Canadian CFR Numbers
 

Can anyone confirm that the CFR vehicle registration system works as follows:

two digits - year in which vehicle came on strength
dash
two digits - vehicle type code
three digits - actual vehicle number

Thank you.

During which era?

Ed
The format you list was correct for the 50s, but things changed sometime in the 60s and again in the 70s. Lets use the jeep size vehs for example. In the 50s, all the jeep CFRs started with 30, the 3/4 ton with 40, and on up until the armour in the 80s. In the 60s, there was a change in the formula. For instance all the jeeps obtained then were started at 07700, and were numbered sequentially through the 3 different fleets including the m151a2. The M151A2 numbering crossed the 10,000 line and a few hundred apparently were given CFRs somewhere in the 20000 range.

Today, the CFRs are just assigned to the next vehicle that needs one. In some cases blocks of CFRs are reserved, such as when the MLVWs were built over a 2 or 3 year span. Commercial vehicles purchased during the manufacture of the MLVW were assigned numbers higher than the MLVW fleet.

Other than the reserved blocks, CFRs are just assigned sequentially to the next acquisition that needs it. If the 5 digits are still being used on an in service vehicle, then that number is skipped and could get used next time they go around the 100,000 available. There also seemed to be something different about the first 10,000 numbers. I noticed, back in the 90s, that they went from 99999 down to 10000 and started all over again. The only exception I noticed was a couple land rovers over in Bosnia, which were in the 5000 range if I recall, and a few other oddball vehicles overseas..

Note that CFR numbers are also occasionally assigned to certain high cost equipments for tracking and cost analysis purposes. This includes SEV kits n the back of trucks (and sometimes even the bolted on cargo box as is the case with some of the binned mlvws), artillery guns (usually start with a 00 for year), and even certain electronic items.

CFR Numbers
 

Thank you for the information. The sampling of CFRs in photographs I have was not large enough to come up with an answer and some of the CFRs did not make sense.

Two oddball CFRs that you will run into will be replacement CFRs and locally procured/manufactured trailers.

If a plate is lost or stolen, the truck was supposed to be assigned a new CFR. It didn't appen very often, usually guys would just go to transport and they would sticky up a new one. But if the missing plate problem made it to major equipment section, then you were looking at a vehicle whose plate would be way out of sequence.

Locally procured or manufactured trailers would have a plate which would be the UIC of the base and a digit. For instance, the first such trailer in Wpg would be 01171, the second one would be 01172, etc. Not sure what they did on the tenth trailer as you were out of space for the numbers.