I am trying to do a vlookup on a cell that has ben truncated.

I have cell D2 (2006122405654 in it)
Cell E2 is " =left(d2,8) " which shows the first 8 characters (20061224)
Column F2:F365 shows 20060101 thru 20061231
Column G2:G365 shows 1 thru 365

If I try =vlookup(E2,F2:G365,2,false) I get back a "#N/A" instead of the number.

If I try it with a cell that I type in the 20061224 they I get back the correct number from the lookup.

For soome reason it does not find the correct number using a already functioned cell.

Am I doing something wrong, or is there another way of doing this?

Thank you in advance for any help.