info on my 55

[john parsons]

hi i started to restore my 55 when i was sanding the boot lid under the badge was stamp in the lid was s12 ...............dose anyone know whatthis means

[Rick_L]

Several of my body panels, especially internal ones, were stamped "H54" or something similar. I thought it was a date code, which could translate to August 5, 1954 and makes a little sense as my car was a November 1954 car (even that is off a bit). But you can't use similar logic to decipher "S12" as a date code.

[BamaNomad]

I haven't read anything about original 'codes' on trifive sheet metal, but for the late 60's cars, the date code on FISHER sheet metal was 'Plant code followed by week#'.. ie. H 26 would be H plant and 26th week of the year. In your case, following that same logic 'S' would be the Fisher stamping plant code, and 12 would be the 12th week of the model year. These codes only show up on sheet metal installed during factory assembly. OTC replacement parts do not exhibit these codes.

For *extremely strict judging* this sort of thing could be important, but I'm unaware of ANY trifive organization which judges even more basic things anymore. Even in the days of NNC and CCCI 1000 pt judging, the sheet metal itself was not judged for 'factory codes'.

[john parsons]

cool

[john parsons]

hi all
here is some more for you to work out
right hand rear door has on it 2wa9 10111

[john parsons]

left hand rear door has on it w1110112

[roadster601@aol.com]

this is all good info, I do have a question for you, where can I get a book or write up of the finishes for my restoration on my 55 Chevy belair convertible any ideas thanks

[BamaNomad]

Lou: We provided responses last night with references for your paint finishes questions... Check your thread! :)

John Parsons: Beyond what I've already told you, the only thing I can do is give you a LINK to a discussion on Fisher body stamping practices (from the CRG). The CRG is Camaro Research Group (of which I'm a long time member) and the Fisher body stamps have been discussed at length there. Fisher was stamping body panels for a long time and their practices didn't change much thru the fifties and into the 70's as a minimum. The initial alpha character(s) are for the stamping plant making the part, and the numeric following is for the WEEK (of the production year) it was stamped.

http://www.camaros.org/forum/index.php?topic=11258.0

One other point: Even though at the time of production, the 'dates' of the sheet metal used were close in 'time' to the body build and auto production (since they had little space to store parts for millions of cars), After the past 50-60 yrs of maintaining our TriFives, MANY (or possibly even most?) cars have seen body panels from other cars used, so the actual dates don't tell you much.. (and it hardly matters since most aren't even visible without disassembly of the car and no organization judges these parts stamping). You could certainly record the panel stamping dates for all the parts on your car, but it probably will not matter to anyone but you... :)