MGB GT rolling Shell.

[99Chimaera]

Morning.
I am thinking of buying a MGB GT as a rolling shell, as I have always wanted to have a go at restoring a car, and thought learning to repair the shell, refurbish the axles,hubs etc. There is a solid shell advertised with V5. The plan is to buy a complete rotten car to transfer the bits to the shell.
Given that the shell has its own v5 as well as the donor car, would the shell be able to retain its registration? Would I have to re-register the shell with the donor car registration?
Many thanks.

Philip

[hilly10]

You have to earn points which you get with retaining certain parts of the car. Someone who knows more will be along shortl.

[DickyC]

It may also depend on how close to the wind you wish to sail. If the rolling shell has a V5 and registration number DVLA won't know about the rebuild unless someone tells them. They just know the car is SORN. In due course you would inform them of the engine swap and a colour change if you choose a different colour to match the donor car. When it's ready it goes in for MoT and is declared fit for the road.

[Flying Phil]

As DickyC says, it is probably easiest to keep the V5 for the BGT and just change the engine number/colour later....it is still the BGT after all.

[99Chimaera]

Thank you very much for your help everyone who replied, much appreciated.

Another question, if I removed the indenty of the rolling shell and put the indenty of the donor car on it, that would be ok wouldn't it? It would be treated as resell? The indenty of the rolling shell would declared to DVLA as scrapped. Would that be legal?

Many thanks

[Matt_E_Mulsion]

99Chimaera said:

Another question, if I removed the indenty of the rolling shell and put the indenty of the donor car on it, that would be ok wouldn't it? It would be treated as resell? The indenty of the rolling shell would declared to DVLA as scrapped. Would that be legal?

No, that would be what is commonly known as 'ringing'.

[99Chimaera]

Matt_E_Mulsion said:

No, that would be what is commonly known as 'ringing'.

Ok thanks for your help

[DickyC]

Ask DVLA if you can retain the donor car's registration. If you can, when the refurbished car has its MoT, transfer the registration to the car from the retention document.

Yes it sounds tiresome but you're asking quite a lot of the system.

[Norfolkandchance]

Surely the DVLA don't know that you are only buying a shell. So do a transfer of ownership with the V5 as normal. Build up using second hand parts. MOT and off you go.

Many MGBs will have lost their original engine, gearbox and axle by now. Some will be on their third engine, at least. The DVLA don't seem to have a problem with this. And don't check.

Surely yous would be in the same boat as that?

[99Chimaera]

Norfolkandchance said:

Surely the DVLA don't know that you are only buying a shell. So do a transfer of ownership with the V5 as normal. Build up using second hand parts. MOT and off you go.

Many MGBs will have lost their original engine, gearbox and axle by now. Some will be on their third engine, at least. The DVLA don't seem to have a problem with this. And don't check.

Surely yous would be in the same boat as that?

Thanks for the advice, this will probably be the route I'll go down, slowly build it up using 2nd hand parts, I used to own a 1970 BGT a few years ago which still had its original engine and gearbox.

[99Chimaera]

DickyC said:

Ask DVLA if you can retain the donor car's registration. If you can, when the refurbished car has its MoT, transfer the registration to the car from the retention document.

Yes it sounds tiresome but you're asking quite a lot of the system.

Thank you for your help.

[Matt_E_Mulsion]

Why would you rather retain the identity of the donor car and not just keep the identity of the solid shell as it currently is?

I've seen this 'trick' done a few times 20+ years ago, particularly with the original Minis. People would buy the identity/car of something pre 1973 ish (if my memory serves me correctly) and transfer that identity to a much newer and more solid Mini. That way the car would get classic status and become tax exempt etc and unless you were an anorak at a glance it would be hard to distinguish that the car you were looking at was much newer than the registration would suggest. They all looked very similar back then across a few decades.

[99Chimaera]

Matt_E_Mulsion said:

Why would you rather retain the identity of the donor car and not just keep the identity of the solid shell as it currently is?

I've seen this 'trick' done a few times 20+ years ago, particularly with the original Minis. People would buy the identity/car of something pre 1973 ish (if my memory serves me correctly) and transfer that identity to a much newer and more solid Mini. That way the car would get classic status and become tax exempt etc and unless you were an anorak at a glance it would be hard to distinguish that the car you were looking at was much newer than the registration would suggest. They all looked very similar back then across a few decades.

Thanks for your reply, I thought that having
Transferred all the bits over from the rotten shell, I thought it could be treated as a reshell, but using a second hand shell than a new shell.
But I guess that would be illegal perhaps?

I've recently seen vin numbers advertised having been removed from a rotten shell.

Thanks.

[4rephill]

99Chimaera said:

Matt_E_Mulsion said:

Why would you rather retain the identity of the donor car and not just keep the identity of the solid shell as it currently is?

I've seen this 'trick' done a few times 20+ years ago, particularly with the original Minis. People would buy the identity/car of something pre 1973 ish (if my memory serves me correctly) and transfer that identity to a much newer and more solid Mini. That way the car would get classic status and become tax exempt etc and unless you were an anorak at a glance it would be hard to distinguish that the car you were looking at was much newer than the registration would suggest. They all looked very similar back then across a few decades.

Thanks for your reply, I thought that having
Transferred all the bits over from the rotten shell, I thought it could be treated as a reshell, but using a second hand shell than a new shell.
But I guess that would be illegal perhaps?

You're not really re-shelling the car though, are you?

You're talking about buying a second car, that has a chassis number that is already registered with the DVLA, and therefore already has it's own identity, swapping over the mechanical parts from the rotten car, to the 2nd car, and then swap the vin plate and registration plates over, and claiming it's actually the rotten car still - NOT LEGAL!

(Technically, I'm not convinced you're actually talking about carrying out a restoration, because you're not restoring the car, you're trying to replace the car with a better example, and then lie about it's true identity.)

99Chimaera said:

......I've recently seen vin numbers advertised having been removed from a rotten shell.......

And you think that's all perfectly legal?

[DickyC]

4rephill said:

And you think that's all perfectly legal?

Charitably, he might just be in the dark.

With the BL Heritage shells, I believe I'm right in saying, you have to prove you own a car, and they then make a shell with that VIN number. And presumbly some additional ID on the VIN plate to say it's a replacement.

[99Chimaera]

DickyC said:

Charitably, he might just be in the dark.

With the BL Heritage shells, I believe I'm right in saying, you have to prove you own a car, and they then make a shell with that VIN number. And presumbly some additional ID on the VIN plate to say it's a replacement.

Thank you, that's good to know, I can't afford to buy a new shell from BL Heritage, they are now 11k.

[akirk]

As the B has no separate chassis the shell is the ‘chassis’ so under the points system you can only replace it with a new one, not a second hand one. A new one doesn’t count for points purposes, a second hand one does but on its own is more points than would allow you to keep the original identity- therefore basically you can only reshell the car with a new shell...

[v8bloke]

I think I'm right in saying that the earlier mgb's only chassis identification was an ally plate stamped with the chassis number. This plate was pop riveted to the body. If you drill out the pop rivets and remove the plate there is no other way to tell its identity. So if you swapped over plates from 2 cars of the same period and changed the engine number on log books who could tell?

[Matt_E_Mulsion]

I know very little about MGB's, but do they not have the number stamped directly into the body somewhere too like most vehicles.