Adelaide plant last FC production date

[fe350chev]

Wasn't there a strike that delayed the fb release. I thought it was supposed to be a 1959 release. It's code was based on it or something. I don't have time to look much atm. So based on all this, mine is probably a last week car. The numbers were quite high then. They must have been chugging along after Xmas full steam. They may not have anticipated the success of the fb. I grew up near the plant and at times they parked cars over the other side of the road on the raaf base side. It seemed to eb and flow a bit than one would think. All sorts of variables even transport strikes or shortages. As a production manager of noblett furniture, all I heard growing up was dad talking about end of production runs, Xmas and when to time new releases. So it was a case of sales first at shop, managing turnarounds abd deadlines expected from office managers and the poor production line managers dealing with the shit they caused up the line. Hence they always needed good projections of data when busy. Everything was coded.

[FE_UTE]

Ken I have the numbers for my FE Ute, may be of some use

Engine casting Jan 8 1958        No. L422766
Gearbox casting Nov 28 1957   No. L424668
Build date Feb 1958

[Dr_Terry]

Hi

Re the last fc produced in 1959, I would like to know what was the last chassis, engine or head built in Adelaide or destined for Adelaide before introduction of the next cars in 1960. Roughly how many days turnaround was it for an engine to be built then transported to Adelaide to be put in an Adelaide body? My head is 18 December which would make my fc one of the last by the time it was assembled and shipped etc. The 24th was Thursday so with 18th being a Friday, once cooled and assembled, must have been a last week in December car before the plant knocked off For Xmas.

I would think that the last FC 132.5 head or block casting would've been made AFTER the last FC car was built. GM-H had to build (& then stockpile) more motors than cars for spare parts, warranty replacements & industrial engine supply, prior to the FB 138 ci motor coming online.

Dr Terry

[fe350chev]

Yeah I agree.

[mcl1959]

Yes, but all motors built after the last one built for installation in a production line car had no engine numbers stamped on them. They would be stored with a 740..... Part number.
New replacement engines had no stamped number and were stamped by the local police station. This is where the VP and NP blocks come from.
There would have been many hundreds of these built after the last FC ran down the line.
I would think Gary's set of engine and gearbox numbers would be typical of most cars built around that era.



Ken

[mcl1959]

Dean, notwithstanding all the various delays, shortages etc, the numbers are what I go by.
Here is how I came to your date.
The highest chassis number I have for SA is FC18929A. We will assume this car was built on the last day of 1959. So if the FC was in production for 20 months (approx). This is equivalent to 600 days. 18929/600 = 36.7 cars per day. This is conservative towards the end as production increased over the life of the FC but let's go with it.
18929 minus your car (18495) = 434
So 434 / 36.7 = 11.8 days. This means your car was made at a minimum 12 days from the end of the year which is the 19th. Less a couple of days for Christmas gives the 17th
You can see all the assumptions I have made are all towards the conservative end so if anything your car would be even earlier than the date I have come up with.

Ken

Ken

[fe350chev]

So, why does the taxi have such a late designated casting date for an "l prefix" gearbox? I must check I got it right lol.

[mcl1959]

It doesn't really add up. A gearbox casting date of mid to late December can't make its way into a car built in mid December. The code L169 can look very like L168 on a casting.

Ken

[fe350chev]

Ok I'll check again. It's very hard to read so I'll wire buff it later. Thanks.

[fe350chev]

Re my 12th Feb post above, the gearbox pulled from taxi is L635590. I don't care about the fe. But I have been working on the fc cos it's home (in 39 degrees mind you 😏) and it's def this number. Can you recheck that's the number you checked originally. Thanks.

For your authenticity here's the chassis number pic.