VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - 1945 AND EARLIER 1929-1932 1931 truck vin question

i have a 31 half ton truck, my vin has 4 or 5 readable numbers on it. not sure how many there is supposed to be? also is the vin on the frame or body anywhere? going to register with dmv in ca soon and want to make sure i have all the info i need. thanks!

What you have is a serial number, If you post the number we could tell you if it's all there. There are no other numbers on the frame...Joe

80879 is what i can read. does the engine motor tell me anything? or the only thing i can go by is the serial number on the cowl tag?

The serial number plate should have a plant code followed by "AE" for 1931 if it's a pickup & then those other numbers should follow. Take a good look with a magnify glass. Sometimes it's like a member of the Browinie troop stamped it & other times it like Arnold hit them himself...Joe

I have a 31 canopy express. The I'd plate is located on the firewall above the starter.
It says "independence" printed on the tag.
The stamped number is below. Mine reads 2AE121988.
2=the factory 2=Tarrytown,ny
AE=model
The remaining number is the production number.
So mine was the 121,988 to roll off the assembly line.
That does not mean just a canopy express or 1/2 ton chassis that means of all the vehicles and apparently there were between 600 & 700 thousand for all models produced in 1931.
This what I have been told. And best confirmed by ken Kaufman a historian for chevrolet.
Also in 1932 the first two numbers after the model letters indicated the month. Not true in 1931.

The engine number 836409. G281 20xx
G=July 28 1931

Keep in mind that the serial numbers started at 1,001.

Jmm,
The serial number reflects the total number of vehicles produced in each plant. It includes passenger, 1/2 ton and larger trucks.

Thanks for the fine tune.

Ok I found these production numbers for commercial chevrolet 1931 1/2 ton 109"ae
Chassis-------13990. (Not sure if these chassis numbers were used by the specific models in other words if this was the total chassis production which specific models were crafted from or just single chassis made separate and apart from the specific models, maybe crafted for parts.
Panel-----0
Canopy express------0
Suburban-------0
Cab---------------3641
Cab &box.-------7823
Spec CCH-------1079
Spec PU----------0
Spec pnl----------430
Sdn dlv------------0
Dlv pnl-------------0
Rd del--------------17
Rd PU--------------2209

Totals--------------29189

The numbers do not reflect any 1931canopy express production. This could mean 1. The data is not available. 2. The. Canopy express was made from the cab production of 3641 and or cab &box production of 7823. Or they were sent off to the Martin parry company and produced there. Even though that company was purchased in April of 1930. Supposedly 1931 was the first year the canopy express was a "chevrolet" model included in the product line. However there is a production number on the cab body from Tarrytown.
If anybody can clarify this it would be appreciated. Thanks jmm

Where did you get your data? It does not appear to be complete. For instance there are 1931 Sedan Deliveries that are known. I am sure that Tucson Joe has a figure for total number built.

I have 4340 for a total 1931 sedan deliveries. That's from 60 years of Chevrolet....Joe

http://home.znet.com/c1937/Prod.htm this was my source
these are "commercial truck" data 109" ae
kaufmann has limited data for 1931 for commercial truck data

wait so how many 1931 trucks with 1/2ton truck bed(not flatbed) did they make? full cab not roadster.

all i can read are those 5 numbers the rest of the tag is faded really bad. can see the bowtie emblem barley. any advice to find out the rest?

The numbers you need the most are the stamped numbers, not what was printed. Take a look at 1931chevrolet.com. Bill has some pictures of the serial number plate there....Joe

Go the website shown scroll down to commercial production 1/2 ton chart look in the 1931 column. I have not validated this data. The other data does not include any commercial production numbers, that I could find.

ok so seeing how i can only make out those 4 or 5 numbers on the serial plate, what should i put for the vin when i register it? the engine number? or whats left of the serial>?

DanK,

The car number (aka serial number) is stamped into the plate.
Have you tried to do a pencil rub? I think you put a piece of white paper on top of the numbers and rub a pencil across the paper over the numbers. Don't know how hard to rub or thickness of paper. Suspect fairly light rubbing and thin paper would be the best. Your local police can often show you how to do it.

It's a production number not a vin number. It's stamped on the plate. You may take a piece of paper and a pencil and do a rubbing across the stamped letters and past where they might be. Then see if they can identified for additional numbers. There are processes used to pull out serial numbers of handguns that have been filed off to identify the numbers. You may want to google that process. My title uses the production number. You could use both. Your existing title should have one or the other. You may just have a low production number, one that starts toward the beginning of the year, the engine number could help confirm that. The engine could have been replaced and the production tag could have been replaced as well. Any historical provenance would help. An ownership trace would benefit. Regards jmm