1969 Production date
I have a Fathom green / vinyl saddle L71 1969 Corvette Coupe w/ MA6 dual disc clutch option (VIN 194379S738401). I purchased it in early 1975 during my Senior year in High School for 3500.00 from a used BMW Porsche lot in Hermosa Beach, CA. The NCRS birthday request I submitted quite some time ago returned with no record. When I use the C3 birthday calculator, I get 12/1/69. I checked two sequentially higher and lower VIN's in the C3 birthday calculator and all four are 12/26/69. The car was special ordered by a fighter pilot toward the end of his tour in Vietnam through a dealership in Florida. He wanted an L88 but was told they didn't have any more engines, hence the L71. 1969 JG shows 1,964 Corvettes produced in December 1969. C3 BD calculator shows the last 1969 VIN of 38762 being produced on 12/31/69. I calculated that approximately 135 Corvettes were produced each working day during November '69. With my car being the 1,603 made in December, that should put my date around the 15th or 16th of December. Thoughts?
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Re: 1969 Production date
The car is in storage in the hi desert. I thought I had that info somewhere but can't find it. I'll keep looking and if I can't find it in my files, I'll get up there, get the information and a picture to post.Comment
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Re: 1969 Production date
#38,305 has a trim tag date of Q15 (Dec 15)
#38,516 is Q16 (Dec 16)
But those numbers leaves you no closer than you were before. Even with the trim tag date you will not know when the car was completed; and then you have to define the term "completed." There are various definitions of that term, and Chevrolet's numbers for the numbers of cars produced changed over the years. In some cases it was when the wheels touched the ground the first time, others were when the car exited the plant doors, and other times when the car left the plant grounds. Some say it was when the car was paid for.
Calculations using daily averages will be altered by whether the plant worked between Christmas and New Years. The number of days for Thanksgiving holiday will change the averages for November. Other holidays will change those months as well.
Good luck in your quest.TerryComment
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Re: 1969 Production date
Terry, our best "guess" as to the completion date shown in the SDR is when the car was deemed complete in the factory and transferred to the shipment company. I believe this date was also used by the bean counters to confirm production quantities per time period. There is also an invoice date which lags the production date, sometimes by a few days and infrequently by weeks or months. Again I think this was some sort of accounting criteria.Comment
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Re: 1969 Production date
Doesn't this narrow the trim tag date range to 12/15 or 12/16?
All the definitions of "birthday" (trim tag date, wheels down, shipped, purchased, etc.) leave room to celebrate what you want. The only date I know on my '70 is what's on trim tag, so that's its "birthday" for me.
You seem to know a lot about the original owner. Any paperwork from his purchase?Mark Edmondson
Dallas, Texas
Texas Chapter
1970 Coupe, Donnybrooke Green, Light Saddle LS5 M20 A31 C60 G81 N37 N40 UA6 U79
1993 Coupe, 40th Anniversary, 6-speed, PEG 1, FX3, CD, Bronze TopComment
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Re: 1969 Production date
Mark
The information I have is from George Barlos and Phil Hawkins, both of whom worked at St Louis. They were kind enough to educate some of us for years at the Bloomington Gold event.
Of course, I am aware of the information NCRS has, and I understand that data has origins in insurance coverage for the completed car. My reference above was to the end-of-month production numbers that Chevrolet accumulated and published, and to the method of calculating average daily production. The need for insurance coverage was probably a more stable number.
The bottom line is that if we try to determine the exact day of production we will find a good deal of variation in definition that will, in the end, lead to confusion. That is why for judging purposes those of us who judge Corvettes with trim tage usually settle on the date on the trim tag even though we know that tag was attached to the car body before the car was complete, and in some circumstances (work stoppages) it can be some time before the car was complets. What we do is far from an exact science.TerryComment
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Re: 1969 Production date
Thank you all for your very valuable input.
Mark - I met the original owner who gave me some broken parts he still had from the car (dual disc flywheel and pressure plate(s) with broken diaphragm spring). I spoke with him in 1975 and due to my young age and ignorance, coupled with these cars not having the notoriety they do now, I never asked him if he had any of the original paperwork. I did recover a partial build sheet from the tank where you can make out the 435 HP designation but otherwise is pretty broken up. I need to find a company that does document restoration to see what can be done with it.Comment
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Re: 1969 Production date
Joe - I found an old 35mm photo that I scanned. Refining / sharpening of scanned photos is not my forte. I'm not sure something this grainy can even be improved. Let me know if you can make out the date code on it.
Thanks,
JohnComment
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Re: 1969 Production date
And I do the same, just like both of you. Just like we do in judging all the other C3s. There are exceptions for those cars stuck on the line during work stoppages or those requiring extensive repairs, but those circumstances are few and far between. They are probably far fewer than those people who try to get their cars fall under them.
I was a little surprised to find my 1970, with a trim tag that shows January 29, had an NCRS completed date of January 30. I would have expected another day or so later, but whatever it is, it is. Either way a day or two works for dating all the other components. I remember it got to the dealer on February 14, but the suburbs of Chicago are not that far from St Louis. It wasz not like going to California.
TerryComment
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