.In New Jersey,the number on the tag is the number on the title,and since no two cars share the same number,it kind of makes it the VIN no matter what.Since the door VIN is so easy to damage,I could see it much more plausable that it could need replacing so reproduction would have at least so chance of being legitimate.Dash tags on the otherhand should be off limits.

I blame Chevy:) They should have better records. I can find out exactly what my Ford or Pontiac had from the factory with very little effort and for very little money. I think it would be nice if you could order replacement tags from the original manufacture provided you have the necessary proof. Whether the proof is a state inspection or other documentation. When you think about it it's kind of silly that you can't. Instead, people are doing it illegally. Hey, first gens alone might be able to get GM out of trouble with TAG repops:)

In New Jersey,the number on the tag is the number on the title,and since no two cars share the same number,it kind of makes it the VIN no matter what.Since the door VIN is so easy to damage,I could see it much more plausable that it could need replacing so reproduction would have at least so chance of being legitimate.Dash tags on the otherhand should be off limits.


........Using that logic in reference to the Trim Tag in the highlighted portion above...then every 1st Gen Camaro is incorrectly titled because the Trim Tag is independant/irrelevant to the VIN for identification purposes. It doesn't "kinda make it the VIN no matter what".:confused: I think you might be misinformed in regards Trim Tags/VIN Tags.

David F.

i wonder what the law is concerning 67 and earlier cars that really didn't have VIN numbers. I say this because most of the time the tag numbers were for warranty purposes and not referred to as VINs and weren't thought of in a legal way. I think in 68 or 69 is when the federal gov't made it mandatory to have a VIN number and started using it for legal purposes. Example is 64-67 Mustangs - Marti reproduces all of the tags with no issues. In fact, I think they are approved by Ford. Try to find a readable VIN on an old pickup or a 50s car that had them on the a-pillar sometimes. I've had several Nova's, a Chevelle, still own a Ventura, and own a 67 Mustang Convertible along with the Camaro - by far, the 1st gen Camaro VIN issue comes up more then any other car I have owned. I would think it would be a bigger deal to repop a 67 cowl tag then a 67 VIN.
What are you talking about? There has been VIN on cars and truck ever sense they started to license vehicles. With out a VIN the state would not be able to tie a title or license to a particular car. How would anyone prove ownership? Only thing the federal law did in 68 was to mandate a standard location for the VIN on the vehicle.
As for lost or damaged VINs most states have laws and procedures to go through to replace them.

Roger

They weren't VINs. Ford's was a warranty number and no one called them VINs in the sense we use them today. Before the federal law, each state made their own rules. They weren't the same thing before the federal law - before this law, the federal government didn't care. That's why in some states cars older then 72/73 don't have titles. I'm not that old, but I bet there was a time when you went to the DMV and picked up plates without the mention of a VIN or a VIN check. I don't have a title to 3 of my cars - just a registration. In many states, a registration isn't permanent - in other words. if you don't register it for x years, they wipe it out of the system - no record to be found. On a titled vehicle, the title never expires or deleted. State DMVs in the old days did not care what identification number you used to register the car - they didn't check if the number matched the make/model or even if it was stolen other then in that state. I know if NY, the DMV would not know if I was handing them a number for a 67 Chevy II or a 67 Camaro. If it's a 73 or newer car, it's tracked in national databases (think CARFAX). In fact, I had a 69 Camaro a while back that had a mistake on the registration that was missing a number completely and it still said 69 Camaro on the document. If all cars were issued permanent titles, then maybe this would stop some of the swapping. A pre 72 car sitting in the NY (and many other states) scrap yard for 20 years with the VIN won't have any record with the DMV. On some old trucks the VIN as we now call it was actually on the motor - they had no body tag.

My point is that 1st gen Camaros seem to run into this debate often with VIN swaps, re-stamping, etc. If the person has legal ownership of the car with proof of VIN, I think they should be able to get the same serial number, body tag, or VIN re-created. This happens all the time legally with 64-67 Mustangs (and other Fords of that era) with Fords approval as I mentioned. Of course you still have to own the car and it's easy to verify the car's info from Marti.

