Shat R Proof Front windshield with no DOT?

[JohnZ]

So would your back lite have been replaced at one point? (since it is dated march, and you say your car came off the line in February)

Nope. The guys at the glass plant jumped the gun to the March logo by a couple of days.

[JohnZ]

however it is my understanding that it was not possible for an after market supplier to install glass by hand manually as it was done inside the factory with a machine. 

I don't know why this issue keeps coming up or how it got started, but it's incorrect. Windshields and backlites were installed manually in the plant (two guys with suction-cup grippers for each glass), just like the replacement guys used in the glass shops. Machines/robots weren't used successfully to install fixed glass in production until MANY years later.

[69Z28-RS]

So would your back lite have been replaced at one point? (since it is dated march, and you say your car came off the line in February)

Nope. The guys at the glass plant jumped the gun to the March logo by a couple of days.

OR.. maybe John..  your car got built/finished late?   Do you know the date of production based on your VIN?  or from GM docs?   It *could be* that even with a 02D scheduled week, your car wasn't built until the early days of March...

[firstgenaddict]

His shipping date is in Feb.

 
"I don't know why this issue keeps coming up or how it got started, but it's incorrect. Windshields and backlites were installed manually in the plant (two guys with suction-cup grippers for each glass), just like the replacement guys used in the glass shops. Machines/robots weren't used successfully to install fixed glass in production until MANY years later."

I stand corrected... probably started by the replacement glass companies which is where I heard it years ago.

John, was the "dam" material READILY/EASILY available to after market installers at the time?
&
If so how common was it for outside glass installers to use the "dam"?

[rick 67]

 Can't find the link to the TRI 5 discussion.   Also talked to our plant Quality guy (and glass guru today) and am emailing the pics to him but some pics of the 55 with with both logos would be a big help. He will forward this to a guy out of Rossford that he says knows all things LOF glass.    Just an observation but the second logo looks painted to me.

Rick

[JohnZ]

OR.. maybe John..  your car got built/finished late?   Do you know the date of production based on your VIN?  or from GM docs?   It *could be* that even with a 02D scheduled week, your car wasn't built until the early days of March...

The NCRS data shows it came off the line on February 27th, and the Canadian docs show it was shipped on February 28th.

[JohnZ]

John, was the "dam" material READILY/EASILY available to after market installers at the time?
&
If so how common was it for outside glass installers to use the "dam"?

We received the extruded "dam" material on 200- or 300-foot spools (it took about 18 feet per windshield); our application gun applied hot-melt glue to the fabric-reinforced side of the dam as it was applied to the (cleaned and primed) glass. I have no idea when the dam material became available to the aftermarket.

[69Z28-RS]

So would your back lite have been replaced at one point? (since it is dated march, and you say your car came off the line in February)

Nope. The guys at the glass plant jumped the gun to the March logo by a couple of days.

John,  are you aware of other situations where the glass plants 'jumped the gun' on their dates by a week or more - which it seems would have been required in the case you cite..  Was this a common occurrence in the plants that the date codes didn't mean anything?  .. if so, it sorta makes all these games we play with 'dates' meaningless....

[rick 67]

 Well I am probably going to jump into some DO DO again. Normative practice and required by GM is to have a "3 week supply" of finished glass in the system. Up to 12 weeks close to our labor contract expiring. In theory that works well in practice eh not. So GM makes 20 thousand Camaros a month  A tempering furnace can make 8 thousand backlites in 24 hours. They run the sidelites and rear quarters as double lines ( both side lites at the same time, both rear quarters at the same time) So doing the math that is approx. 8 furnace days a month. so obviously lots of other windows for other cars and trucks are made on that furnace during the month. I have stated in a thread on Team Camaro that its possible for later year production models to have all 8 (67) or 6 (68,69) different date codes on a car with all original glass. Our date codes were not "required" by GM to match their production dates.
So the date code serves two purposes.
So here is what happens. At the load end the furnace was hand loaded. Rack of glass is pushed up ready to load. The ticket on the rack is recorded date time and MONOGRAM and date code verified. Loader picks a piece of glass sets it on the monogram machine where the monogram is sandblasted onto the lite and loads it onto the front conveyor and does this 400-500 times and hour depending on part size. Glass goes through the furnace pressed quenched (tempered) run through a lighted inspection area Monogram verified again. Then picked off the end of the line by another inspector onto a size fixture checked and passed onto a packer who packs 165 into a rack or smaller parts 330 into a double rack. During this time the furnace operator twice an hour pulls a piece checks size and verifies the Monogram and date code again. Once every two hours the Quality assurance guy comes along pulls a piece checks size and verifies Monogram and date code again. After each rack is full the rack guy DATE STAMPS and signs a shipping ticket affixes it to the rack does it up and sets it aside. Every few hours the shift foreman comes along checks each rack for various things checks the Monogram and date code and signs the shipping ticket. The quality assurance guy also did this. 
  So that is a lot of Monogram and date code checks. Why?
 For GM it was so we could track quality problems right to the hour they occurred so if we were in a quality sort position we could from the time stamped on the shipping ticket backward and forward through other stamped racks to quarantine the glass for further inspection.
 For safety its a legal requirement for us to have the date code on it also for tracking purposes if there was an accident where someone is suing us because of glass failure (its been tried, but never successful that I know of)
 So yes the date codes are all there for a reason.
So could a March date coded backlite get into a late Feb build ?  Yes it could ! Very unlikely and improbable but it could and has happened.
Normative practice was at midnight of the last day of the month the old date monogram was removed and the next months date was put in and recorded.
 Go back to the 3 week supply statement and how much glass that can be run in a month. If the last "scheduled backlite" run on the furnace was mid feb. and  the next early march. After the mid feb run all leftover monograms would be destroyed and the Lab guy would start making the March ones. Well some unforeseen problem comes up and we have to get glass to GM toot sweet or shut the plant down (not a good thing) Emergency furnace changeover run a couple hundred backlites to keep them going. Oh problem no Feb Coded monograms. Because of all the checks we do as long as the glass is documented on all those reports plus the shift report and a report from our head of quality so it can be tracked back to actual day and hour of run on the furnace it is acceptable and legal.
  Did all this happen in Rossford that last week of February in 1969 ? there is no way of knowing unless a few more show up. All of the above I know because I did most of the jobs on a furnace that cam from Rossford  using all the same procedures that Rossford used.

