Went to the DMV today to put plates on my '50, which had no old registration with it. Appears that it's become signifgantly easier to register your non-***led cars, trucks and bikes in New York - which is all pre-1973 cars and trucks. These forms work for bikes and ATVs, too, from what they say on them. They gave me these forms: MV-51 "Certification of Sale Or Transfer For 1972 Or Older Vehicles" MV-51B "Statement of Ownership for Non-***led Vehicles" If you've had the vehicle in question less than a year, the seller is to fill them out - so if you are buying a new project, good idea to swing by the DMV and grab these when you pick the car up. After a year, you may be able to fill them out yourself. Niether form requires notarization - the only information you might have trouble on is it asks for the name/address of the owner previous to the person you would be buying it from. One asks for a reason why he cannot be contacted ("moved, no forwarding address" or "Deceased" are probably good bets). Chances are as long as you're close, or can make it up, you'll be okay. Or bring a buddy, have him buy the car and sell it to you for a dollar, and you'll have accurate info for two owners. (in that case, you may need the reciepts for him buying it and you buying it both). The car weight is also asked for, but if you bring a couple of alternate VIN sequences for the make/year (the first section up to the actual sequential production number), they can look up other registered examples in the computer and use the weight from one of them (they usually like to be able to look at at least two; mine didn't come up at all, I had to give an alternate just to get one). Saves weighing it. You could probably make up somehting or use a shop manual or "Standard Catalog Of ______" figure. [Sidebar: Just FWIW, my '60 Pontiac had originally been registered in North Carolina according to it's PA ***le and had been registered in NY when I got it - with a stated weight of something like 2300 lbs. on the registration. That has to be the ch***is weight on this car, the '59 Olds I had ages ago, same body style (with factory air), was 4400 lbs. But no one questioned it and as a result the fees were cheap. So you can do whatever you feel comfortable with here. Mine's going to be 3460 lbs.] When you go to the DMV you'll need a pencil etching or photo of the VIN tag as well and your reciept. Now unless they throw a surprise at me tomorrow, that should take care of it. You also have to fill out the usual registration form and so forth. Just remember the quality of your DMV service varies from office to office - if you come to a roadblock (either due to your mistake or personnel who don't want to cooperate), you can always start over at a different one. I had to do that once today. It's very simple, and almost too easy - I can see someone stealing a big $$$ muscle car or hot rod, changing the tags, getting a registration, and selling it somewhere for big money. He'd have to be able to tuck it away for 6 months before the registration becomes transferrable, though. In any case it's one more step closer to a mighty f--- you to my neighbors. Got a nice note in the mail from the town last week, they accused me of operating a business in a residential district and having disabled cars here. Not too worried about the business thing, there's no signs, no storefront, no one comes here to buy things, and so on. Heck they couldn't spell business right on the letter ("buisness"). The argument will be with the codes officer over the definition of "disabled" - I'm hoping having plates on the car will resolve the problem, along with the fact that the car couldn't be towed to where I have it now. I may cover it for the day they're supposed to come around, too - I don't think he's allowed to touch anything, just look. The ordinance says no disabled cars are allowed, but that you can have them without plates for up to 6 months if they aren't disabled. But this is the same town that told me that "commercial vehicles aren't allowed" in a residential neighborhood, when I checked the actual code it's "commercial vehicles over 7000 LBS GVW are prohibited" .... a trailer with a 3500-4500 lb car on it is worst case just barely going to approach 7000 lbs. So I am kind of expecting to have to go to court and tell the judge "well, it's out here in the lot where I drove it up here, it's kind of ugly but it does start, move and stop" in about 30 days or so. I don't dare finally start in on the brakes or lines, I don't want to leave it torn apart while this clown comes to inspect things. But if the court date's that far out, I can have the front brakes working anyhow and maybe get the wiring done. Town hall is only around the corner about 1/4 of a mile, so it doesn't have to be perfect. On the bright side, I did start parking again where the neighbor's wife asked me not to. Today she's like "I thought we agreed you wouldn't park in front of our property anymore" which I did do when I got my Ramcharger last fall and she couldn't see around it. I told her "well, I thought you folks were nice, but then I started getting letters from the town because your husband wants to be a pain in the ****, so I guess I'm not going to be nice anymore either." Then I went inside. I already checked, the only codes on the parking tell me I can't park on the street between November 15th and April 15th, and the folks on the other side have a party every week and park all over the place. Let 'em study the rust patches on my current beater Suburban, it's uglier than the Fleetline is, that's for sure.
