So, this came across my mind today while looking at the black/tan dash that I have in my basement. I plan on selling the black/tan interior from my new chassis and swapping in my all back interior from my wrecked car.

But the dash obviously has the VIN attached to it. How do I go about swapping that?
I googled around a bit since obviously people have done this before, but hardly anyone mentions how they handled VIN & registration. A few people mention just drilling out and riveting the correct VIN plate in but that seems pretty grey area/probably illegal without proper paperwork, yah? The DMV site was no help, either.

This is in Pennsylvania. Anyone have experience with this?

 

You're overcomplicating it. Vin is on the chassis, oil pan, door jamb, and dash. Drill and rerivet.

 

Drill out the old and rivet in the new is what i did. Took like 30 seconds.

 

Yeah, I think I am. I'll just rivet it then. Seems to be the most common solution.

 

I've just never swapped the vin plate. If anyone asks I'll show them one of the other vin stickers on the car, or the one on the body behind the engine.

 

This.

 

I NJ at least, tampering with those rivets is technically tampering with the VIN.

 

Then drill out old one and rivet in the new one. Or just say the dash was swapped before you got the car. I mean if a cop really started looking at my car they would see 4 or 5 different vins on various parts that do not match.

 

Or just permanently get rid of the dash vin plate without replacing it - then you will not have swapped vins...

But seriously, vins are tied specifically to "vehicles", and a dash board does not constitute a "vehicle". The "spirit of the law" was to prevent disguising a vehicle as another, and you don't seem to be in a predicament which violates this.

If you're that nervous about it, then just take a grinding wheel and grind off the underside of the rivets so that all of the aesthetic qualities of the rivets/plate remain intact, then glue them in place of the old one.

 

^^ This - that's why my car is called "FrankenMiata"