Go down to your courthouse and they can tell you what it will take for a builder's title. In Kansas, the main components have to come from three or more different cars ie: Body, engine, chassis...

"One day spent working on the car is like one hour of sex"

What do you mean make up my mind?

The Mini will be used exactly as I use my Moke right now. About 500 miles a week on average (whenever the North Dallas weather plays a favorite hand to me and unless my turn to pick up my rug rat from daycare on my commute home) adn we attend most Dallas area car shows (within reasonable distance).

My Moke is no show piece, he has the garage bangs from the Kids bikes, the Texas interesting Bugs in his grill, pock marked front panel from being sand blasted by all the contruction activity here, etc.

I am not looking to recreate and flim flam an S, I am quite comfortable calling the end result a Mini Cooper rally replica.

I just want to know before I pour money and soul into it that it can be registered, legally.

Before posting this thread I went to my local DMV and I was told to bring the finished vehicle and then they'll decide, hence this thread.

 

 

your right in one way it was hard to buy a works mini ,  I picked up the  ex works mini  because of bad paper work, when Gordan Spice was traveling around the world  for a international race tour , they were in the Bahamas  and the car was seized by the local customs because of  improper paper work ,  the car was sold at auction ,a guy from winnipeg bought it and raced it for years , I bought  it in 1990  and started to restore it ,  it was sold in 2001 .     I was in a small island in teh bahamas   on a medical rescue ( I am a medic for the bahamas air sea rescue) and I was walking beside the local customs and there was a  old lotus f1 car less engine sitting in the compound  , wow    went in the next morring and asked what the story, was shipped in  many years ago with wrong paper work  , asked it I could buy it , even offered a bribe , it the bahamas  bribes are a way of life .   but no go , so I will work  to see whe it will be auctioned , or if i can wangle it out some how.   You do not see a very historic car like that on a small island very often.

If you have a real "s"  1969  i do have one parts car left  with vin and ident plate . 

i wonder what part of Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) people choose not to understand?? Every car is given an ID at birth, you can't change it just because you choose to.... usually for profit - no one ever re-vins an S into an 850

I think i could reasonably confidently state that the "Works" NEVER re-vinned a car. Sure they rolled in a new shell and reused an existing registration/body numbers etc but this was perfectly legal in the UK (as has already been mentioned) and no change in identity was involved. And every Works car had a competition history when it passed out of their ownership. While cars were rebuilt to continue competing, no cars were rebuilt AFTER their last event and then sold on to raise revenue. Of course they're not to blame for the shysters that have got in the act since.

I really don't see any difference between re-vinning and identity theft. In every legal jurisdiction I have been in, re-vinning is fraud. Its taking one vehicle and re-labelling it as another for whatever purposes. Its actually a very profitable way of processing stolen cars.

Here in Oz the vehicle ID must be stamped into a permanent part of the vehicle main structure - and tampering with that number is illegal. From the 60s the UK engine number tags were cut off and the numbers re-stamped on the block. The factory used to tie the UK engine plate onto the top rad hose -or somewhere convenient - with a bit of tie wire. When my S had a violent encounter with a giant grasshopper the bonnet slam panel had to be removed for repair. Rather than reweld it I had it bolted in place (a great idea at engine out time). One consequence was that the registration authorities changed the vin. Previously they used the body number because that was spot welded to the panel, now they choose to use the FE number. They would not allow the car number (Ka2S4) as an official ID because that could be removed through use of a screwdriver...

We have to face facts. Cars die just like people.

While you might carry your Father's name and continue his legacy, you don't share or perpetuate his identity.

Cheers, Ian

I think all this VIN paranoia just doesn't have a meaning at all.. the key point is to compromise in my opinion.. as i read in the previous posts DMV in every case gives you the benefit to move the car at least.. Quick make up your mind for what you want the mini to stand for you said you would like to use it as a show car or a Sunday runner..as soon as you stick with that i don't think you'll face problems in moving the mini around.. In Greece for example things are much more stricter its almost impossible to put an old car on the road doing all this reVining stuff you can issue what is called "historic license plates" but in order for me to do so i have to join a club pay some fees rebuilt the car from scratch to factory specs then pass a commission of classic petrol heads that know everything about classics and then give me my "historic license plates" you are very lucky to be able to have choices minis die here and we can't save them due to this stupid paperwork..

I have owned  2 strange minis   one was gordan  spice's last  works mini   it was a cooper "s"  but had a normal 1275 vin,   I questiond  why and found out some times  the works guys would start with a "s "body and vin it as a normal mini   due to bugets , a normal mini was cheeper to acount for then a  real "s" ,   second was Teds powels  pixie   race car  , the "s"   1963-4  he had shipped from BL as a body of a copper "s"  before the "s" was sold in canada  so it was vin'd as a noraml mini   in the 39,400 range .    however said.  that  even Heritage did not know how to account for the diffrence  , but paper work I had showed  the trail from the factory .   It was typical of the works and customers work supported cars to be wrecked and re bodied  yet keep the same vin or even have normal vin's. 

