On Thu, 25 May 1995 TinyHost@aol.com wrote:
> Phil Searle and I are kind of curious. We've been trading E-mail as I
> try to figure out the lineage of my '71/'72 TR6, and he brought up an
> interesting point that it may be unusual for the engine number to be
> lower than the commission number of a given car. His reasoning, and it
> makes a lot of sense, is that Triumph supplied engines to other car
> makers and it would be more common to see higher engine numbers.
Bruce, I'd agree that the engine number is probably higher 99.44% of
the time. But there are possible explanations for the reverse (in no
particular order):
1. engine was changed by some DPO some years ago
2. engine changed by dealer under warranty when car was new (I don't
know how new replacement blocks or complete engines were numbered)
3. engines misplaced at factory for x amount of time, or one or a batch
were held up temporarily due to some machining/assembly problem or
U.S. emissions certification question, or....
4. Well, that's just bloody how they did it sometimes.
5. engine changed more recently; replacement engine supplied by whomever
coincidentally is close in number to, but lower than, original VIN
number of car.
The only way to verify for sure is with the Heritage search. Maybe
someday they'll go on the Web with the complete records that we numbers
freaks can peruse at will. (I can dream, can't I?)
Andy Mace
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