Serial # question: Has anyone seen this before?

[RightSpin]

Both of the frame serial numbers on the 67 C10 I bought are struck out the same way. The corrected serial number matches the VIN tag on the cab. It's obvious this happened at the factory, but has anyone seen anything like it before?

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Steve

[indymachinist]

I have seen something similar on a Mazda before so I know it does happen...


This was a 1990 so a lot newer.

[68bowtie]

no. but it makes sense that it's one digit off, like they forgot to change the die.

[Bigdav160]

I've seen struck through numbers on the Corvette forums

[Keith Seymore]

Yep. Someone was having a bad day.

The VIN stamper is a large hydraulic "press" hanging from a tool rail and with the weight offset by a "balancer" (imagine a Harley-Davidson hanging from the ceiling that you are supposed to maneuver into position and press a button). It is supposed to index to the next digit automatically -but - if you mis hit or get out of sequence for some reason then you have to make a repair. Chevy and GMC have different VIN sequence numbers, requiring different stampers hanging there, so if the operator stamps a Chevy VIN on a GMC, for example, then not only is that particular truck wrong but you are out of sequence on every truck after that.

The assembly line repair person and/or the "quality man" (the foreman's right hand man) follow the vehicles down the line with an "X" stamp and a 5 lb hammer and correct the VIN sequence number as required.

Usually it's not just one truck. It normally takes several trucks before somebody notices, so you'll have five or six trucks that have to be fixed - all without the line stopping - so it's quite a scramble for a few minutes while you figure out what happened and what has to happen to make it right. You pray nothing else goes to crap while you've got your two best guys otherwise unavailable.

Cool pics - thanks for posting those.

K

[chewychevy67]

So my 67 gmc has no stampings at all on my frame in either location. Could this have been missed down the line? I had it blasted and coated and you can tell no one has grinded them out or messed with the frame in these areas.

[RightSpin]

Excellent responses! And special thanks to Keith for the cool history lesson. It adds nicely to the story line of this truck.

[57taskforce]

Originally Posted by chewychevy67

So my 67 gmc has no stampings at all on my frame in either location. Could this have been missed down the line? I had it blasted and coated and you can tell no one has grinded them out or messed with the frame in these areas.

I've heard before that the 67-68 gmc didn't always have the partial vin stamped on the frame. I've also read some didn't have Spids as well.

[RenoKeene]

We have a 70 GMC short bed Sierra Grande with no VIN stamping at all so I know it happens.
Also a couple of our 67's definitely didn't come with spids.