Painting California license plates

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Dustman73

Dustman73

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Farmersville, Ca
My duster has modern blue and white plates on it.. Since my duster is a 73 it should have blue and yellow license plates on it.. I really dont like the look of those though.. I was wondering if painting the white plates to the 60s look (black and yellow) would be legal? Anybody have a clue?
 
Its illegal to alter license plates here. I would imagine more so there.

-RPM
 
I think that the CHP would not like it and you might get a fix it ticket for your troubles - or worse. My brother has a 67 Cougar and when he got the car re-painted, he painted his yellow and blue license plate, but the blue was not the correct color blue. He got pulled over for it and when the officer checked out that he hadn't altered the numbers on the plate he let him go once my brother explained that he wanted the license plate to look just as good as the car, but he got quite the frown from the officer. Changing the color of the plate I think would not be a good idea as the paint scheme is kinda part of the series the license plate is from.
Just my thoughts.
 
Maybe you could find some one with an old set of black plates to sell you. Think you can just have them changed over? Old plates only had 6 digits. New ones have 7.
 
I have two sets of black plates,but I don't know if you could do that.
 
You don't want to alter the existing plate in ANY way here in California. I too want a set of Yellow/blue plates for my Duster, but the YOM plan here stops short of what we need dude.
Does anybody know if the YOM plan will adjust to include more years eventually?

I was thinking about grabbing a set of clean yellow/blue plates just in case dustman73.
 
Can't put black plates on a 70 or later car from what I understand.

Here's something that I found on the net. Strict interpretation, it's a felony to alter a plate, but you really don't have any criminal intent in doing so. BUT, I wouldn't want to fight that battle because an officer decided to interpret the statute as such. It would cost some money, maybe impound your car... too many potential landmines here.

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CVC 4463, though presumably intended to primarily address the intentional
falsification of registration information, defines it to be a *felony* to
alter license plates. Though it would indeed be an extremely strict
interpretation of the code as written to charge one who has simply trimmed the
edges of their license plate with a felony, it is a possibility. It should be
considered that this code might also suggest that a plate altered in any way
is probable cause for a traffic stop.
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the whole situation is even more tricky than meets the eye ... To wit :

Here's a fairly comprehensive rundown of Ca's plates' colour-to-year , etc.

Black with Yellow Characters : 01-01-1963 through 31-12-1969

Blue with Yellow Characters , 6 digit : 01-01-1970 through c.1980

The 1st letter indicates the plate's year-of-issue . For example :
337 GBL . G = 1972-issue

Your '73 Duster -should- have originally had a plate with its 1st letter being "G" , "H" or possibly "J" ( "I" wasn't used as a 1st letter ) , being preceded by 3 numbers ; example :
726 HYH . H = 1973-issue

Certainly , black / yellow plates did indeed appear on certain early-build , early-sell 1970 models ( I've seen no less than 2 different 1970 Darts with black/yellow "Z"-series plates ) , and on the contrary , seeing 1969 models with blue/yellow plates
( there's a '69 Camaro around here that was built in Dec '69 and sold new in Jan '70 . Its plates are blue/yellow and start with "A" as the 1st letter ) .

1970 was also the first year for personalised plates ;

1980 was the year that plates went to a 7-character arrangement ;

1982 was the first year for the "sunburst" plates ( ornate , art deco-era "CALIFORNIA" with the "O" as the Sun ) ;

1986 was the last year for blue/yellow plates ;

1987 was the year that the white / red "CALIFORNIA" / blue characters plates were issued ;

1993 was the first year for the cursive "CALIFORNIA" , the one that's still around , and is ugly as **** .

For such a car-culture-rich state , we certainly have the most boring , ugly , uninspired license plates , BAR NONE !

To answer your question : Do. Not. Change. Your . Plates' . Colours . You WILL get nailed .:glasses4:
 
LH23H2R said:
the whole situation is even more tricky than meets the eye ... To wit :

Here's a fairly comprehensive rundown of Ca's plates' colour-to-year , etc.

