Real 1953 #029

[53 Blue Flame]

Well, I just got back from the NCRS Winter Regional. What a treat it was to inspect the real #029. It was so nice to meet the owner. What a nice lady. She was very appreciative of the NCRS and everyone else involved. NCRS awarded her a Certificate of Appreciation for displaying the REAL #029 for everyone to inspect and admire.

The car has an original, hand laid, one piece floor pan, among other unique characteristics. Much different than a later production press molded floor pan. It was believed that only about the first 25 or so cars had this characteristic. There were also some other pieces that are different than any other 53's I have seen. There were about 12 family members there for the weekend. The owner also provided documentation back to the mid 60's.

Ken Kayser and I conducted an informational session saturday afternoon about the history and characterisitics of the Flint assembled cars and in particular, #029. "Hats off" to Ken for his contributions to this story.

The owner and myself.

The owners family

 

[Tom Bryant]

Brett,

Thanks for posting the pictures. Looks like you had better weather than we did in AZ.

 

[Golden53]

The car has an original one piece floor pan, among other unique characteristics. It was believed that only about 25 or so cars had this characteristic. There were also some other pieces that are different than any other 53's I have seen. There were about 12 family members there for the weekend. The owner also provided documentation back to the mid 60's.

Brett-

Neat pics.

I am intrigued by your one piece floor pan comment above. I know you have come across both jig assembled and one piece floor pans in your 1953 restoration work. And I freely admit that I know very little about the varying body production techniques used during 1953. But I thought that the one piece floor pans started to pop up mid to late 1953 (my 53 #276 is jig assembled). Were you surprised by the one piece nature of Florida #029? Other than Fl #029, what is the earliest one piece floor pan that you have seen?

You also mention other seeing other differences in Fl #029 - that's a teaser comment. So, uh, what else did you see? Any pics?

Thanks,

Russ

 

[53 Blue Flame]

Brett-

Neat pics.

I am intrigued by your one piece floor pan comment above. I know you have come across both jig assembled and one piece floor pans in your 1953 restoration work. And I freely admit that I know very little about the varying body production techniques used during 1953. But I thought that the one piece floor pans started to pop up mid to late 1953 (my 53 #276 is jig assembled). Were you surprised by the one piece nature of Florida #029? Other than Fl #029, what is the earliest one piece floor pan that you have seen?

You also mention other seeing other differences in Fl #029 - that's a teaser comment. So, uh, what else did you see? Any pics?

Thanks,

Russ

Hi Russ. The later cars have a press molded floor pan that is not jig assembled. These later floor pans are not what we would call a one piece floor pan when compared to the first 30 cars or so. I would characterize the later cars as having a smooth floor pan (not jig assembled) and not made of 1044 cloth. Press molded.

The first (29???) or so cars had a CLOTH one piece floor pan that was very stiff and caused the door gaps to be almost impossible to close. It was hand laid. These floors were actually cut at the factory by a saw in order to gap the doors properly. #029 has such a floor pan.

There were some trim pieces that were completely different than anything that I had seen. I will let the restorers at J&M post pics of these items with the owners permission.

 

[Golden53]

Hi Russ. The later cars have a press molded floor pan that is not jig assembled. These later floor pans are not what we would call a one piece floor pan.

The first (29???) or so cars had a CLOTH one piece floor pan that was very stiff and caused the door gaps to be almost impossible to close. It was hand laid. These floors were actually cut at the factory by a saw in order to gap the doors properly. #029 has such a floor pan.

There were some trim pieces that were completely different than anything that I had seen. I will let the restorers at J&M post pics of these items with the owners permission.

Wow - learn something new every day. Thanks.

I wanna make sure I have this right...

Based on your description above, the earliest floors were hand-laid one piece affairs, so that one side would be relatively smooth and the other side would show cloth completely? I assume the bottom of the pan was smooth, while the cockpit side of the pan was rough with cloth?

After the first run of one piece inflexible floor pan cars, GM went largely to a jig assembled approach - maybe involving both hand laid and vacuum bag produced pieces. Thus, you would see some smoothing of the pieces produced by the bag method. But you would also see evidence of the pieces put together, especially in the trunk area, which consistently shows heavy cloth usage along the seams of the rear wheel wells and a 9 inch cloth piece that runs from side to side of the spare tire carrier.

Mid to late in 1953, GM started introducing press molded floor pans that were smooth on both sides (and you wouldn't see cloth).

I know that GM was doing a great deal of testing during 1953, and that manufacturing techniques evolved pretty quickly. Thus, the body for one 53 can look different than the body of the next 53 produced. But is the above basically accurate as a general rule?

Thanks again,

Russ

 

[53 Blue Flame]

The trend that you described would be pretty accurate as a TREND in the manufacturing techniques during the 53 production run, in my humble opinion. It's important for me to say that only the people who manufactured the cars in Flint actually know 100% because they were there. We weren't. I can only speak from what I have encountered restoring these cars.

Being that automobile manufacturing with fiberglass was in it's infancy, there were very few hardfast rules and cutoffs with certain characteristics and body construction techniques.

 

[53 Blue Flame]

Wow - learn something new every day. Thanks.

I wanna make sure I have this right...

Based on your description above, the earliest floors were hand-laid one piece affairs, so that one side would be relatively smooth and the other side would show cloth completely? I assume the bottom of the pan was smooth, while the cockpit side of the pan was rough with cloth?

Both sides of the early one piece hand laid floor pans do show cloth on both sides. A car as early as the real #029 could also show each framework of the hood, decklid and trunklid was made of cloth, not matt.

 

[Golden53]

Thanks Brett. I really appreciate your insights on this.

After thinking about your comments, I decided to hunt down the Steve Koss article on early Corvette bodies in the NCRS Restorer (Vol 14, Number 3, 1988). For those who don't recognize the name, Mr. Koss worked in the GM Parts Fab Section for 30 years, including the early 1950s. Mr. Koss was very active in the NCRS later in life, and supplied Noland Adams with a fair amount of pictures and insights for his books. Here is what Mr. Koss had to say about one piece floor pans and jig assembled floor pans (the dates are in 1953):

Fascinating stuff. As Brett indicated above, GM moved away from the one piece floor pans early in the 1953 run and went to a jig assembled approach into 1954. Based on Brett's experience and this article, MFG apparently started making the die pressed floor pans late in 1953 and did not ramp up production enough to meet demand until May 1954. Just when MFG ramped up production, GM of course told MFG to slow way down, given the lack of customer interest in the 53-54 Corvettes.

Russ

 

[53 Blue Flame]

Good stuff, Russ. I have the Koss training video of the jigged floor pan construction. I need to get a copy of the Restorer article.

NOTE
Also, Russ, thanks for the copy of the Koss article. Your V-V articles were sent yesteday.

Thanks
Brett

 

[vettefinderjim]

Congrat's to all

It is such a pleasure to see this coverage of this early car being discussed here on CAC. The Corvette hobby is very well. Ken, Russ, and Brett, thank you. I wish I was in Florida last weekend.

Arizona Auction Circus always grabs me as it is so close. Tom and I fought off the 100mph winds.

kEEP UP THE GOOD WORK !
Regards,
Jim Gessner

 

[53 Blue Flame]

It was nice meeting you at Carlisle last August, Jim.