factory grease pencil marks?

[NC_John]

I noticed these marks on my truck (70 C-10). I couldn't figure out why someone would have put them on the firewall, especially "blu" (I mean they obviously put it on there AFTER it was painted, right?) but then yesterday I noticed the same number on the inside of the RS fender when I pulled the inner and started thinking.

Are these factory assembly marks? Seems incredible they'd still be this intact after all these years if they are.


If they are factory marks, then I've been spelling her name wrong all along- its "Blu", not "Blue."

[truckdude239]

Yup there factory

[mgkgmc]

Yes these are factory my Gmc has them also.
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[NC_John]

That's pretty cool and amazing to me that they lasted this long. Guess I better be careful when I clean under the hood (and apparently nobody else ever cleaned under there!)

Thanks guys....

[bruceman1968]

Hey John, As you continue to disassemble your truck, if you find anymore grease pencil markings could you post the pics up in this thread? Keep a eye out for that 902 number. That's probably the last 3 digits of the "job number" of your truck. The BLU is the first time I've seen a color name instead of the code, but I'm sure it's factory. It could be referring to the paint or interior color.

[NC_John]

Originally Posted by bruceman1968

Hey John, As you continue to disassemble your truck, if you find anymore grease pencil markings could you post the pics up in this thread? Keep a eye out for that 902 number. That's probably the last 3 digits of the "job number" of your truck. The BLU is the first time I've seen a color name instead of the code, but I'm sure it's factory. It could be referring to the paint or interior color.

I will! I haven't found anything in the cab yet....

[Ol Blue K20]

I don't think the BLU is a color but an inspectors initials my blue truck had ASH or ASK it was real sloppy couldn't tell which it said..

[Orange67]

My 67 still has them. Didn't see any around the fenders when I had them off, but I wasn't looking either. I would like to try and figure out a way to preserve this, even though the original 327 is long gone.

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by bruceman1968

Hey John, As you continue to disassemble your truck, if you find anymore grease pencil markings could you post the pics up in this thread? Keep a eye out for that 902 number. That's probably the last 3 digits of the "job number" of your truck. The BLU is the first time I've seen a color name instead of the code, but I'm sure it's factory. It could be referring to the paint or interior color.

Agree. "902" was the general assembly (trim and final) build sequence number.

You might see it on the hood, rad support, fenders, grille, rear axle, inside the wheels: on anything that was built up remotely and then conveyed to the final line in sequence.

My truck was number "87" (my truck was built on a Monday, btw ).

K

[NC_John]

Originally Posted by Orange67

My 67 still has them. Didn't see any around the fenders when I had them off, but I wasn't looking either. I would like to try and figure out a way to preserve this, even though the original 327 is long gone.

I confirmed yesterday that I still have the original engine and transmission (matched the serial numbers to the protect-o-plate). I don't have a particularly collectible truck (long bed with no cool options) but its still neat.

[NC_John]

Originally Posted by Keith Seymore

Agree. "902" was the general assembly (trim and final) build sequence number.

You might see it on the hood, rad support, fenders, grille, rear axle, inside the wheels: on anything that was built up remotely and then conveyed to the final line in sequence.

My truck was number "87" (my truck was built on a Monday, btw ).

K

That's interesting. My truck was taken off the lot in Sept of '70 (by the bill of sale) so unless it sat on the lot for months, its probably not #902 of the production run. Maybe that number for the month it was built? I need to break down the VIN I guess...

This is kinda like ancestry.com for gearheads, eh?

[Orange67]

I totally agree! Very cool indeed! that is the one thing about my truck, it has factory buckets, and a few other options, but the glove box doesn't look like there was ever a SPID, no residue at all. no protect-o-plate, or build sheet. Just the grease pencil marks on my firewall.

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by NC_John

That's interesting. My truck was taken off the lot in Sept of '70 (by the bill of sale) so unless it sat on the lot for months, its probably not #902 of the production run. Maybe that number for the month it was built? I need to break down the VIN I guess...

