looking for help • The Dodge Challenger Message Board

by **71 shaker** » 15 Jun 2008 7:04

new to the site,looking for info on how to trace history of car.new privacy laws make it very hard to get any info at all.i have a 71 jh23 challenger, 340
4 speed,pretty much a plain jane stipper with a factory shaker hood.i do have the build sheet and fender tag.car is b5 blue,blue interior,no vinyl top,standard guages.car was built 3-23 71 but order # is very low,00274.seems odd a mid year car with such a low order #.any help would be appreciated,thanks 71 shaker

by **christer** » 15 Jun 2008 7:41

Welcome to the board. I found this answer in another thread. Maybe it can give you some guidance?

Alaskan_TA wrote:Welcome to the site first of all.

Your best bet would be to search and see if you have any old insurance records, the should list the VIN. Same with old registrations.

If you can not find any paperwork on it, try the insurance company you used then, they may have a record of it.

If those strike out, try a letter to your DMV, some states will do "reverse" lookups for you, but most of the older information is not in their computers.

You can also post old photos of it and hope someone recognizes the car.

Best of luck!

Barry

by **Alaskan_TA** » 15 Jun 2008 19:43

The order numbers splatter all over the place, they are not calendar specific.

The one you posted is missing a letter or number though, it should be six digits.

by **71 shaker** » 15 Jun 2008 21:46

sorry,the order # is 000274.still seems like a low number for a mid year car.thanks for the help

by **Alaskan_TA** » 16 Jun 2008 2:39

Is it a Y14 car or a Y16 car? Or?

by **71 shaker** » 16 Jun 2008 4:02

it is a y14 car.thanks

by **Mike l** » 16 Jun 2008 12:39

This car would have been built in Aug. of 1970 with such a low number. I looked up a fender tag that was built on 3-15-70 and the number was
1B327908. Also all 71 340 were JS cars and not JH cars. Hope this helps.
Can you post the fender tag?

by **dave-r** » 16 Jun 2008 12:53

Mike l wrote: Also all 71 340 were JS cars and not JH cars.

Yes you could get a JH 340 as well as a JS.

1,226 JH Hardtops and Convertibles.
1,078 JS Hardtops only

by **71 shaker** » 16 Jun 2008 14:28

cars build date was 3-22-71.there were 72 jh23 cars built with shakers in 71.so far i have seen 2,and read about 1.the first 2 were 340 cars,the other was a 383 car.i have read they made 34 automatics and 38 four speeds.cant guarantee those numbers,but thats what i have heard.here is the tag.

by **Mike l** » 16 Jun 2008 17:54

O.K. that is 334172, that makes sence. The 000274 is the Vehicle order number and the 334172 is the assembly plant sequential serial number

by **Alaskan_TA** » 17 Jun 2008 1:00

OK, since it is a Y14 car, it was either ordered by a dealership or by a customer through a dealership and it either had a deposit put down on it at that time or it was paid for in full.

Chrysler sent out numbered order pads to the dealerships so they could order cars. The pages of the pads were sequentially numbered. I have not been able to figure out how many pages were in each pad yet, but it was at least 25 pages.

The number on the pad was how the order was tracked with the shceduled production date as a prefix. The date and the number from the order pad appear on all documents for the car, including the fender tag.

So, as far as the low VON number goes, it just happened to be a number on a pad of order blanks sent to the dealership your car was ordered from.

There are some exceptions, if a Challenger was ordered from a numbered pad, but the order included a 999 paint color, the VON would be pre-empted with one that started with a J as one example.