1969 M22 breakdown of Quantities

[hihorse]

Why do you think ECL codes should ever be posted?

[bcmiller]

Because 99.99% of people would never need them.

[KurtS]

And they would just help fake documents.

[jdv69z]

Just because I'm curious, what you are saying is that you have a list of all the ECL codes, but you only know what some of them mean or how they apply? That is, only some of them have been decoded? And I get the idea of them as a useful tool against fake paper work. Kind of like trim tags were at one point.

[william]

They have another use: production totals.

Chevrolet apparently summarized each of them for a report but did it at the end of September '69. Maybe IT was not aware production was to continue into November. The report only lists them when ordered as a distinct option. Some options were standard equipment with others. CE1 Headlight Washer was a "rare" option; only 116 ordered. But CE1 was included with Z22 Rally-Sport; 37,773 built. M11 floor shift control was included with D55.

Another potential problem is how the query was run. In an earlier post here I mentioned Canadian Shipping Records. They list all kinds of things not seen on shipper copies, window stickers or invoices. For example, data on cars ordered with J52 Power Front Disc brakes also lists J50 Power Brakes. Does that mean the J50 total of 82,890 includes the 34,932 J52 total? Don't know.

Canadian docs for COPOs lists L78 in addition to 9560 & 9561. It is possible the long-standing L78 production total of 4,889 includes both COPOs.

[bcmiller]

Great questions William! I wish we had ALL of the answers.

[fsc66]

Options included with other packages: Just using logic I do not think the options that are included within other packages are being considered in the totals. I believe these options show totals only as stand alone options. The reason I feel this way is that each individual ECL code has it's own total, then those are summed up to give us the total for that particular option. When these same options I.e. C14 are included within other packages, they don't have an assigned ECL code, therefore I do not think they are included. Perhaps somewhere there is a total for production of an option that would include both stand alone and when it was part of another package.
Maybe we can test some of these and prove this out one way or another based on different reports showing totals??

Paul

[william]

They are definitely not included; Chevy likely built 37,889 Camaros with headlight washers. CE1 does not appear anywhere on docs for RS. Same with V32-12,369 as an option but included on 20,302 Z/28s. The ZL2 hood was included with COPOs 9560 & 9561 and is probably not included in the 10,026 option total.

Another screwy thing Chevy did was use M40MA for both TH350 & TH400 applications. So much for sorting on that one.

Without a lot more paperwork, don't see much progress here.

[HOT3O2]

Would they have used different ECL codes at the Van Nuys plant vs the Norwood plant?

[william]

I have a lot of 1969 ordering information and there is no mention of 'CA only' or 'n/a CA' as there was in later years. At this time I haven't seen any powertrain ECLs in CA docs not also seen at Norwood. There is a Z22 ECL only seen on a Van Nuys doc but that doesn't mean it wasn't possible at Norwood.

By the late '70s some cars intended for operation in CA could only have certain engines, transmissions and axle ratios. I believe for 1980 Corvettes sold there were all 305 automatics. The dark days for sure.

Great question! 

[mikea]

"Does that mean the J50 total of 82,890 includes the 34,932 J52 total"

I see the J52 total as 67,231 on the option sheet. William?

Thanks.

[william]

The option production totals came from plant build records. The record for each car listed, by internal code, how the car was configured in production. It is not the same as order configuration.

The only known surviving '60s build records are for cars shipped to Canada. A long time ago, GM Canada would send a copy of the page your car was on in addition to the letter. They stopped the practice many years ago, possibly because key codes were displayed. In the two records shown, the 1st car was built only with J50 Power Brakes. The next car, a Camaro SS, lists J50 and J52 even though it was included with Camaro SS equipment [Z27AA5].

When all this was tallied at the end of production, 82,890 cars were built with J50, 67,231 were built with both. The 67,231 total includes 34,932 Camaro SS.

Sure would be nice to have the complete, original report.

[firstgenaddict]

ECL's are an entertaining field... I have been researching them in relation to the ZL2, U17, G84 performance ratios and N34 steering wheels... I have also studied them regarding the u69 and it's ecls in relation to other interior appointments.