Negative. They had probably already built several hundred thousand vehicles so the full sequence number might be something like 299902, but they just wrote the last two or three digits on the various components for tracking purposes. The full build sequence number just keeps climbing all model year as vehicles are built, but in this way you could be building vehicle 901, 902, 903, 904 etc. one day and then 001, 002, 003, etc the next. (Full sequence would be 299901, 299902, 299903, 299904,etc; 300001, 300002, 300003, etc).

My truck was built on Monday Sept 29 of 1986 (in Flint) and the VIN was already up in the 317000 range (60 jobs per hour, two shifts); similarly my Chevelle was built in September of 1973 in Oshawa and the VIN is also already up in the 300000 range.

K

[davischevy]

I had a 72 Cheyenne Super once that had "Red Orange" on the SPID and "Hugger Orange" in grease pencil on the cowl.

The Super I have now has "4T" on each side of the cowl. I have always assumed it stood for 4 tone to designate the red white red white paint scheme. Even though it's not four tones.

The engine, trans, and rear codes are also on the cowl, which is common.

[bruceman1968]

Originally Posted by Keith Seymore

Negative. They had probably already built several hundred thousand vehicles so the full sequence number might be something like 299902, but they just wrote the last two or three digits on the various components for tracking purposes. The full build sequence number just keeps climbing all model year as vehicles are built, but in this way you could be building vehicle 901, 902, 903, 904 etc. one day and then 001, 002, 003, etc the next. (Full sequence would be 299901, 299902, 299903, 299904,etc; 300001, 300002, 300003, etc).

My truck was built on Monday Sept 29 of 1986 (in Flint) and the VIN was already up in the 317000 range (60 jobs per hour, two shifts); similarly my Chevelle was built in September of 1973 in Oshawa and the VIN is also already up in the 300000 range.

K

Keith, Are you saying that the 902 number is the last 3 digits of his VIN number?

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by bruceman1968

Keith, Are you saying that the 902 number is the last 3 digits of his VIN number?

Nope. There is no direct linkage between the build sequence number and the sequential portion of the VIN.

The build sequence number absolutely increases one-for-one for every truck built. So at the beginning of the year you start with truck "01" and start counting, all the way to 700,000 or every how many trucks were built in that plant.

The VIN sequence portion does not increment one for one....nor are trucks necessarily built in VIN order. In my day Chevy's started with 100001 and GMCs with 500001 (and then Cadillacs with 600001); so, while within a nameplate the VINs increment up one by one but because the various nameplates are jumbled in during the day's production run the VINs do not increment up exactly one for one overall.

Let's say your daily build looked like this (I'm making this up for illustration purposes):



PVI = "Primary Vehicle Identifier" - and is the way the cab/box are identified in body shop, before the GA (General Assembly/Final Line) sequence number and VIN are even created. There are two opportunities for the build order to be shuffled: coming out of body shop into paint, and coming out of paint into trim/GA.

GA sequence number is the order in which the trucks go down the final line. Once they hit trim/final the build order is locked in.

In the example shown here the operator would write the "901", "902" etc (or even just "01", "02") on the front of dash, rather than the full "299901".

Does that help?

K

[Keith Seymore]

So - the purpose of the above example was to show what the "902" means.

But - there are some other nuances buried in there, that I put there on purpose, that I would like to discuss briefly:

a) Vehicle order numbers: those are real live actual dealer order numbers. That's how they look in terms of alphanumerics, and in order (all jumbled up). I've never seen any kind of rhyme or reason (or intelligence) in how the order numbers are constructed.

b) PVI - is the primary tracking number prior to GA and is established after the dealer order number is received at the plant and released for production. The vehicle cabs and boxes were built in PVI order through the body shop but shuffled going into paint, due to repair, rework or part availability.

c) GA sequence - the cab and box get shuffled again, coming out of paint before dropping into trim/final. This is again due to any repair or rework or part availability, but additionally to balance the workload for the people in trim and final. Said differently, you can't have too many air conditioning, manual trans, cab roof marker lights, dually boxes, etc (high work content) vehicles in a row. Gotta spread 'em out a bit.

d) Notice how the VINs increment up one by one within a brand. That is not always the case but I have left it that way for the purposes of this example.

