Spoke to a friend yesterday who is looking at a '69 Camaro w/ the VIN stamped by the oil filter. He said that the area where the VIN is stamped looked like it had been ground down and restamped (not rough cast). He brought this up to the seller and the seller told him that it was done at the factory b/c they occasionally made mistakes and had to restamp the block. The date codes seem to match up (engine build date early Feb. '69/body build date late March '69). Has anyone ever heard of this, or other than the obvious reason, why this may have been legitimately done? Thanks Team Camaro!

Factory VIN repair consisted of X'ing out the incorrect VIN and restamping the proper one. No grinders on the engine assembly line at Norwood or LA.

It was rarely done, because the incorrect VIN would only be off by a couple of numbers and wasn't caught very often.

That date spead is a bit wide for February - March of 69, especially if this is a Z28. Production was real tight relating engine assembly to installation into a car in this time period. Not impossible, but with that wide a spread and a ground out VIN I would be sceptical.

Mark, What's typical on camaros for days between engine stamp date and body build date? Did it vary some during '69? How about other dates (i.e. block cast to stamp, rear end cast to stamp, rear end stamp to body assy, tranny stamp to body assy)? I'm more familiar with early vettes and am fairly new to Camaros. TIA

It varies by engine, and by time of year. L6's seem to have huge differences in assembly dates and car build dates for most of 69, seems like Flint built a ton of 6 cylinders and stored them somewhere for use. Low production cars, L89's, L72's were batch built in certain time periods and installed in cars as they were ordered early and mid year, then production scheduling tightened up as the end of the model year approached. Car build and engines are very tight in February and March of 69, almost as soon as they were assembled they went into cars, especially Z28's.

So the answer is, it depends. Generally casting to assembly 1 week or less, assembly to installation 1 week or less. Remember that the Foundaries in the engine plants never shutdown, they ran 24/7 and GM was building roughly 5000 engines a day at Flint. There is only so much room to store engine blocks, and heads at the facility. If the assembly section shutdown for a weekend, there would be 10,000 blocks and 20,000 heads waiting for them on Monday. Engines were assembled as soon as the castings were cooled enough to work with. I'd guess it would usually take about 8 business days on average at Norwood from casting to installation. LA took a little longer to get into a car because of additional shipping time from Flint or Tonowanda to Los Angeles. And there are always going to be engines that took 3 or 4 weeks to get pulled off the shelf and installed in a car due to the way they stacked the engines at the assembly plants.

Axle assembly dates are usually within a week to a week and a half of car build date, for the common axles like 2.56, 3.07, 3.08, 3.23 etc. Further out on 3.73's and 4.11's. JL8's were batch built in two or three specific time periods during the 69 production year and used as needed.

[ 01-06-2004, 06:52 PM: Message edited by: Mark C ]

Any chance of getting the casting # for the block? Would be curious to see what it got

As a note of interest- my original 06A Z28 has 2 vins stamped in the rough cast by the oil filter, both the same , but 1 of them is almost impossible to read, almost looks like a double strike? I guess they must have decided to hit the vin again so it was readable? I have a friend who says that his 11A/69 Z28 is also double whacked with the vin, but i canot verify this as i have never seen it. My block casting date is May 21 and the pad stamp is VO527DZ.( 6 days ). Had a documented 65 Corvette Fuelie in the shop about 5 years ago and the cast date to stamp date was 2 days differnce, almost sounds impossible to have been cooled, machined and stamped, but it WAS definately original. I also have seen Corvette Engine Deck Pads with a grind out and new vin stamped below it, 1 such case was a Documented 69 corvette 300hp/350. I wonder if Mark knows if early Z28,s with the vin up on the deck ever had grind out,s as there is not much room ? I also have seen x'd out vins but most of them were later in the mid 70,s . Also saw a 4 speed trans case with the vin stamped 3 times. Just my 2 cents worth.

The grind out on the engine pad was the engine plants method to correct an error in the assembly code, not the VIN. They used an 8" angle grinder to remove the assembly code and then restamped the correct one. The VIN was stamped at the vehicle assembly plant and was either X'ed out completely(approved GM method) or the individual incorrect number(s) was restamped if it was only off by a digit.

Mark C,
Thanks for the very good information.

Olympic69,
The cast number on the block for the car was 3956618 and the cowl tag denoted X33D80.

Overall the rest of the car seemed to match (transmission/rear) and the body and interior were in very good condition. Since the car was supposedly an original RS Z28, I estimated the value to be 25K. I told him to proceed cautiously and to verify that everything else is what it seems to be.

No X33 D80 codes on a March Z28 that code combination didn't come out till sometime later in the year. Repro tag alert.

Tell your friend to run like hell. Restamped engine, repro trim tag, things not worth 15K.

[ 01-06-2004, 03:45 PM: Message edited by: Mark C ]

We need to get the VIN from that car and post it as a fraud. If the trim plate is a fake then the whole car is. There is just another example of why you should not get a repro trim tag unless you can prove what the original had on it. If this guy sells this to someone for $25,000 or $30,000, he has stolen $15,000 to $20,000.

The 69 Corvette 300HP/350 i talked about in the early post DID have the vin ground out, it was Definitely a documented original Canadian car ( GM of Canada documentation as well as protecto plate ) and the vin was restamped below the grind out. Someone must have hid a grinder in their lunchbox LOL. Maybe Al Grenning ( the #1 Corvette Engine Stamp GURU) would know for sure.

Mark, what do you mean "no X codes on a March 69 Z28? They were phased in app. Dec 68. A March or April built Z28 should be using the X and D codes.Frank

I said no X33D80 codes on a March Z28. The D80 part was not used on March cars. That part was added to all cars with factory spoilers later (I'm not telling when) in the production year.

May