1963 hood prop bolt head markings

[Frank D.]

Re: 1963 hood prop bolt head markings

I've gone over this few times before here, but one more probably won't hurt:

Virtually all fasteners in GM plants were double or triple sourced, meaning two or three different manufacturers. Such fasteners were shipped to GM plants in cartons of say 2500 pieces, on a pallet with many cartons. All cartons were then stored in a central location, by part number, at each plant. It was not unusual for the same part to be present in that plant's central location from two or three manufacturers.

The hilo driver who supplied these fasteners to the line cared not what the supplier name on the box was, only that the part number was correct. So the driver would deliver the boxes to the line and leave. Line operators at a job site usually had some container at their site for each fastener they installed and they would refill this container frequently, pouring them from the box of fasteners that had been brought to them by a hilo driver.

The operator almost always poured some parts into his container when it became low, mixing the "old" fasteners in the container with the "new" ones, resulting in the container possible containing parts with two (or three) different head markings. The operator took them out as they came to hand, never glancing at the head marking. Nobody cared.

It is therefore possible, even common, that a component might be attached with two or three of the same fasteners, all of which have different head markings. If a fastener found on a car is of the correct construction, with a known GM supplier's head marking, and the judge recognizes the head marking as being from a common GM fastener supplier, there should be no deduct.

More critically, subtle differences in head markings were ALWAYS present on fasteners, as the logo was cut into the heading tooling by a tool marker with no instruction to be exact, only to apply something close. These heading tools were changed frequently, during a manufacturing run, each logo slightly different than the last. It was not important to anyone.

Let's quit being so anal about this, no one in those days cared, so long as the car got out the door.

Those that have worked in a large, industrial, production facility "back in the day" will echo this.

My early '70s Naval aviation depot experience was precisely as you describe. We had tall standing "trees" of fasteners in outward facing, rotating open "bins" with faded paper labels on each container. If the part number on the label jibed with what you needed you brought a handful back to the work area and got going again. No bar codes, no computerized dispensing, no agonizing over "correct" fastener look and finish. MANY hardware contractors produced the fasteners.

[Brant H.]

Re: 1963 hood prop bolt head markings

Just for reference, these are the bolts in my Jan. '63 production 1963 FI Coupe.

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