Black with Yellow Characters : 01-01-1963 through 31-12-1969

Blue with Yellow Characters , 6 digit : 01-01-1970 through c.1980

To answer your question : Do. Not. Change. Your . Plates' . Colours . You WILL get nailed .:glasses4:
Click to expand...

so 63-39 was 5 digits or what?
is it possible/legal to buy some old ones and get them transfered?

I'd love to get some old plates stamped in 69 on my car..
 
Black plates, 6 digits, letters then number ex VTC 566

Blue plates, 6 digits, numbers then letters ex 118 BLI

I was told that if you want the black plates on your car you need some type of old registration/title showing that plate number attached to the car. Maybe someone has found a way around it. I don't know.
 
When I lived in Socal back in the 60's, you would get pulled over for just putting clear plastic over the plate!
 
Man.. Looks like im out of luck... Haha its too bad we dont have a little more freedom with our license plates... You would think that as long as it is legible that you could alter them.. I restored my friends black and yellow plate and that inspired me to wanna mess with mine but i guess not haha didnt know that there was so many stats on license plates :) thanks for all the great info guys..
 
Too bad that this stupid state ( Ca ) with its money-hungry mentality , doesn't offer plates exclusively for its high-population of Antique , Classic , Muscle , Custom ,etc. , vehicles !

imo , NOTHING take-away from a vintage vehicle's appearance than those shitty looking , 7 digit , glow-in-the-dark , Ca plates >:p

My Coronet has 1984-issue ( 1KWU*** ) , blue/yellow plates on it ; and , while I despise the idea of them being 7-digit , at least they're NOT those hideous '93-present ***** !
 
California has a Year-Of-Manufacture license plate program that exists for 1963 to 1969 year model cars, motorcycles, and trailers that allows those year vehicles only to use 6-character black and yellow plates. The plates don't have to be the original ones issued to the vehicle but must be a matched pair of original plates not currently on the California DMV records.
Check out http://www.dmv.ca.gov/forms/reg/reg352.pdf to see a copy of the application form.
 
Yes, OC....I've heard about that program! Now, black and yellow plates are starting to command a bit of $$ on Ebay etc. for this reason. I've actually seen new custom plates ("hot bug" or whatever) get painted black with yellow lettering and put on an old car. Talk about a cop magnet.....lol..
 
LH23H2R said:
imo , NOTHING take-away from a vintage vehicle's appearance than those shitty looking , 7 digit , glow-in-the-dark , Ca plates >:p
Click to expand...

I agree with you man, and that's why you have to come up with a witty or smart *** custom plate using the new ones!:thumbup:

As I mentioned earlier, does anybody know if the YOM allowed years will eventually increase, to include ...say 1973:p
 
:hello1: glad I didnt order my custom plates yet. I need to get new plates so I have a front one...

ocdart said:
California has a Year-Of-Manufacture license plate program that exists for 1963 to 1969 year model cars, motorcycles, and trailers that allows those year vehicles only to use 6-character black and yellow plates. The plates don't have to be the original ones issued to the vehicle but must be a matched pair of original plates not currently on the California DMV records.
Check out http://www.dmv.ca.gov/forms/reg/reg352.pdf to see a copy of the application form.
Click to expand...
 
Allow me to muddy the waters..

A buddy of mine here in SoCal painted his 6-character blue/ yellow plates Black with Yellow numbers. His car is (was) a 1967 VW...that was completely restored and made into a "California Special"

He did this years ago and has never had any issues, as I recall..


YMMV, and all that...


--
 
crackedback said:
Black plates, 6 digits, letters then number ex VTC 566

Blue plates, 6 digits, numbers then letters ex 118 BLI

I was told that if you want the black plates on your car you need some type of old registration/title showing that plate number attached to the car. Maybe someone has found a way around it. I don't know.
Click to expand...

yep go get "custom" plate thru DMV with that number (if the old plates have been deleted) and then run the old ones...
 
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