Registering a Caterham Seven in VT / NH

[xflow7]

Hi gang!

I have a quick favor to ask!

I am planning to move to the Upper Valley at some point in the next several months (once I can find gainful employment!) and will be bringing my Caterham Seven with me. I was hoping to get some advice from the car enthusiast locals as far as registration procedures and pitfalls.

From what I understand, both Vermont and New Hampshire have annual state inspection and emissions tests. I built my car from a kit some years ago so it is titled as a 2002 car. However, in the spirit of a quasi-period-correct car, it has a Ford Crossflow on Webers and so has no OBD-II port and doesn't stand much chance of passing an emissions test to 2002 levels. Other states I have lived in that have emissions req'ts have had various programs which exemptcars titled/registered as specialty vehicles of one kind or another (Collector Car registration in Ohio, Custom car reg. in New York).

Do either VT or NH have any kind of dispensation for Self-Assembled vehicles, Reproductions, or the like? Any recommendations for resources to turn to (kit car friendly garages, builders, etc)?

I've browsed the information available at the respective state websites, but haven't turned anything up. I hope I'm not going to be screwed. I'm 3 for 3 in getting the car legal in the states I've lived in so far, so I'm hopeful I can work something out up there.

Thanks in advance for any advice!

Dave Williams

[STI NICK]

Hi Dave,

I believe there is an exemption of some sort for kit cars in VT. Russ would know more about that as he built his Cobra himself, and had to go through all that. I am sure he will chime in. You shouldnt have much of a problem if any.

[343Saturn]

In VT, I think the easiest way would be to register it is a Lotus 7 of some year if you can. For mine, I just told the DMV that it is a kit that replicates a 1965 AC Cobra and that is what they registered it as. The state was pretty good about the whole thing. I think there are some other categories that you could look in to but if you can just register it as the car it replicates, life is pretty straight forward. That avoids all the inspection hassles that go along with modern cars as well seeing the checklist on a 1965 is pretty short .

The one place that you could get hung up is that I had to provide a Bill of Sale (no problem as I had the receipt from FFR) and a Certificate of Origin because it had never been registered before. Again, FFR provides a C of O with the kit so I just gave them that and they checked the chassis number against the C of O and it was a done deal. If you already have it registered as something else, it may make it hard to go backwards unless you have some of the original documentation that you could use to start from scratch again.

Hope it helps!

[xflow7]

Guys, thanks for the responses. Sounds somewhat encouraging. What did they do for a VIN on your Cobra? Does it have a conforming VIN number or did they use whatever number is on the chassis or assign one? Mine was titled in Ohio and Michigan under it's chassis number, but NY wouldn't do that and made me get a NY State assigned VIN number.

I share the concern about trying to title/register it as a 1967 Lotus or whatever given that it is already titled in NY as a 2002 Custom. But maybe if I plead my case with pictures of a Lotus Seven S3 they'll be willing to go that route - particularly if they don't have a siimilar Custom title category. I have the bills of sale and the Certificate of Origin from when I built the car originally in Ohio (although the Ohio authorities gave me a bunch of grief about the fact that the receipt from the engine builder had no serial number on it; they finally caved, though).

I hope I don't have to try to go from scratch as they'll probably have a hard time with the fact that the car has 15,000mi on it.

Thanks again for your help! Hopefully I'll find a way.

Dave

[343Saturn]

As far as the VIN on mine goes, they used the chassis number even though it is not offically a VIN (it does however look a lot like one as it is a pretty long alpha-numeric string). VT has the option to get a state assigned VIN but I would avoid going that route as it is a bit of a pain.

If you have the original paperwork, I would try starting from scratch and seeing what happens because it will be much cleaner (I think). The odometer reading may not even be an issue even though they will probably record it on the paperwork. The other thing I found interesting is that I didnt have to provide any supporting documentation about where the parts inside the car came from. I was prepared with the motor, etc VIN info but they only were interested in the chassis.

Good luck!

[6speed]

I investigated this several years ago when I started planning on removing the VW Bug underpinnings from my kit car and replacing everything with custom stuff. They did inform me I can plead to have the car keep the 1974 year classification instead of the 2xxx (2025 by the time I finish it?!) classification. There are "hot rod" inspectors at various locations around the state. They are much more informed about cars than the average DMV employee, so you can have a good conversation with them. I would give the Montpelier DMV office a call and ask for the contact info for the person in the area you'll be moving to. It's really geared toward a newly built '32 Ford hot rod replica or what not, but they were very accommodating with my special case. I never did talk to the local person (I haven't really started yet), but everything seemed pretty straight forward.