e) Notice how there is a GMC every 9th or 11th job, and a Cadillac every 20th job. That was intentional. The VIN sequence reflects the production volume of that brand built, too, ie: at this point 200,000 Chevy's have been built (317388 minus 100001), but only 20,000 GMCs (521102 minus 500001) and only 10,000 Cadillacs (610101 minus 600001).

f) Those vehicle owners are for pre-production internal users. For regular production that would be the actual ultimate customer (Keith Seymore, or Bruceman, or DavisChevy, etc)

Just a reminder: on my truck the GA build sequence number was "87" but my VIN ends in "317388".

K

[bruceman1968]

Any chance the 902 number refers to the PVI number or vehicle order number, instead of the GA number? From your last post it sounds like the GA number isn't known until the assembly process. In the research I have done, that number shows up before the assembly process. I have documented that number showing up during the stamping of the pieces used to make the truck. Here is a example.









I took this pic and the stamped number is 214


I have documented several trucks with the stamped number matching the grease pencil number. Any light you can shed on this would be greatly appreciated. I have used the info you provide in your posts a lot to help me do this research. you are a most valued resource. Thank you for all the knowledge you share with this board. We need more assy line guys on here.
P.S. I love the story of how you followed your truck down the line. To cool

[Keith Seymore]

Originally Posted by bruceman1968

Any chance the 902 number refers to the PVI number or vehicle order number, instead of the GA number? From your last post it sounds like the GA number isn't known until the assembly process. In the research I have done, that number shows up before the assembly process. I have documented that number showing up during the stamping of the pieces used to make the truck. Here is a example:

Thank you -

Yes - good examples - in the examples you have posted it looks like the trucks were built "straight through", meaning the PVI (not the dealer order number) and the final line GA sequence number were the same. No shuffling occured after body shop or after paint. The stamped portion was done in body shop after the cab was welded up and then the grease pencil after paint.

Were those Fremont trucks, perhaps? Fremont built straight through (no shuffling).

Re: Following my truck down the line: I wish now I had kept some of the paperwork (the build manifest, build sheet, inspection paperwork, etc) from that day but I didn't even think of it until recently. I actually followed two of my own personal trucks down the line for fun - but now I follow preproduction builds down the line for a living.

Originally Posted by bruceman1968

We need more assy line guys on here.

Probably not; then we would just argue with each other...



K

[bruceman1968]

Originally Posted by Keith Seymore

Thank you -

Yes

Were those Fremont trucks, perhaps? Fremont built straight through (no shuffling)



K

Two of them are Fremont trucks for sure. The 3rd one probably is to, I don't have a VIN on it.
All the trucks I have documented so far (with a grease number and a stamped number) have been from Fremont. Even have a GMC.
Thanks again Keith, your responses really do shed a lot of light. I appreciate the help.

[NC_John]

Keith- thanks for all the info- that was a great tutorial!

[Bishops Trucks]

Originally Posted by bruceman1968

Hey John, As you continue to disassemble your truck, if you find anymore grease pencil markings could you post the pics up in this thread? Keep a eye out for that 902 number. That's probably the last 3 digits of the "job number" of your truck. The BLU is the first time I've seen a color name instead of the code, but I'm sure it's factory. It could be referring to the paint or interior color.

My truck was from the Freemont plant. It has "215" stamped in the cowl. When I disassembled the truck, I found the "215" on the trans. case, gas tank, and header panel for the bed. My truck is the original ochre/white top, (repainted once) and on my firewall had the factory crown writing that said "Mustard". The interior was saddle but I've since changed it to black.

[RenoKeene]

Great thread!
#214 is in my shop and destined for greatness

[bruceman1968]

Jim, Do you have a pic of the mustard writing. I would like to have it for my collection. Also any pics of the 215 written anywhere. IIRC your truck has been painted, so if you don't have the pics, no problem. Just thought I'd ask.

[Timborees]

Hey guys, mine is an all original, all matching numbers (engine, gearbox, rear) with protect-o-plate and has the more generic code still on the firewall....... See photo....