Matching Numbers Help.......Please

[voldog90]

So I am new to the forum and according to my father and brother have been living on the dark side......classic vettes, not classic camaros. They have recommended members here as a knowledgeable resource and I am certainly not too proud to beg. I have come across a '65 Vette that hasn't been registered since the late 70's, clear title, reasonable condition but mechanically unknown. It is a small block 4-speed car with a "supposed" matching numbers 327. Beyond that there is some mystery and a couple conflicting stories. I had someone look at the car for me and send some pix, of which several are a lil fuzzy. The body tag matches trim, body style, paint and interior color. I am having problems in sorting some other things out.....the deck machined on the block for the engine ID appears to have only one 7 digit set of numbers, no 2nd set that matches last of VIN. The number (as communicated to me by the person I had look at it is: 11209HC. So.....shouldn't the first position be alpha, not numeric to identify production plant for the engine? I suppose they may have mistaken a 1 for a T but that seems like a stretch. Second problem with the engine ID is that I can't seem to find a suffix code that would have been a vette engine with an HC code.

Advice on how to sort it out further? I like the car and it needs to go to a good home but I interest may be varied dependent on what I might have to start with. Thanks in advance for any help.

[Bill Pritchard]

You're right, the first position should be either a letter 'F' or 'T'. It's not too difficult to imagine that someone saw either of those letters as a number '1'. In 65, HC would be a 250hp 327 from a 65 full size car....but HG would be a 375hp fuelie 327 from a Corvette. And from what I know, there should be a CON VIN stamp on that pad if it was originally a Corvette engine. If it really is an HC engine, that means it came from a full size car and probably would NOT have had the CON VIN stamp.

Those pad stampings can be pretty tricky to read, especially if there's been a significant amount of surface rust present over many years. You either need to get someone who really knows their stampings to look at it for you, look at it yourself, or get some really good quality pictures.