I don't know the stats on car thefts, but my guess is that most are not recovered or they are returned broken and battered and perhaps total losses. Therefore, VINs aren't to reduce car theft, but to generate revenue for the gov't. I live in NY, so I may be a bit jaded since my registration fees are going up :(

Here is a link - don't know if the information is accurate:

http://www.insuranceusa.com/articlecontent.php?id=81

They weren't VINs........

If they weren't VIN's and were warranty numbers,then what purpose does/did the Chevrolet Warranty Card/POP serve?????????:confused: Seems like alot of misinformation/disinformation in this thread :yes:. What happened when the warranty expired????? Did that make the registration invalid??? That 13 digit number on the dash of my Camaro is and always has been a VIN :yes:.

David F.

Be careful, this could very easily turn in to a thread that gets moved to Off Topic if it hasn't already.

No reason yet for this to be moved to off-topic. It's pretty on-topic of Camaros IMO. However, it might get locked if the debate get's too heated. There is a lot of misinformation going on in this thread.....

No reason yet for this to be moved to off-topic. It's pretty on-topic of Camaros IMO. However, it might get locked if the debate get's too heated. There is a lot of misinformation going on in this thread.....


Thank you Christopher for reinforcing the point that I was trying to make. This thread does indeed have some misinformation.

David F.

........Using that logic in reference to the Trim Tag in the highlighted portion above...then every 1st Gen Camaro is incorrectly titled because the Trim Tag is independant/irrelevant to the VIN for identification purposes. It doesn't "kinda make it the VIN no matter what".:confused: I think you might be misinformed in regards Trim Tags/VIN Tags.

David F.



I know that trim tag numbers dont match the VIN,I was talking about the door jam tag and the hidden numbers on the firewall.Unlike the dashboard numbers,the doorjam number is much easier to damage and isnt as easily visible when th car is just sitting somewhere parked.My point is that there may be many 67 and earlier cars floating around with no tag in the doorjam but have titles and be otherwise legit.reproducing a tag for such a situation would seem far more plausable then repoping a tag for a 68 and later car.How many cars are actually being restored that have that much damage to the dashboard?

It's legal to remove the VIN plate and relocate it to a new dash panel, or new "A" frame IF NECESSARY to effect a repair to the car. It is not now, nor will it ever be legal to have a new VIN plate made and installed on a car for any reason, even if the numbers match what the car had originally. Thats just the way the law is written. Its a federal crime to do so, as it is to be in posession of equipment to create such a VIN plate. As of today there is only one state that has a law about replicating Trim Tags and placing them on a vehicle.

Rich Schmidt,Your absolutely right about the 67 Camaro you mentioned,saw it myself,Joe S SR's car !! Yes thats the old "Born Free" 1967 Camaro that ran a L88 427,what a Time Capsule,all original panel car and paint!! I have pictures of the car on my digital camera from 2 years ago at Joe's place. Rich,Can't remember but was the cowel tag missing,I'm thinking it was.I think Joe told me this was originally from California this car and some how made it out to the east coast. Dan

When I stated it wasn't like we refer to a VIN today, I'm talking from a legal standpoint. It just so happens that Chevy used "Vehicle Identification Number", but not all car manufactures did. Even with Chevy, before the laws were increased, it was more for tracking and warranty purposes then as a holy piece of metal protected by the federal gov't with death penalty should it be tampered with:) I agree that there should be some federal law that permits using the original VIN and creating some sort of plate if proof is supplied. I don't think it even needs to be made to exactly replace the original tag, but to show that it is indeed the car with that VIN. I'm not sure how many re-stamped VINs are around. I think VIN swapping (6cyl to 8cyl) is more common and I would bet in most cases neither the VIN being put on or the partial VINs are those of stolen cars. I don't think of this any different than buying a 67 or 69 shell from Dynacorn. Both may be questionable, but nothing was stolen. I'm not convinced that classic car theft is a major issue - I see more dirt track cars/trailers stolen locally then cars. This is to the point where builders are stamping major parts with identification numbers. Of course I know classic cars are stolen, but some of these threads make it sound like it's worse than the Honda Accord in theft per 1000.

