VCCA Home Forums GENERAL DISCUSSION General Discussions Odd 8 Character VIN for 69 C20

I own a 69 Chevy C20 pickup that has a VIN number like this 9Z123456 (not actual VIN). I know my VIN number and I don't need any help figuring out what it is. I need to know how to look it up so I can find out what the original engine/trans etc were. The first 2 characters 9Z are correct. The VIN has 8 characters total 1 Letter and 7 numbers with the letter Z being the second character. I've tried every VIN decoder and lookup and nothing comes up, or the decoders show more characters than I have for that year. Does anybody know how to decode this odd VIN number?

Welcome. You might find your answer here: https://www.gm.com/content/dam/comp...hevrolet-trucks/1969-Chevrolet-Truck.pdf

If you take a soft wire brush to clean the code it may make it easier to decipher. If you rub a pencil across the code covered with a blank white piece of paper is common for low enforcement to reveal the code.

I already know the VIN on my Truck.... It's not a typical VIN number so it's hard to lookup.

The PDF file posted is only for 1969 C10/K10 trucks. Mine is a 3/4 ton C20.

In that time period all the VIN would indicate was whether it had a V8 or a six cylinder engine. The VIN did not give any information about engine size or type of transmission.

Also in that time period for Chevy trucks there was a separate Model Number on the inside of the glove box door. It was a 15 position number & character string. Some of the elements were the same as in the VIN.

Most online VIN "decoders' are designed to use a 17 character VIN. Those were introduced across the industry in January 1981. Before then every manufacturer used their own format.

67-72 VIN

It may be an artifact of the image but it appears there are digits ahead of the 9Z in your second picture. There appears to be a 2 at the far left with the digit following not readable. Maybe doing a pencil rub as Chip suggests might help bring the whole thing into focus. Another technique we used when I was in law enforcement is to use a light source at an oblique angle so that there are shadows cast across the area of interest, helping to highlight any hard to read characters. If it was built in Fremont in 1969 as the decoder Rusty posted suggests there should be four digits ahead of the 9Z.

The VIN stamped on the frame has no characters before the 9Z.

That does not surprise me. Those numbers were typically stamped on the frame on the assembly line based on the VIN tag of the body.

That was similar to the process that Chevy used to stamp the numbers on the engine block.

It was just the serial number, not the whole VIN.

Do you have the original glove box door?