Hello all,
I used to post on this forum few years ago but you can call me a noob if you want to. Anyway, i just bought a 99 4dr accord with 108k for 6 grand. Its a nice EX with no dings leather and sunroof and i thought I got a great deal but now im not so sure. I drove the car and ran a carfax on it and everything came up clean so I bought it. The previous "owner" said it had not had a new timing belt put on so today I took the valve cover off to see how it looked and it looks new. In fact everything looks new, there is no discoloration of any of the parts under the valve cover and the belt does not appear to be cracked or worn at all. Then i noticed empty bolt holes on the outside of the engine, my friend said there should be engine grounds attached. In fact we didnt see the engine grounded anywhere. So i started wondering if the engine had been pulled and replaced. Then, Low and behold I noticed the engine VIN did not match the vehicle VIN. So now Im a little worried. Im not sure if i got a great deal on a car with a newer engine or if i bought a car with a stolen engine or with an older rebuilt engine or what. I would have taken pics of the engine and inside but my camera batteries are dead. The "owner" of the car i bought it from was actually a relative of the dealership whos name was on the title.
my car vin looks kinda like this : 1HGC5759X(AO87138)
the engine vin looks kinda like : F23A1-(2066117)
(the real vins are slightly different)
Ive never run into this before so I tried running a carfax on this number
1HGC5759X2066117 (made by switching the numbers in parenthesis) to see if i could get mileage info on the car the engine came out of, it came back invalid. If anybody knows how to get more info with these numbers from carfax or some other service i would really appreciate it. and if you have read all this info because you just need a carfax report EMAIL ME with your vin please dont post requests for the report, they will go unanswered .

 

Your engine code is different from your vehicle code. Here's a good overview:

 

Thats good info thanks.
So if the engine serial is diff than the body serial how do you know if they came from the same car? Is there a database somewhere that you can look up or should the serials partially match (partially since they are a diff number of digits)

 

the honda owner link on honda.com might tell you.

 

I don't know of anyplace you or I could look up the engine serial # vs. the VIN.

But in '99 the engine should ALSO have a metal tag with the VIN riveted on the block somewhere. I'm not really sure, but I think just above the oilpan on the back??

 

neither of those VIN's are valid. if you look at the vin plate on the dashboadr (drivers corner of the window) maybe we can do something with it.

 

well, for 6k there has to be a catch

 

yeah do what the honda guy said. that # there is the key , see if they match with the engine and also n the driver side door.

a friend got a good deal on a civic si but when he went to register he had a little problem. he had 2-3 diff vin number lol anyway this was 2yrs ago and last yr the car swallow some water and die lol so we install a used nice engine on it with like 160hp.

 

could someone compare the last 5 digits of their vin with the last 5 digits of there engine number and tell me if they are the same? Mine are similiar but im thinking they should be the same if the engine came with the car. Thanks in advance!

 

They're NOT the same on mine.

On my '98 Accord 4-cyl, there's a VIN plate riveted into the engine block, on the back, to the left of the oil filter. You can see it thru the hole where the axle goes out to the wheel, but I guess you have to get underneath the car to actually READ it.