[Wil Ferch]

My point is how far can you go to "modify" something....and still be legal?. What if the Merc were instead cut all up, body discarded, and rebuilt to smaller wheelbase and a "Cobra" body put on top? Is that better than truly burying the original Merc car in the ground..... so it can never show up again (illegally as a duplicate), and only re-using the VIN plate?. Both the Merc and the Cobra would end up with similar "Architecture" ( if you will) and both would have "Ford" engines that need not match the chassis as "original delivery". Doesn't have to.

I do however, see the points you are making as to "how" a VIN can be replaced with legal backing vs. not having official backing for the change. I'm not altogether condoning this....but I lay it out there as a question.