Lost chassis number

[simontaylor]

New member question.
Current restoration of 73 Fulvia, 1.3 progressing well, but have come to register and the chassis number has 2 characters that gave become illegible with rust. DVLA being helpful but without these two missing numbers they want to issue alternative age related number.
Any ideas how to recover?
Reg BTW 125L

work done so far:
New rear wings (new old stock)
floor pans
Inner and outer sills
aluminium bonnet / boot
Subframe replaced with dry state mint one
engine rebuild

Ingredients are there.. just need reg.

[Neil]

Where are the illegible characters, the number is stamped in bonnet channel in front of the windscreen as well as the chassis plate inside the OSF wing?

[DavidLaver]

Just on the off chance - are you sure its part of the chassis number that is missing not the type number?   The first few numbers will always be the same for the model and version.

David

[Scott]

Have you got an old MOT certificate somewhere? This should have those details on.
Might be too obvious but would have been remiss of me not to suggest! 

[stanley sweet]

I have an S2 and apart from the chassis plate it has the number stamped into the nearside bonnet channel (different place to the windscreen channel mentioned above). It can't be seen any more as it's under 45 years of different paints but I can feel it underneath. If yours is hidden under paint you could try a bit of 'brass rubbing' with a pencil and thin paper. Hopefully you can retrieve the missing numbers.

[Richard Fridd]

Or use some putty type material to create an albiet reverse image.

[fay66]

I have an S2 and apart from the chassis plate it has the number stamped into the nearside bonnet channel (different place to the windscreen channel mentioned above). It can't be seen any more as it's under 45 years of different paints but I can feel it underneath. If yours is hidden under paint you could try a bit of 'brass rubbing' with a pencil and thin paper. Hopefully you can retrieve the missing numbers.

Stan,
 I think you'll find the number in the bonnet channel is probably an ID number for the panel rather than the chassis number, but if the car has been repainted the chassis number in front of the bonnet may also disappear under layers of paint, certainly 'Fays' has.

Brian
8227

[Neil]

Brian, the number in front windscreen should be the chassis number and the is another number on S2 car stamped in the offside front channel which is the panel ID. Both can be difficult to read if under several layers of paint, the putty suggestion to read from underneath seems a good idea.

[Richard Fridd]

Regarding putty,  I should have said underneath, and not reverse image!

[stanley sweet]

Ah........OK. Never knew it was the panel number. Something new I've learned after 21 years of ownership!

[simontaylor]

Everyone many thanks for all your responses, status is:
The car has been off the road for over 18 years, so no V5 or previous MOTs and no idea who was the previous owner was.
The aluminium VIN number plate on the inner wing crumbled and totally unable to get number.
The number in the inner wing is the wing number as stated.
The chassis number in the channel below the windscreen is as follows:
818.631*?463?6

I will try the reverse putty method later.
I also used HPI where they give you 30 days to input data, I took a guess that the first digit would be 0 as I don't think they made over 100000 Fulvias.
Then entered every number between 0 to 9 and still no joy.

What I would like to know is on the V5 for the chassis number can anyone check if the dot or star is recorded on the V5

thanks
Simon

[fay66]

Simon,
I'm positive the missing digit is a zero as the 818.630/631 chassis number range was from 1001-79922, model years 1970-1976, Reference 'La Lancia'. (Although the build was actually completed in 1975.)

Which would also fit in with your 1973 Manufactured date, as the chassis number range for the 1973 build of 818.630/631 was from 41682 to 55834 . Reference the Lancia build sheets I came across and posted on here about 2 years ago.
See. http://www.lancia.myzen.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=5435.msg38563#msg38563See
 
Essentially the two zero's are only filler code.


Brian
8227

[nistri]

If the panel number is reasonably close to the chassis number, the car is original and it shows that it has not been repaired (for instance after a crash), Andrea

[Neil]

I have heard of the DVLA querying the 0 after the *, when some cars were originally registered they recorded the 5 digit number after the star and ignored the 0, where as some records included the 0 after the *, in later years they do not recognise the cars with 5 digit numbers and argue it is a different car.  That might be another whole can of worms, before we look at the actual name or description on the V5, on mine it described as sports, but is clearly a coupe!   Human error might be the case here, try searching for 5 digits only.

[fay66]

I have heard of the DVLA querying the 0 after the *, when some cars were originally registered they recorded the 5 digit number after the star and ignored the 0, where as some records included the 0 after the *, in later years they do not recognise the cars with 5 digit numbers and argue it is a different car.  That might be another whole can of worms, before we look at the actual name or description on the V5, on mine it described as sports, but is clearly a coupe!   Human error might be the case here, try searching for 5 digits only.

I think a lot of this problem arose when the DVLA ,or whatever we called it then, turned over to a computerised system which in many cases won't let you leave boxes partially blank so 0's were used instead, hence filler code, you'll find on Eper if you  don't enter the correct number of digits in the chassis number box, the system will not search for a vehicle, but just reject the query as incomplete.

Brian
8227