This El Camino caught my attention for some obvious reasons. For the owner’s sake, I hope it doesn’t catch the attention of the police. Not for the straps that seem to be the only thing holding the cargo cap on. Who cares about that here? Or the numerous “No Parts” written on it, which suggest it came from a junkyard, perhaps?
I’m talking about the license plates. I did a Carfax check on them, in the hopes of determining the exact year of this El Camino, and the result was “2004 VW Passat”. Well, that doesn’t quite jive. So this really is a parts special?
I didn’t look inside to see if there’s anything else holding the cap in place, but my guess is obviously not.
Looks like the interior has borrowed some parts from a Monte Carlo, or something similar.
Parts is parts
Wow, those seats just scream “80s GM!” But I cannot place them.
In Indiana we can put a plate from an old car onto a new car on a temporary basis but we have to get the new car registered within something like 28 days of purchase. Does Oregon work this way? Perhaps this is all the owner could afford after his 2004 Passat coughed up that fatally large repair bill.
It’s also possible that transfer-of-plates paperwork has been submitted to the DMV but word hasn’t yet reached Carfax.
“NO PARTS” probably means the junkyard thought it could sell as a complete car (and were right).
I’d love to give them the benefit of the doubt, but Oregon registrations are valid for two years. Given the junkyard provenance of the El, it wouldn’t be hard to find a 2004 Passat or some such in the same place with a year plus to go on the tags. The plates do stay with the car to the bitter end, so they’d likely be there waiting to be pilfered by someone who needed a car and couldn’t get one the legal way.
When i moved to San Francisco in 1990, an Irish guy lived upstairs. He worked construction jobs off the books as a lark. He would just buy cheap old cars from unsuspecting people with no intention of registering them. He would then park them wherever until they got the boot and the whole process would begin anew. He was only there for a few months, I suspect he got ratted out and hightailed it back to the old country.
Does Oregon work this way?
No. No switching around of plates.
Oregon does let you transfer plates for six dollars. I transferred my Trailblazer Plates from one Camry to another then finally my Caravan.
Any plates or just the special ones? I may well have been wrong here.
I believe that any plate 1988 and newer (when the current passenger plate debuted) can be transferred as often as you would like. The pre-1988 Blue on Yellow or Yellow on Blue Plates the DMV rather you not transfer or they will not allow it.
I transferred my Oregon “LOW CO2” plates from my 2001 Prius to my 2010 Prius when I bought it. Standard fir tree background, but custom. I’ve also transferred my ham radio callsign plates from one car to the next. I don’t know if you can transfer ordinary “123 ABC” plates.
I especially like the optional gauge cluster on the right side of the instrument pod.
I wasn’t aware that Carfax keeps records of license plates. True?
Yup, that is how I look up model years when I get curious.
Carfax keeping “tabs” on license plates may be why folks cover the plates in Craigslist?
An ’04 Passat and/or an El Camino? Someone has eclectic taste.
I think those seats are from a78 to 80’s Pontiac Grand Prix or Lemans. nice seats!! the truck itself needs no intro as it is one of the nicest body styles of the 80’s.
The no parts is something that wrecking yards frequently do with a vehicle comes in for processing and they determine that it may be something someone will buy intact.
Not sure about the laws in OR but in WA when a wrecking yard takes possession they must remove the plates and then surrender the title to the state. If they do sell it is on a bill of sale and the vehicle will need to have a VIN inspection before the state will issue a new title and thus plates.
So my guess is that the person took the plates off of the other car so it wouldn’t attract the attention of the police, though removing the “no parts” would be on my list of things to make it less conspicuous.
It may be a theft recovery. It has an Oldsmobile gearshift handle, so I bet it has a replaced steering column out of a Cutlass to make it use a key after the first one got busted up stealing the car.
“It has an Oldsmobile gearshift handle”
Your eye for detail is most impressive!
I’m pretty sure this is the owner.
This might be attributable to one of the quirks of Carfax license plate searches.
Carfax searches are tied to VINs, and the whole system only works for cars with 17-digit VINs (i.e., built after 1981). To me, this looks like a 1980 El Camino — though with the extent of borrowed parts, it’s hard to tell for sure.
I’ve come across a pre-’81 car before where the plates Carfaxed to an entirely different (post-81) vehicle. My guess is that when plates from a newer car are transferred to a pre-’81 car, Carfax records are simply not updated. Just a guess.
Carfax always gives me just a “Sorry, but the License Plate you entered returned 0 results” in that case. Or always has in the past.
It’s an 80 El Camino based on the grill… if that’s the correct one for it, but it’s 80/81 ballpark for sure.
I recall an incident many years ago where a local farmer got in trouble because while he licensed one of his farm trucks, he switched the license plates from truck to truck depending on which vehicle he was driving. He got away with it for years before he was finally caught. In his defense he argued that he was only driving one truck at a time so that he didn’t need to have current license plates for all of his trucks.