VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - 1945 AND EARLIER 1929-1932 1929 landau Imperial sed convt, Trim!

Skip
I have never ran across a closed body Body No. number that did not have a letter prefix that indicated the Fisher Body plant on the Fisher Body nameplate on the cowl. I have seen a few cases where a large body plant like "S" St Louis supplying coupe bodies to say the Oakland plant. In cases of miss stamped body numbers or not stamped body cowl plates, I would think the Job No. and the Body number stamped in the wood by Fisher would be the more correct. Like Jimmy Hatton wrote concerning his 1928 convertible a few days ago, all the blank letter prefix body No. he has seen in Australia always have the stamped "C" in the wood for the Cleveland Body Plant.
Concern the C441 and 1AC1330 indicates this car was built the first week of production in December but must of had major engine problems and a new engine installed a few months later.
kenK

Ken,
Maybe the post I made a few days ago, quoted below, can add some more credibility for this car.


It is my understanding that many of the early production '29 engines had enough problems that they were replaced or had to be repaired by dealer mechanics. That is still a problem in todays world though not as often as in the past.

Ken: I have been checking job numbers and body numbers for years on the 1932's that I have run across and some of vehicles did not have a factory letter code in front of the body number on the cowl tag. I thought that it was odd when I discovered the first one, but since then I have seen a handful of 1930 through 1931 sedans, coupes and coaches that were lacking the factory letter code. The mystery as to why still continues.

Also, since a "C" was stamped on the wood cross member next to the body number why didn't Chevrolet also have the same "C" as part of the body number on the Fisher Cowl Tag? What was their thinking on this?

Guys,
There are certain lots of mysteries concerning Chevrolet serial numbers and casting numbers and why they did it that way? This is what makes it interesting and why I believe it is important to document all these numbers and letters in some logical format. This is what I have tried to do with the pre 25 Chevrolets, recording all the numbers I can get when I am checking out an early Chev 4. This helps in establishing trends and adverages. I even made car registration list for cars I was researching with an interest to purchase. So I had the car numbers and photos of all known 1912-3 Little Fours Ruabouts, 1918-9 Model D "EIGHTS," and Scripps-Booth Model C, D, and G Roadsters several years before I purchased each of these three cars. I should we should also try and get the title or license number which I find on the pre 25 cars to be incorrect about 20% of the time. I am very surprised no one has not collected the numbers on the 1929 Convertible Landau Sedans to date?
kenK

The early 1929's had no piston pin (wrist pin) bushing in the piston. The pin ran directly in the pistons cast iron surface. This caused the pins to wear rapidy and the pins to get noisy very fast. From what I understand they replaced the pistons with the late bushing style when the owners complained. Perhaps on the first cars they replaced the engines.

I was looking through a few back issues of the G&D from the '60s and refresh my memory a bit when I read that the then editor of the G&D - Duane Steele had purchase a 1929 Convertible Landau Sedan. Duane never mention what his Body number was but I found in the VCCA 1967 Roster [which was the last roster to list serials numbers] that Duane gave his car number as 5AC 21443. Duane also started a 1929 Convertible Landau Roster and asked for both VCCA and non members to join him in his quest! I wonder what ever happened to this Roster?
kenK

I found a video on You Tube that mybe can have some interest in this discussion .




Here can you see the Fisher Body tag , General motors of Canada,Job and Body no.

Is this where the 300 began???

I was sorting out some of my magazines and ran across this in the No,-Dec 1972 issue of "The Action Era Vehicle", the publication of the Comtemporary Historical Vehicle Assn.

Article "One Mans Chevy Treasure....Whats it All About" By Gene Davis. He was a VCCA member at that time but I believe he has passed on.
Mr. Davis says, "It has been estimated there were only about 300 of these models produced, but if any one knows for sure, I'd like to have them contact me."

Now it is his car that is pictured in "60 Years of Chevrolet" .
Under the picture of Mr. Davis and his 1929 Imperial Landau in "60 Years" is the caption "He has good reason to be proud of his car because the car is most rare, most unusual and most sought after Chevrolet. Approximately 300 were built" ......"Surprisingly, though only 300 were built, there are at least 16 still know to be in existence."

I believe this is where the 300 number began as so many articles have used information that was published in "60 Years" and the errors in that book have found their way into other publications.

Gene,
The "60 years of Chevrolet" is full of errors. Not only did a bunch of other authors use the erroneous "facts" but some even created other "statistics" based on what an owner (many trying to increase the value of their vehicle prior to sale) told them what they "believed". Once published a "fact" becomes extremely difficult to change. The longer the erroneous facts are unchallenged the more authors and authorities can cite "the preponderance of evidence" supporting their claims.

And the right people always belive the wrong thing....just like the interet today, and try to change their minds.

If 60 Years Of Chevy was quoting Mr. Davis, who told Mr. Davis?

I think it was the "sell an old car fairy" in Mr. Davis' sleep.

Along the lines of the serial numbers I asked the current owner of the only Imp Land Sedan in our region if I could submit his serial number. He does not have a computer and said that would be okay. The story goes that this car was restored by Dick Davies in 1959 using many NOS parts. The restoration is starting to show its age but runs and drives great. The body number is O 1879 with a vin of AC27347. This would indicate that many plants produced these bodies. I did not look up the engine serial number. Any comments?

