Re: reproduction license plates

Posted by Jim McDermaid On 2013/3/27 11:06:25

In Arizona we can use what is called "year of issue" license plates provided the plate is an original and the number in not in use. They won't register reproductions.

I bought my original 1922 plate (the official plate on my 1922 Model T Ford) on ebay and had to do body work on it and I repainted it. I had been bidding on several and managed to find a phone number to MVD to clear the number, they were not very helpfull.

There is a web site for Arizona that shows every plate style ever issued. I took my restored plate down to MVD and finally they allowed me to license the car with this plate. I have to have the renewal sticker in the upper right corner so I made a metal flag that mounts the sticker so it is touching the old plate (I call it mounted). The law doesn't allow covering any of the graphical material on the plate but nobody could tell me how to put the sticker on so it would comply.

Fortunatly Arizona doesn't require a front plate by law and in fact they don't issue one. The point being is that Arizona is the hot bed of license plate collectors and there arn't any to buy and the price is sky high, and finding a pair is impossible.

After all the drama I have been running the 1922 plate on the T and the cops always stop a car length behind and I figure they are running the number.

Arizona is also the home of RedFlex who makes all the photo radar cameras and all the police cars are equipped with cameras and computers which run all the license plates they can see. Frame are not allowed in Arizona because the camera has to see the entire plate.

I mention this because it is all coming you-all's way sometime soon.

Every time I stop someone asks what my car is even though the plate says 1922 and Ford put Ford on every part :)

My Packard has a regular issue license plate.

Jim