 Next another fallacy ! We never ever shipped matched sets of date coded glass to GM. Glass is installed at very different areas of a car plant to try and track a set of glass to these areas would be impossible. Anyone with an early first week of the month build date more than likely has glass date coded the previous month, 2nd week you might get one of them dated the previous month. 3rd and 4th week builds probably have all that months coded glass. But a piece can still come from a previous month if it was set aside for repair and then repaired and packed into the next months run or even the month after run !
 

[69Z28-RS]

That's an interesting explanation of how it *might* have happened, Rick..  but I'm unaware of a final user ever requiring a 'date code' on such a part;  the date codes are ONLY for the use of the plant making the item, for the purpose of determining problems in their production and nothing else I'm aware of.

so a plant making new items (glass or ??) in mid February, and dating it March...  would seem to put it all out of whack?    Now, having said that, and realizing that glass dates are ONLY for the month and year..  perhaps a week or two 'variation' doesn't really matter in glass production?

Note:   On original Chevrolet cars, it is NOT unusual to see glass that varies by several months (earlier) on a car, but I personally have never seen an original glass dated AFTER a cars production.   That several month variation comes not from the variation in the supplier shipments, but generally from how the assembly plant handles their incoming inventory.. (as has been said many times before, 'it ain't bread'.. and doesn't need to be rotated FIFO...).. 

[rick 67]

The date code is 99% for us. Its just if some defect comes up at GM or another Auto maker we supply for them to be able to set aside and contain the spill quickly before more get into cars (costs us a ton of money when that happens). So the two things they look at are the shipping date of the shipping ticket and the date code on the glass. Then we send guys there to sort or worse they hire an outside company. Either way shit rolls down hill.
No I was talking an emergency situation say 27th of feb we get a call from gm someone screwed up and we need glass asap or you will shut our plant down. We have a certain amount of time to get the glass there or the shutdown cost is billed to us. So you are talking big effin scramble. THIS DOES HAPPEN !! Monogram date is mainly for us, at that point GM could care less about a date code. So they put the first ten off in rack load it our plant van rushed to Oshawa where he can drive the thing right to the windshield station with minutes to spare for production on the 27th.  IT CAN AND DOES HAPPEN  not often but I have seen it. Now the stars have to be in alignment at the end of the month but yeah it can happen but its still very unlikely.
 Now here is something everyone should know. Parking lot hot day someone's backlite pops. Not as common nowadays as all backlites have a finished edge, Back in the day when the edge was just seamed with a wet 80 grit seaming belt it was very common. Tempered glass can break at any time hot or cold if it has an edge defect in it. So backlite pops right out in the parking lot of the factory and replacedthere or in transit and is replaced at  the dealer.

 Now along with the date code we also put "which run of the month it is" on the glass denoted by from one to 5 dots. Windshields are getting more complicated The jeep Liberty has 11 different part#'s off of the same glass along with heads up display "HUD", acoustic plastic rain sensors and combinations of them all.The Camaro with HUD and acoustic vinyl.
 All I am saying is its possible unlikely but possible and only for a very short run> Not a normal circumstance

 

[rick 67]

 And lets add heated wipers and satellite antennae (onstar) to the mix of 11 and still the occasional windshield gets in the wrong rack (wrist slap BAD BAD Collingwood PILKINTON)
 So what we need is a few more 02D built cars with original march backlites to confirm if this may have happened. If it turns out there is only one then I would say doubtful !

[firstgenaddict]

I can only imagine what it would cost you (a company) to shut down the assembly line...
I had deals with in the packaging industry where it would cost me 2000/hour if I kept presses waiting for paperboard.

[KurtS]

We helicoptered parts from our plant to the assembly plant. Still cheaper than shutting them down....

[rick 67]

Back in the day we pretty much supplied Oshawa car and truck plants in Ontario. Less than a 2 hour drive and Ste Therese in Quebec about 4 hours. Now we don't have much of that with Oshawa shutting down and Ste Therese gone. 7 car plants in Ontario all within 2 hours and we only have 2% of the business. Gee we even ship to Brazil ! Honda Allliston car and van plants are only 30 miles away and we have none of it. Apparently a Chinese company got the Civic contract and are building a glass plant in OHIO.