to preface this, the other night I was driving back to my house in my 67 1800S(I'm in the process of restoring it, but couldn't help myself from driving it when I need to just go somewhere in town), when I got pulled over, because my taillights weren't working(a wire just came unplugged). I knew almost immediately it wasn't gonna be a very fun experience because, A, the cop had no idea what kind of car it was (I could here him radio it in as "uh.. it's an.. it's grey.."); and B, he thought my drivers license was some sort of weapon. so after he came back to give me my license back he decided it was a good time to start accusing me of things, and said "why are you out here without plates on this car, how am I supposed to know you didn't steal this?" I explained that there were in fact plates on the car, located right where license plates are supposed to be located, and he told me to keep my hands where he could see them cause he was gonna check the VIN. I laughed to myself when he marched up to the windshield with his flashlight pointed at the dash like he was on a serious mission to inspect my defrost vents, and then he asked where the VIN was, so I told him it was on the bulkhead, then I had to repeat myself, then I had to explain what a bulkhead was, (I think I just said "a bulkhead is a bulkhead")and it all ended with me telling him I could show him where it was, but I'd have to move my hands away from where he could see them, and I'd have to exit the car, and so he just told me to go home.

okay so as for the actual question: when I got back home I decided to check the VIN myself, and noticed a discrepancy between how it appeared on the car, and how it appeared on the title. on the car it reads 183451-025XXX*. the title, however, reads 18345125XXX. exactly the same, but without the "0". I seem to recall reading that the first half of the VIN just specifies various details about the car, and the second half is the unique number assigned to each chassis, so I could understand why the "0" would get omitted from the title. I'm assuming that there should be several others out there that have that same "0" so I'd kinda like to know which interpretation is the correct one.