Sorry to drag up an old thread, but I'd like to hear opinions on a different angle regarding this registry bit.
I know the fate of my '73 340 Challenger. It was parted and crushed, but I don't know what became of the VIN number or the title as it met this fate after I sold it. The engine went into a '65 Barracuda, the trans into a '69 Charger, etc. The dash pad ended up in a '71, but what that dude did with the VIN tag I don't know. Hell, he might have registered the '71 as my '73 since he didn't have a title for his car and mine was clean. I have all the original paperwork from that car: build sheet, window sticker, MSO, trade-in agreement, you name it. If that VIN is running around out there, the car's a fake/rebody. So, do I submit it?
Another case: 60 miles from here is a car that I know is a rebody. It's a Panther Pink T/A, except of course it's not. The T/A bits were ripped from a wrecked car in a junkyard that was painted Panther Pink, but was originally B3. That car was crashed hard. I know who the original owner is, who crashed it, everything. The data tag in the car is a total fake to make it something even the original T/A was not. The guy that owns the fake ended up buying the wreck out of the junkyard because word got out on another site (a friend of mine exposed it). The body numbers don't match because the clone was already painted before he took the wreck out of the yard.
Same dude is not making the same mistake twice; he recently cut all of the available numbers out of a '72 Road Runner 340/4-speed car in the same junkyard. That car was already a "clip"; the back half of it was a '71 Satellite or Road Runner. I know that VIN too, and someone's gonna end up with another fake.
So, do I let people know this information? Or do I pass it off as someone else's problem?
Regardless of state law, moving chassis numbers is a federal felony. I realize the gray area surrounding using 75% or more of metal from another car or repro houses, and I'm not saying I've got the solution, but that is the law. A friend is currently doing exactly that with his '68 Charger; he found his first car after 25 years and it's really too far gone, but emotions, first love, etc. have him bringing it back from the dead using a '70 Coronet donor and repro parts. He's only doing the car for himself, and he's not changing the fact that it's a 318/column shift auto car in quadruple green (two-tone green gut), either. He's more than happy to show you the current condition of the car, which isn't much more than a cowl, firewall, tail panel and roof, really. It's so rotten, we literally lost the driver's side torsion bar during the tow home. It fell out somewhere, and we never found it despite searching the entire 40-mile route.