I did check and only around 12% of cars are recovered. California has double the theft rate of any other state. The Northeast has the lowest auto theft rate - who want's to steal cars in the snow:)

BTW - it wasn't until 1984 when the Federal govt made re-producing VINs illegal -
"Another 1984 federal law made it a federal offense to counterfeit or forge motor vehicle title certificates. In 1985 the Department of Transportation required that 14 major vehicles parts be inscribed with a 17-digit vehicle identification number (VIN)."

http://www.iii.org/media/hottopics/insurance/test4/

Hey Dan.Joes red 67 is his M/P car from back then,the Born Free car was a 69 that he also bought in 1970 or 71.That car had a regular title and VIN and was in fact a 427 car when he bought it.He used to say it was a Motion car,but the way he described it to me it was a COPO car.had a bone stock iron head 427 and steel hood.They yanked the engine out of that and put it into Pat's Chevelle {Pat the driver of Born Free}.He said the 427 was a turd and that the 396 they had in there was faster,but thats a whole different story.He used to swap engines between those cars,he would run high MPH of the meet in ProStock with the 69 one week,then put the engine in the 67 the next week,run M/P and set the record in B,then add or take out weight and race in A or C too.He still has the 074 aluminum heads and tunnel ram that were ported by AFR back in 1972 and helped him set those records.I recently found a pro street 69 for sale that looks like it might be the old Born Free.car.I remembered the last 4 of the VIN in so I could check with him.The car is right in Jersey City,has a cage and rear rails that looked like they were done by Durenhiem's and has a steering box now but has brackets on the frame for a steering rack and the engine cradle was removed like on Joe's car.Rumor was that Sam Haddad was asking about the car back in the day for somebody who wanted it as a super stocker.That would make sense since the car also has a steel nose on it.I gotta call Joe anyway so I will ask him soon.

Rich,Yes Joe Senior told me the same thing that it was a 69 Copo 427 Camaro from Baldwin Chevrolet.He said the original owner had financial problems soooo he sold it to Joe and Pat M. Just so you know that car was originally a RS too.I have old photos of both Born Free cars and several aricles with them next to each other. I know who Joe and Pat sold the 69 Camaro to and he was a Jersey City guy.Supposively the car was later old out of Jersey City,Joe told me that.The car will NOT be found with a 12 bolt or muncie! Car would have a glass frontend with RS tail lights and Lower Back up lights in tail section. By the way I bought a 1969 L88 427 512 March Date code short Block from Joe years ago,his name is stamped on the pad.I also bought a L88/Zl1 1969 GM 7115 Crank from him a year or so ago.Crank has his name stamped in it too.I met Brooklyn Heavy at Joes place 2 years ago when I owned Heavys Ramp truck! My friend who was the last owner of Grumpys 68 Camaro was there that day too talking to Heavy and Joe! He brought pictures never seen before of Grumps car and what he did to it.. Joe was happy to get all together at his place that Sunny day! I know Sammy Haddad he ran a 68 Camaro,69 Camaro and 69 Vette at ET Raceway Park.He had amachine shop.Was at Sams place 3 years ago.Bought some suff from him.Hows Joe SR doing now,major health issues right now.Joe is a GREAT guy and I'm so glad met him and his family,One of BEST!!!! If you talk to Joe tell him I said hi!

So who was the last known owner of the 68 Camaro?I know the 69 supposedly was last known being raced for a shop by the name of North Jersey speed shop or something.He had told me to look out for a pinto flex shaft on the steering rack,but I dont think that he knows that they havent been legal for 30 years at least.Haddad was asking about the car with the intentions of putting a steel nose and stock steering back on it,that was back in the late 70's,and Joe told him it should be O.K. as long as they fix the cut up firewall too.The car had lots of odd things about it like the fact that Joe took the factory discs off the front and installed drums because they were lighter and had less drag was one thing that stood out.Joe's problems have mostly been with his eyes and his sugar.He is just about blind now.He is still wrenching on friend's cars from time to time,but he doesnt have a shop anymore.One of Joe jr's friends opened up a performance type shop down by Wilson's carpet in JC and Joe sr and jr both go there and wrench on stuff from time to time.

