Inline Tube - Details of Restoration
Getting down to the details.
When restoring a car we have all seen the articles on recovering seats, trunk paint, and engine detailing but in this article we are going in deep. This article is about the final detailing of any concourse restoration. I am talking about all the tags, paint dabs, chalk markings and inspection marks.
When you car came down the assembly line it started out as thousands of parts. These parts had to be identified to the assembly line worker. There are many ways this was done: color, tags, parts in bins, and markings. After 35 years most of these identifying marks are covered with dirt, road grime, and usually some rust. If you have a car from the east coast the rain, snow, and salt has diminished the visibility of any of these markings. If your car is from the west coast you have a much better chance of finding some of the original markings.
This identification and inspection process of labels, tags, and marks has been around since your were able to pick the options you wanted on your car. First came the assembly line, then came mistakes and not long after came inspectors making sure the job was done right. Next time you are passing the new car dealer ship stop in and take a look under a few cars. The process is the same today replaced by bar codes tags but you will still see plenty of paint dabs and grease pencil markings.
Lets not forget the master blueprint for your car the build sheet. We have all ripped apart our cars looking for this gem. It could be simply under the back seat, or the door panel, under the gas tank, the package tray, under the carpet or anywhere the factory worker tossed it. Some assembly plants did not want the sheets discarded in the cars and others could of cared less. In most of the muscle cars I have owned I have found nothing, but my brand new truck had it taped to the bottom of the body. A friend of mine has found as many as three copies in his Chevelle under the seat, door panel and carpet. Some guys have all the luck. The build sheet worth nothing yet it proves the authenticity and tells the entire build history on the car. It is the finger print to your car, but of course it is in code. Every little box has a letter code. If you read the shock box there will be a 2 letter code. There might have been 20 different shocks depending on performance or comfort. This code would appear in the form of a white tag with rounded corners and black letters on the body of the shock.
The factory worker would read the build sheet and put on the matching parts. All parts or assemblies that made up an option or changed due to an option would have had a tag on them. You could have had a steering column that was the standard column shift or a floor shift, tilt on the floor or tilt on the column. The steering wheel could have been the standard wheel or a sport wheel. The tag or bin box matched the build sheet and identified the part to the worker. Most of the parts in the build boxes had tags. These parts included springs, shocks, brake & fuel lines, booster assemblies, battery cables, and frames etc. The tags were usually different size colored paper that had the part number and the 2 letter code.
Another form of marking is grease pencil and paint dabs. When your frame moved down the assembly line a worker marked up the frame so the next guy would know where to bolt on the parts. If you look at the engine cross member there are multiple holes for the different engines offered that year. Different engine mount locations were grease marked before the engine was installed. There are many holes on the frame for brake and fuel lines. Not all the holes were used. The same frame was used on all A-bodies but GTO ran the fuel line on the driver side of the car and Chevelle ran on the passenger side of the car so the inspector marked which holes to use. This was common for transmission cross mounts, exhaust, bumpers, etc. Paint dabs are usually seen anywhere important bolts have been tightened down. The marks are on all suspension bolts, calipers, drums, gear boxes etc.
This is one area of the restoration where you have to think like the worker and put marks where you think they should be placed. When the part was tagged it could have been anywhere on the part most of the time not even visible. So keep in mind when detailing it is better to not see all the marks in clear view.
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Only original once
Original cars are very rare but a gold mind for original details. This 6000 mile
cutlass has a brake booster with large green and blue inspection marks and a
small one at the number tag on the top of the booster. This booster is gold in
color with the WK on the front face. The master cylinder has the correct
bleeders and you can see it was painted black and all the machined surfaces are
bare metal. The cap is gold and the bail is silver and again has the tag on it.
The most interesting part of the assembly is the Master cylinder brake lines.
They have black paint on them because before the body was on the car the line
worker was instructed to black out the frame. As a rolling chassis the black
paint was applied to everything from the axle to the brake lines, fuel lines,
cables hoses, and anything else in the path of the gun.
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Only original once
This
is another great shot - you can see all the belts and hoses. All the rubber
hoses have ink stamps and are ribbed. Some hoses have color stripes. The number
of ribs described the type of hose it was and the 2 letter coded again linked it
back to the build sheet. All the belts are the smooth type again with the part
number and manufacture stamping and in some cases the date code. The hose clamps
are the tower style and a few in the front of the engine are painted over gold,
so they were installed before engine paint. The oil fill tube is silver zinc and
was put in after the engine was painted. The paper tag on the fill tube denotes
the engine to the assembly line worker and this is checked off the build sheet.
The pump to the carburetor fuel line still has the tin coating and the gold zinc
fitting.
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A Closer look
The throttle cable has a white tag with black letters. There was different cables for different engines and carburetors. The wiper motor pump is surprisingly white and bright. The wiper ground strap is copper and again all the hoses are ribbed . At the top of the booster is that small blue mark again and you can see the number stamped into the tag on the booster. Not all the boosters are the same and this number matches it to this car.
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The air cleaner is a gloss black while the fire wall is much duller. There is also plenty of bare spots where paint is over sprayed or missed completely. The top edge of the fire wall is usually missed as you can see in the photo. The exterior of the car was no different, you can see a big huge run in the inner fender paint. This car has tons of runs and bare spots. The engine color also has plenty of stains from leaking fluids. These cars leaked from the factory but no one noticed until it reached the ground and left a spot. The hood hinges are phosphate, and the radiator is medium black. All these parts came from different manufactures and were painted with different shades of black. It is not uncommon to have frame parts in all different shades of black and even plenty of bare parts.
1969 GTO engine
This is a
low mile 1969 GTO has all the details. Detail tags, striped hoses, plated and
painted parts, overspray shades of black and all the correct hardware. Every
time I find a car like this at a show I take hundreds of pictures. What a great
reference and all free information.
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The original trunk spatter paint is unmatched by any aftermarket product. The paint is a oil based paint that has different color spatters but the spatters are perfectly round like fish eyes. The painter at the factory could have a heavy spray or a light spray depending on the guy behind the gun. Sometimes there is no spray under the trunk matt. The spray stops below the hinge but behind the hinge there is no paint. The trunk weather strip has the white and orange mark to center the strip, the joint is at the trunk latch. The rear seat is viewed through the hole in the rear firewall and you can see the springs are natural and seat backing is like new. The wiring is hanging down and has a tag to define the type of harness.
Inspection Marks
From the factory there were plenty of hands on your car and inspectors were making sure the job was done right. The blue HH and the Yellow N are 2 different inspectors. There is a third mark next to the yellow mark was wiped off , maybe the job was not done yet. The firewall has plenty of dimples for different options. Also any hole in the firewall had a grommet and the messy spray on tar like undercoating. This is around the heater box, throttle cable, fuse block and any other opening. The heater box is gloss and the firewall is semi black.
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Over spray
Body overspray was everywhere. There was never a tape line on a factory car, maybe a controlled spray, but no hard line. Paint is expensive and was not wasted on areas you did not see, so the firewall and the bottom of the hood and inside of the doors could be primed, black or e-coat. The bottom of the car also had plenty of overspray that over ran the body panels. This over spray could not of been on the frame or suspension because it was not under the car yet.
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The Junk Yard
The best place to research detail is the auto wrecking yard. We have all said it one mans junk is another's treasure. What a huge collection of un-restored gems with thousands of details just sitting in the sun.
Sources:
Inline Tube - Brake & Fuel Lines
15066 Technology Drive
Shelby Twp, MI 48315
(586) 532-1338
