missing cowl tag

That's a very interesting debate and one that shows up on just about every "car talk" site around at some time or another.

Most states have rules that will allow you to swap VIN and Data/Trim tags. I worked in a bodyshop in VA for several years and it was done all the time.

You had to have the titles for both vehicles. A state trooper would come and take both titles along with pictures of both vehicles. He would research both vehicles to ensure neither was stolen, etc. Then he would come back and personally witness the removal of the tags and installation on the new/repaired vehicle. Then the donating vehicle had to be completely stripped and destroyed. The remaining tags were taken by the trooper along with the title.

As an example, we were repairing a roll-over pickup truck. We were swapping the cab off the roll-over. We did the cab swap, which included the front clip and the trooper was there for the VIN tag swap. We kept the rear and trans out of the donor car along with the bed and a few other odds and ends. Then the screwed up cab was bolted to the donor frame. The trooper then followed the hulk to the scrap yard for disposal. It took some planning, but it's a very simple and smooth procedure that we did at least twice a year.

It can be done by individuals as well. Trim/data tags are a simple thing that anybody can do. The main thing is to know what needs to be on the tag, and thanks to BRO and RammZ, anyone with a 65 knows what they need. The only thing for a Fremont car that may be tricky would be the sequence number that would need to on there and without a buildsheet would be hard to get correct. Ahh, but who cares?