Car registration and VIN questions...

[Looneybomber]

All hypothetical here.

-Let's say you take a chassis of car A and put on body parts from car B. Now you have A with VIN 1234 that resembles B.
-Said car A gets wrecked and fixed. So removing of bent/crushed materials and replacing with clean materiel is done.
-Now car A gets stretched/shortened, so parts of the chassis or unibody are added/removed. It still has VIN 1234 and looks nothing like the original car is both size and appearance.
-Car A then has some crazy rust problem and a new welded, boxed frame is created to bolt everything back onto. Still has VIN 1234?

So here comes my question. Why can't a person just take a tiny piece of some car A and create a tube frame for it built around that section of frame and/or fire wall the VIN is attached to?

That then leads to my ultimate question. Why couldn't a person buy a built-for-the-track Ariel Atom and weld in a piece of Honda Civic frame and whatever else and register it has a rebuilt/salvaged Civic?

[mechanicalmoron]

Do it.

Also, I think there's probably got to be some sort of way to apply for a VIN, since you can register full-on homebuilts, some places at least.

Although you can ACTUALLY swap engines all you want and it doesn't need to match the car, I think that if you put the honda motor from the specific honda that you used for the VIN, with matching numbers, in the atom, you'd have a much stronger case for saying it's that specific honda. Put some honda struts or something in it. Put a honda badge on the front.

I thought atoms are street legal.... guess I missed something.

[krash]

All hypothetical here.

-Let's say you take a chassis of car A and put on body parts from car B. Now you have A with VIN 1234 that resembles B.
-Said car A gets wrecked and fixed. So removing of bent/crushed materials and replacing with clean materiel is done.
-Now car A gets stretched/shortened, so parts of the chassis or unibody are added/removed. It still has VIN 1234 and looks nothing like the original car is both size and appearance.
-Car A then has some crazy rust problem and a new welded, boxed frame is created to bolt everything back onto. Still has VIN 1234?

So here comes my question. Why can't a person just take a tiny piece of some car A and create a tube frame for it built around that section of frame and/or fire wall the VIN is attached to?

That then leads to my ultimate question. Why couldn't a person buy a built-for-the-track Ariel Atom and weld in a piece of Honda Civic frame and whatever else and register it has a rebuilt/salvaged Civic?

I knew where this was going from the start and I started lol'ing. We've all thought about this at some point haha.

I feel like its the original car that needs to be modified to keep the vin. I don't know how far that stretches, like you said. I think you'd have to crash the civic and then rebuild it using the atom as a base, or something like that.

[Dattebayo]

So here comes my question. Why can't a person just take a tiny piece of some car A and create a tube frame for it built around that section of frame and/or fire wall the VIN is attached to?

Because the law determines that is fraud.

That then leads to my ultimate question. Why couldn't a person buy a built-for-the-track Ariel Atom and weld in a piece of Honda Civic frame and whatever else and register it has a rebuilt/salvaged Civic?

Also fraud. Your intention has a lot to do with the law's interpretation of what you do in this instance. If you just had a few parts of one car laying around, it's obviously not a whole car and you're just kidding yourself if you really believe that is worthy of calling it whole. If I recall correctly, the bare chassis is required to at least start with. You can buy frame/unibody replacements, but then you're getting into having the original VIN transplanted onto it.

Rebuilt titles are a whole different thing, and it seems you may have gone into discussing that issue with the cutting and whatnot. I know that limousine companies have to get a new vin for what they do, so yeah...

[Looneybomber]

Any idea what the law states as to how much of the original car must remain?

What got me thinking about this, was the '69 Boss mustang with the 494 CanAm race engine. They built a new chassis & suspension for the car, new engine and drive train, body is modified, etc. There's not much of the original car left at all (maybe most of the firewall is still there?).
http://theoriginalwinger.com/2012-12-03 ... tti-engine

[Dattebayo]

Not specific, it changes state to state. My friend who works in a specialty truck shop down the street mentioned that you can get a vin swapped by doing what the DMV calls a "rebody", but there's a lot of hoops to jump through.

He says he remembers something about a law stating that 49% of the original body still has to be there in the construction of the vehicle, including the original firewall and VIN plate. Removing the plate requires the procedure above. Removing the firewall will need to to apply for a specialty vehicle VIN. Also, the engine cannot be a 10 year newer or older make than the VIN code shows the car to be.

This is all kind of hearsay, but why so interested in circumventing the law?

[Looneybomber]

This is all kind of hearsay, but why so interested in circumventing the law?

Just making conversation, plus I saw some not-street legal atoms for sale for a pretty good price. Not that I have the $ to buy one, just brain storming.

[Jesda]

In Florida they'll give you a VIN and clean title for a potted plant if you ask nicely enough.

[Looneybomber]

In Florida they'll give you a VIN and clean title for a potted plant if you ask nicely enough.

If that plant is from out of state, the dept of agriculture may try to kill it with fire. Will state farm pay for that?