Age related number plates

[ashford]

I have a 31 chassis with one letter of the chassis number obscured and a second sidevalve chassis with no number at all. The sidevalve engine that I would like to use in one of these also has an un-readable number! If I built one of these into a car; could I get an age related number plate? I've looked at the DVLA website and can't find anything about them. Whats involved? Is it expensive? Does it matter that Im lacking complete engine and chassis numbers?

[Toby]

If you built the car or it was nearly complete and the appointed representative from a DVLA approved car club could confirm the date of chassis production (probably the Morris Register would be best) then you should be able to get an age related plate but this would be nontransferable. The engine No. would be irrelevant as it could have been changed and Ian will probably confirm that there is no surefire way of dating engines?

[Ian Grace]

Engine numbers were randomized slightly with respect to chassis numbers because they were delivered from Coventry to Cowley by the truckload and picked at random for installation on the producition line. A further complication is that more engines than chassis were produced - to provide spares, and in the case of the SV Minor, engine numbers started at 501 instead of 101 for some reason that has been lost in the mists of time. However the blocks do have casting dates which would typically precede the date of installation by some weeks.

Which digit of the chassis number is missing? Depending on which one is missing will define the first/last chassis numbers which it could be, and therefore provide a date 'window' (from the Progress Books) which should be less than a year, unless it is the first digit that is missing.

If the chassis has no rear fuel tank braackets, it is 1931 season. If it has hydraulic hose brackets, it is 1934 season. Anything else will be 1932/33 season.

[ashford]

Thanks for the info. One chassis is definietely 31; it has the sv. type front cross memeber but with out the rear petrol tanl brackets. Its missing the 3rd digit. The other is 32 or 33 (rear tank brackets but not hydraulic).

[Ian Grace]

if it is the third digit is missing (of five), then the possible span is 100 to 900 or 800 chassis, which isn't many weeks of productuion, so we should be able to tie down the window. What are the visible digits? If it is a 4-digit number, which it may be if it is a '31 chassis without fuel tank brackets, then that would narrow it down to just 80 chassis.