I believe there is a machine shop,speed shop with that name that I went to years ago.I know I have their business card somewhere.I'll find it and tell you what it says.Rich removing the front disc was pretty common back then for the reason you stated.Its amazing when you call on these old race cars that are untouched that have drums.You asked if the 69 Camaro had original disc brakes and they don't know.I say look at the original brake pedal whats it say? Then we go from there and ask more questions.Yeah I've known Joes a Diabetic since I became friends with him.He's had several eye operations to correct his eye site,not good.Its so sad that this happened to Joe,loves wrenching still !! Hey didn't you buy a old 67 Blue Camaro race car 3 years ago in JC?Any uncovered history on it? I gonna have to call Joe,haven't talked to him in a while!

I hooked my neighbor up with that car.It was built by Durenhiem's in about 1978 buy the guy who we got it from,he got it off a dealer lot as a used car.The car needed two small bars added and it went right through certification which says a lot about their work.It has a super high strung smallblock with 6.14 gears in the rear and a 6500rpm stall convertor.I redid the engine with Brodix heads and a much smaller cam,and he swapped in some 5.13's,but the convertor is a dud,it wont even stall at 4500,and leaves too soft.The car was a mess,every body panel was shot even the roof.Mostly yard truck damage.It looks great now,painted Capri Cream,it kind of looks Grumpy's toyish.Maybe I will post a picture.

Just to add my 2 cents to the title discussion as far as I know there is no federal law that covers that. Here in NH vehicles over 15 years old don't require a title. Nothing like what was stated such as 1972 or that type of thing. This year 1994 & older don't need one. Next year it will be 95 & older, etc. Rhode Island it's 10 years old that's the cutoff. The thing that makes NH unique is that we also don't have mandatory insurance so it used to be common for people in other states to do a "paper shuffle" with a friend in NH to get cars with missing titles papered in their state. I knew a guy here in NH who used to do it regularly for friends of his in NJ until the NH DMV started asking why he bought & sold so many cars without having a dealers license. It works like this.. Joe from NJ sells me his 69 Camaro that he's got no title for on a bill of sale (the car is still in Joes garage). I go to the NH DMV & register my "new" Camaro (about $40 for an older car) and show them the bill of sale Joe sent me. I wait a few weeks and then "sell" it back to Joe and send him a notarized bill of sale, the NH registration and a letter from the NH DMV stating that there is no title on older cars here in NH. Joe then takes this paperwork to NJ DMV where they issue him a new title with no questions asked since he just "bought" the car in NH and it has a current NH registration. Complicated & time consuming for sure but still better than scrapping a perfectly good car. To be perfectly clear the laws have changed and this is not to be considered an offer to do anything like this so DON'T ask.

I have owned several 1930's 1950's cars bothe Ford and Chevy - all of them had a VIN number. my 29, 30, and 32 Fords had them stamped into the frame on the driver side near or almost under the firewall. They were even coded back then to ttell if the car was a 4 or a V8

........Using that logic in reference to the Trim Tag in the highlighted portion above...then every 1st Gen Camaro is incorrectly titled because the Trim Tag is independant/irrelevant to the VIN for identification purposes. It doesn't "kinda make it the VIN no matter what".:confused: I think you might be misinformed in regards Trim Tags/VIN Tags.

David F.



I was talking about the guy who said that the door VIN plate wasnt really a legally required piece to identify the car since before 1968 there was no standardized area to put the VIN. He is wrong since there is no other complete VIN on any Chevrolet aside from whats on the door jam tag or beind the windsheild on later cars. Whats under the heater box is a partial VIN and is never used to identify any car for normal puposes. The trim tag has no informeation to identify the car.

The real scam with this would mostly pertain to the handfull of Chevrolets that are infact on a registry of rare and desirable cars. It wouldnt help much to a guy looking to resusurect an L-78 car or even many of the COPO cars that arent documented. The only way to commit fraud with a COPO car would be to have the VIN of a known destoryed car,and then repop it. All other cars it wouldnt kake a difference. One exception would be on a 72 Camaro which could have an existing VIN changed with a new 5th digit to make it a Z or big block car,and get a new "magic title" which can easily be obtained for any car that a VIN never even existed for. and then create a clone. Since the hidden VIN only has the non critical digits it would be easy to repop on of those tags with the altered 5th digit using the existing remaining digits.

