Hello to you all.
I am new here and am currently in the process of restoring a 71 glide that belongs to my son in law. His old mad gave home the bike and because it was his dads is why we are restoring it. I thought it was basket case but it wasn’t my decision. The build thread is posted in the touring bikes section.
anyway, my question to you folks is . I have a concern about the vin on this thing. The engine vin stamp on the engine case looks to have been re stamped. I am including a picture that clearly shows the markings. What iOS also strange to me is that the re stamped number appears to be the same exact number that was crossed out. What gives? And is this normal? There is a sticker on the Dow tube of the bike but no vin anywhere on the frame that I can see. My son in law’s father did have the bike registered when he used to drive it although that was back in 95. We are now currently waiting for him to find the paperwork, especially the title. Any thoughts?

Here is a close up of the engine case . Notice the crossed out vin number. And if you look closely, it is literally the same number. If you can’t tell, I did view it with a magnifying glass and the two numbers are the same. What is the deal with that?

The is something very cool about an old shovel head, even one this crusty

 

Being a novice at this its a commitment you could make happen but its expensive and time consuming

you also posted the original post in the wrong section - twinkies are not shovels

first thing to buy is a factory parts book and a service manual — this section can help but you need to be up to speed on what needs to be done

it looks to me to a fire basket case - it will need to be taken to the screws — BUT what is the plan and o you have 10 to 15 thousand to spend on this

 

the kid I prepared to spend whatever it takes. Plus I’m sure just trying to find the parts needed will in itself take lots of time. So I’m guessing that this will take awhile which will likely mean that he will not have to spend the money all at once. Also , I don’t understand what you mean by Twinkie. Is that a twin cam you are referring to? I know that is not what this is. And yes I do realize that this will have to be taken down to the screws. That is a situation I myself have plenty of experience with although this will be the first Harley I will have the pleasure in having a big hand in restoring.

 

Welcome to the forum. A lot of 1970s H-D engine numbers and frame numbers were corrected at the factory by striking a line through the entire number and the procedure was known as a ‘line out’ according to a copy of a letter I have.
But that engine number doesn’t seem to have a line all the way across? And at the left side do I see more than one star? If so, has one of the stars been stamped over the first character? Can you post an extremely clear close-up of the whole engine number please. Thanks.

Also look under each case half for crankcase production numbers. They may be stamped near the outer edges and somewhat toward the front and formatted as per the following example: 171-1234.

Re the frame VIN, normally for a 71 model it would be on the VIN boss which is in the red box I put in your photo below. Also look in the blue box for a frame date code consisting of one letter and one number.
Eric

 

Thanks for your reply and help so far.👍
I cleaned up the area on the case and the spot on the frame you indicated in the picture I posted. The number for the frame was indeed where you indicated. The number on the frame because of rust is just visible enough to make out the characters. So now that they are both cleaned up, I compared the two numbers. They both match, so that is a good thing. Weather or not they match the title, we have yet to be determined.
I also did look for those casting numbers you mentioned but I couldn’t see any. Unless they are further down on the cases which are obscured by the engine still being in the frame.

*2A12782H1** If you look hard enough you can see that the number that was crossed out is the same as the re stamped one. Why? Is my question. Why was this necessary?

So here on the frame you can also just make out the number which does match the engine case number.

 

to me it looks like the crossed out number was wrong, as it looks like the first 3 digits are 29A****** & restamped correctly as 2A*******, they look good to me & the factory did re-stamp their screw ups in this way,..i expect that the stamping gun got jammed or the like.unusual but you shouldn't have any problems with it,

 

I can see in the later picture it looks like the original VIN had a 9 stamped under the A, and the first 2 is light. The person stamping it probably made a mistake and they had to correct it.

 

Thanks for the new photo of the engine number. Looks like another mistake corrected at the factory and we’ve seen plenty of them for the 1970s. In my previous post I mentioned a copy of a letter I have. It was to the owner of a Sportster in 2012 and it was from Peter J Simet, Market Compliance and Vehicle Identification Specialist at H-D Customer Service. Pete said the line out correction procedure was allowed in commerce and was ‘accepted industry practice’ at the time the bike was manufactured. Originally it was stamped as a 77 model but the entire engine number and frame number were lined out and the bike was renumbered as a 78. Even the sequence portion of the numbers was changed. Pete advised the owner to have police or the DMV contact H-D if any questions were raised in the future.

Re the frame number, I see a five-pointed star at one end but not at the other end. But I don’t think that’s a problem and I’ve run across the same thing on other occasions. Notice the frame A doesn’t look as wide as the engine A and that seems to have been normal procedure for some, but not all, 1971 Shovels. The same may apply to the Hs but it’s hard to tell from the photos?

On the left side of the left case, just below the base of the cylinders, it looks like there is a number boss and it should be unstamped. Although as of 1970 models the crankcases changed to a different style and the engine number moved from the left case to the R-H case, the number boss was left in the casting for a while. I think it was present thru 1970 and I’ve also seen it on some other cases for 71 and early-72 although I’m not certain when it was omitted and there may have been some overlap.

Re the crankcase production numbers (CPNs), they should be visible with the engine in the frame even if a crankcase guard is fitted underneath. Via PM I’ll send you an example.
Eric

 

The numbers on the two case halves are exactly right where you said they were. The numbers are 171-2901. Thanks for your help.