Well, I got the registration without a hitch today - looks like it's a lot easier than I thought. It makes it very easy to generate a registration on a car, and that means that if your state will accept one and give you a ***le that becomes easy also.
Hi, Rusty! I exchanged PMs with a retired NYC cop on chevytalk website on this subject and got pretty much the same answer you got from DMV. I have an old '55 Chev. drag car I bought 20 years ago with an unstreetable ch***is, good original VIN, and transferrable reg. for a car it didn't match! I finally got round to re-framing the beast with '74 Cutl*** ch***is from a car that I had clear ***le to. He seems to think I can register it as either '55 using original VIN or as '74 Cutl*** since I have clear ***le and Cutl*** running gear. He thought the only glitches would be if original VIN shows-up on computer under "wants or warrants" as stolen car in NY (not likely since I've had it for 20 years!) or with cops questioning "'74 Cutl*** 4-door" registration for what is obviously a '55 Chevy 2-door wagon. The reason for the whole exercise in my case is same as yours - my town (Town of Hamlin, Monroe County) was giving me B.S. about my "old car collection" after a neighbor blew me in. Wife has been after me to "clean-up" for years so I did get rid of 2 tons of metal in a rented dumpster (Cost me about $180 - if you do it check the scale ticket with the dumpster people, they tried to double-charge me for 4 tons of stuff, I knew darned well I didn't load any 4 tons in that thing!). I knew the town junk vehicle code - wrote part of it myself when they tried to get to high-and-mighty about it years ago. I had them add a line that "vehicle must be visible from public thoroughfare or a dwelling on adjacent property" - my cars were not visible from the road or neighbor's house! Neighbors got pissed at me for complaining about their dog chasing my wife down our driveway and got the code enforcement **** to come in their back-lot so he could see my cars. Just so happens my other neighbor's wife is running for Town Supervisor and he has a couple old cars in the back yard too! She took my letter from Code Enforcement down to the Town Hall and pointed-out that they did not know their own Code and they could send me another letter when they change the code and find the man-power to cite everybody in the whole town with a car in violation, she then told me to forget I had ever seen the letter and have fun with my cars!! Guess who I am voting for in November?? They cannot cite you for a vehicle that is registered - but remember you've gotta have liability insdurance to register and if yuo cancel it the Ins. Company notifies the State DMV and they will fine the heck out of you the next time you try to register a car if you don't turn-in the plates! (Just for reference, the Town tried to incerase my Dad's property tax valuation years ago when he bought a new camping trailer! The old man called the ***essor over to the house, gave him a beer, and pinted-out the New York State lisence plate on his trailer. Since it was already being "taxed" by DMV they had to roll-back his ***es*****t - for God's sake, nobody was living in the darned thing!)
Was looking for a wiring post, I didn't get a chance to see anyone replied to this sooner. The fees in NY are sales tax of anywhere from 7 to 11 percent depending on the county or city tax rates, which is charged every time you register a new car, and a registration fee based on the weight of the car. Typical cars run anywhere from $60 to $90 for two years. Outside of insurance, there were no other fees. I have a friend who tells me that additional cars on an antique policy are pretty cheap, it might be possible to generate NYS registrations for cars for around $150. If your state will take the reg card and give you a ***le, you're all set. --------------------------------- Neghbors are usually trouble, they aught to be glad you didn't just shoot the dog dead -
down my way neighbors who cant keep a reign on their dogs, especially if they are vicious, dont have to worry about the pound taking them or the neighborhood griping. doesnt take much to make the issue go away.
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