Where theres a will theres a way. If nothing else this keeps the market realistic on the cars we love to collect. The real desirable and rare survivors can easily be verified by a good expert,and those cars should be the ones that get top value. There are so man "real cars" that are restored using nothing but a chUnk of original firewall and a restamped block,that it makes kind of foolish to think that such a car is in fact a real rare car at all. At what point do you throw your hands in the air and say "who cares if it was born a yenko" when the car rolling over the block was a former tube chassis race car that had everything piece of steel from the floor pan to the inner roof structure cut out along with the entire fireall,subframe,ect,and it shows up restored using a donor firewall,donor subframe,donor toe board to tail panel floor pans, has mud on the 1/4's where they had to "un radius" the wheel openings, non original welds where they had to piece back in all sorts of missing metal,then got a restamped engne block,trans case and rear end housing? But it is a real "Born Yenko" right?

Good points there Rich.

And I liked the "reminiscing" posts about previous cars. :thumbsup:

And I did find some correct 215 heads that I needed.

If somebody were to repop 1970 and later tags,imagine the look on everybody's face if a 72 or later Camaro turned up with a 5th digit that denoted a 454? Many GM codes carry across from model to model,so the same 5th digit from a Chevelle could be put on a Camaro VIN,apply for one of those "New England" bill of sales,and then title it in another state. Stamp a date code correct 454 and try toscamthe world. Hey Chevy didnt keep any records, and as long as the repop VIN used the same last 6 digits as the hidden #'s who would be able to call your bluff? How would somebody go about disputing the authenticity of such a car. Even one better would be to use an LS3 SS so you could keep the number's matching trans and all the correct SS parts,and just repop or mutilate the trim tag to get rid of the LS3 if it is even there? A true Ghost car:)

In case this confused anybody here is an example. My 73 Camaro is VIN 1Q87F3N108600.The "F" denotes the 307 engine. If in 1973 a Chevelle used the latter S to denote a 454 SS engine,I could have a tag made that says 1Q87S3N108600,that would make it appear that it would have had a 454(which was never offered in a Camaro). Since all the hidden VIN's have only the # 13N108600 which doesnt include any engine code I wouldnt need to change any numbers on the body,trans ect. The new VIN never existed,but it doesnt have to. In bill of sale states they take the number on the dashboard as the car's identification. They issue a bill of sale with the number of any car you want them to,and it doesnt even have to exist. You could tell them your VIN tag reads "Mickey Mouse is a rat" and they would put that on the VIN section of their paperwork. Once you bring that paperwork to a title state like New Jersey they would also just issue a title with that number on it. If they enter the number iin their system and it doesnt come up with any record of being stolen they just print up a title(scary huh?). And thus a car that never was is born.

In case this confused anybody here is an example. My 73 Camaro is VIN 1Q87F3N108600.The "F" denotes the 307 engine. If in 1973 a Chevelle used the latter S to denote a 454 SS engine,I could have a tag made that says 1Q87S3N108600,that would make it appear that it would have had a 454(which was never offered in a Camaro). Since all the hidden VIN's have only the # 13N108600 which doesnt include any engine code I wouldnt need to change any numbers on the body,trans ect. The new VIN never existed,but it doesnt have to. In bill of sale states they take the number on the dashboard as the car's identification. They issue a bill of sale with the number of any car you want them to,and it doesnt even have to exist. You could tell them your VIN tag reads "Mickey Mouse is a rat" and they would put that on the VIN section of their paperwork. Once you bring that paperwork to a title state like New Jersey they would also just issue a title with that number on it. If they enter the number iin their system and it doesnt come up with any record of being stolen they just print up a title(scary huh?). And thus a car that never was is born.

The only problem is, its a CRIME.

Roger

I know that,I was only mentioning how over the top the fraud could get if it were legal to repop VIN tags.