Thanks for getting the body and serial numbers for us. That is some great information! I am familiar with the Dick Davies car and I have seen it several times.

The "O" in front of the body number would indicate the Oakland factory. Many of the other convertible landaus don't have a factory designation code letter in front of the body number, so that is what makes this body number so interesting. Also, since the body number on this car does have the factory designation code, that would help to indicate that the convertible landau body was made in other factories as you suggested.

The "1879" would indicate that this was the 1,879th convertible landau made in the Oakland factory.

The serial number of AC 27347 is not complete since the serial number should have a "6" (designating Oakland) in front of the "AC". Anyway, the "27347" means that the car was the 26,347th vehicle made in the Oakland factory in 1929 since the serial numbers started at 1,001.

Did you, by chance, happen to check out the job number to confirm that it was 8860?

Skip, Yes I looked to make sure it said 8860 on the fire wall tag. It was dark and I was using a flashlight so I did not see a 6 in front of the AC on the sill plate. Seems to me the AC was in large preformed letters and the actual number was stamped. My little 8880 coupe is stored over there so I may be up there again as the weather improves later this week. I was working on my water pump so we could take it on a tour Sunday but it was raining that morning so we had to take more modern iron.

Good going! Your information is extremely helpful, thanks for taking the time to check it out.

By the way, is that convertible landau Mike's car?

I would encourage you to look under the front seat to see what the body # prefix is stamped in the wood? C or O?
Also would like engine # and date code?
Notice the Convertible Lsndau in the San Fernando Region VCCA website under members car.
kenK

Hello, We ended up going to the beach that weekend since we had such wonderful weather. During the next work week I got sick so have not had the opportunity to go up to Mikes until today. The actual serial number on the wood cross-member was the same 1879 but the symbol in front of it was a deep V inside of a vertical rectangle, almost like an M with a bar across the bottom. Does this mean anything to you? The engine serial is 575811. I forgot to get the engine date code as we were supposed to meet some other friends to go to a plant nursery. I sure would like to know how many of these things are out there and were they made at all plants. Was there a Fisher Body plant near each one of the GM plants? That would mean Chev, Pontiac, Buick, Olds, Oakland, LaSalle, Cadillac etc. plants or did they have like six or seven and ship the bodies. If that is the case there would have to have been at least maybe 100,000 carpenters and at least double that many more helpers. Did they have a central woodworking plant in say Michigan where wood was plentiful, ship the machined wood to subassembly body plants and assemble them onto the bodies at the final assembly plant? The numbers and logistics are just mind blowing when you think that in 1929 Chevrolet manufactured 1,300,000 vehicles alone.

Well - this brings another surprise - a [M] stamp Fisher Body that came out of the Oakland, California Code 6 prefix Plant.
The [M] stamp in wood as the BODY No. prefix under the seat on the rear side of the seat heal board as been an almost 50 year mystery to me that I don't recall has ever been mention before.
The day I purchase my 1927 Capital AA Coupe on Thanksgiving weekend in 1962, and cleaning it up to check it out, did I first observe that the [M] prefix was stamp in the wood while the letter '0' was stamp (or imprinted) on the body plate on the firewall. So what Fsher Body Plant use this [M] code? I just do not know!

What I do know is the Fisher Body Oakland Plant was the smallest Assembly Plant in 1927 at 120,459 sq ft with Janesville Assembly Plant at 225,190 sq ft. Both these two plants were owned by the Fisher Body St. Louis Company which was a 776,900 sq ft that was a complete Body Plant The Flint Assembly Plant was 146,000 sq ft, the Tarrytown plant was 153,700 sq ft, and the Norwood was 190,000 sq ft. The last 3 plants were supplied by the Fisher manufacturing plants in Detroit with 5,114,954 sq ft and Cleveland at 1,451,248 sq ft.
It is possibe that the much larger St Louis supplied at time to time, "Body in White" to Oakland where the Oakland plant then finished the paint and interior. Then the [M] might stand for Misouri built Body in White?
kenK

Here is another surprise, and one that will help to support that the 1929 convertible landau was made in other factories.

I just received the following information from Dave Dawn who apparently owns Duane Steele's old 1929 convertible landau:

Serial number is 5AC21443, the Job Number is 8860 and the Body Number is K 481.

You will notice with the "K" Prefix in front of the body number that this vehicle was made in Kansas City, and it was the 481st convertible landau made in that factory.

Did you happen to ask David Dawn, as an owner of a Job No. 8860, and long time researcher of this Fisher body style, if he had a list or Roster of Job No. 8860?
As before. we should be interested in the prefix body plant code stamped in the heal board under the seat. I would like to see a photo image of this Job # stamped in the wood.
It is interesting to note that the St Louis plant was larger than the Oakland, Atlanta, and Kansas City plants combined - so we now need to always check under the seat for this stamped number.
kenK

Yes...I have already contacted Dave and asked him for that information. I will report back here when I receive it.

Just heard back from Dave Dawn and the body number is the same on the wood cross member in front of the seat, K 481. Also, the date stamped on door latches and window regulators is 5-29.

engine serial # on our conv landaue is 702655. mike mccagh

Based on your engine serial number it appears that your convertible landau was manufactured sometime around late May of 1929, which is a further indicator that this model was made to at least June of 1929.