I only sell vin's of cars I know are no longer around and I bought and destroyed ether on the track or due to rust.    in fact my last vin is now sold  .

Not meaning to hijack the thread, but this is in the same thought lines: what would it be considered if someone was to obtain a valid VIN from a car totally beyond saving and seek to recreate/restore the car that goes with it from the Heritage certificate? For example, the original "Works" rally cars were frequently completely "rebuilt" with totally different bodies between races and retained their original VIN's.

Would such a car be a "restored" vehicle? Would it be a "re-vin"? What would it be called?

Again, keep in mind, this is a valid VIN paired with a car beyond saving. It is them put with the Heritage certificate to know what the original car's spec would have been. Then the appropriate parts obtained to rebuild the car back to meet the original spec: replacement body of proper vintage (say MK-I), proper spec replacement engine, replacement interior to proper spec, etc.

I have a hypothetical for you guys.

 

I think I saw this on the Travel Channel.  There is a show called No Reservations were a guy named Anthony Bordian goes to other countries and eats there food and introduces you to the culture of that country.

 

This sounds off topic but read on….

 

In one episode he goes to China. In one city he visits there is an ancient temple some 1300 years old, the temple has burnt down 3 times and been rebuilt exactly the same way every time in the same place using the same method as it was originally built in.  This temple given the material it is made out of need to be rebuilt every century or so due to the wood and the climate.  They even go as far as harvesting special wood form one forest to rebuild the temple.

 

So is this the same temple?

 

A VIN is a VIN, I would say as long as the original does not exist and you are not trying to be deceitful and pass some thing off as some thing it’s not (i.e. a Cooper as an S for profit) there is nothing wrong in a re-vin.

(Insert snide comment here)    

But wouldn't there now be a duplicate car running around?

Could'nt Quick just get a heritage certificate from the body numbers that are stamped, and get the vin that is now missing for the car that way? Make a new vin plate, and get a title again with the orignal vin?

850 PRIDE

An S vin in the UK is an 800 quid proposition.

Don't sell it short.

I would find a body with vin in this crowd.

peter

No more cars left, Westpaminis is now just a memory, Good luck to all those hard working dealers left out there, We can tell you its not easy. We have fully enjoyed meeting all the fine folks we have in the business.

do not get me wrong I am not offering to stir up a hornets nest    but in canada  its very difficult to get a vin for a car ,   so its conveinent to buy a vin off a old car ,   I have always tried to make sure  I sell a vin for a "s" to a  real  "s" . in some states  I have sold parts from a "s"  with the  vin  so your buying a parts car ,   but ether way its up to your own feelings , I know some do not like the idea, so no one is forcing you  to buy a vin , some states its not legal  so I have not sold there , I have only one left which is a 69 "s" . I had so many becasue bought cars and  turned them into race cars  which got destroyed  and saved the vins.  

 

bob

i think that you can go on the dmv web for you state an get a lot of info

Thank you Sir.

This is why I return to my good friends on here, many of whom have been there, done that. I indeed contacted vehicle registration office in Collin County with no real luck. I left more confused than with clarity.

Edit: To note I am not looking to flim flam an S. I am merely going to build a rally replica that my Son and I can take to local shows and I can flog on my weekly commute.

I suspect you're confusing a reshell with a reVIN which are two totally different things.

Building a car around a title document to increase it's value and "rarity", is a bit like finding an auctioneers receipt for a Rembrandt and then acquiring a frame and painting a picture to go in it and claiming originality...

Metric is for people who can't do fractions.

Not necessarily so, jfl99, at least with what is being described in this thread. You could never legally revin into a used shell. What you describe would only apply if one were to use a brand new shell for a rebuild. With a used shell, if memory serves, you could only ever hope to receive a new VIN and a "Q" plate.

I don't see the moral problem with re-vinning the car if it is not an S. Besides, in UK, in the past anyways, you could re-vin a car and it would still legally be the original if it had a certain, fairly low % of the orignal parts. They even had list of what parts equaled what % etc.

Opinions I express here do not reflect my wife's.

Also to consider: If receiving a state assigned VIN on a rebuilt car, it may also get assigned a "Salvage" title. There are regulations governing the differences between Custom Hot-Rods, Kit Cars, and Rebuilt Originals. your local TX-DOT office can give you the book on those regulations. Not overly thick, but also not real clear for some things and makes lots of references to other DOT regulations and publications.

Your best bet may indeed be to hold out for something with full papers.

In your esteemed opinion how would this affect the value on future sale?

I like to poke hornets nest but with a long stick so I am looking ahead to the future rammifications of my skinflintness. Maybe I should just continue to hunker down for a shell with papers.

 You just need to check with your local DMV. In Tn. you can get a state issued vin and title for things like homebuilt cars, streetrods, and junkers pulled from scrapyards. I would guess that each state is different.

Pigs have now flown. Miniguy is still selling cars.