Lynch Road Quality Control

[Aero426]

I have been looking for this photo for a couple years, and finally found it in the mess that is my basement.    I am going to post it before it vanishes into the abyss again.    This is the firewall of a 28k mile original paint Superbird.  The Lynch Road workers left a special message written in seam sealer visible once the engine was removed.   I've never seen anything else like it.

[Ghoste]

Wow, some UAW "brother" was having a bad day huh?

[WINGIN IT]

I'm more curious to know why the message is upside down.
Were the body shells inverted and some point during the building process?

[terrible one]

Ha! Wow. That beats someone signing "Jo" on the inside of my upper door pad!

[Indygenerallee]

  Thats hilarious, my Grandfather owned a Dodge, Chrysler, Plymouth dealership from 1965-1991 and I have been told NUMEROUS stories about crap that came off the car hauler, his service manager was a great mechanic and as a young boy I shadowed him and learned a LOT of my car knowledge from him lot's of little tricks! Anyway he told me once they had car believe he said it was a 67 Belvedere and he said it had a rattle in it going down the road and it went through all the techs and nobody could figure it out, they finally pin pointed the noise was coming from the transmission so they pulled it out and tore it apart and he said in the tailshaft housing they found a bolt that had a paper tag that read "ha ha finally found me". Gramps said they would get cars in and half the firewall would not be painted, rockers he said it was a regular mess. Good ol' late 60's early 70's QC!!

[tan top]

Thats hilarious, my Grandfather owned a Dodge, Chrysler, Plymouth dealership from 1965-1991 and I have been told NUMEROUS stories about crap that came off the car hauler, his service manager was a great mechanic and as a young boy I shadowed him and learned a LOT of my car knowledge from him lot's of little tricks! Anyway he told me once they had car believe he said it was a 67 Belvedere and he said it had a rattle in it going down the road and it went through all the techs and nobody could figure it out, they finally pin pointed the noise was coming from the transmission so they pulled it out and tore it apart and he said in the tailshaft housing they found a bolt that had a paper tag that read "ha ha finally found me". Gramps said they would get cars in and half the firewall would not be painted, rockers he said it was a regular mess. Good ol' late 60's early 70's QC!!

  thats funny , but anoying for the guys trying to find it 

[62 Max]

Probably in union contract negotiations !

[odcics2]

I guess it would be hard to find a "rattling" bolt in a tail shaft.  You'd have to be driving over some very severe bumps to get enough chassis motion past the rubber trans insulators to do that...

[RallyeMike]

Good thing it photographed so it can be reproduced in excruciating detail in the restoration.

[TUFCAT]

some cursive was learned before dropping out of 8th grade...  

[odcics2]

Be nice guys: Fred Schrandt and the late Larry Knowlton were UAW members.  Don't just lump everyone in a class is all I'm saying... 

[Ghoste]

As a former autoworker myself I have few unpopular thoughts on the subject.  Setting that aside for the moment, you can't really call the photo in question an example of good workmanship.

[hemigeno]

I'm more curious to know why the message is upside down.
Were the body shells inverted and some point during the building process?

To my knowledge, no - the shell was not inverted once the body started taking shape.  Maybe at the unibody frame stage, but I don't think it was past that point.

My guess is that the message was written on the firewall before it was joined to the cowl and floor pan sections, when it was simply a contoured/stamped sheet of semi-flat metal.  That's just a guess though.  The writing would have been covered in paint later in the build process, and it looks to me like the paint just flaked off over the years.

[Indygenerallee]

I think your right Stuart, I can see it now as the parts went on down the line or the next area the guy that wrote this must have had a beef with the guy next in line!!!

[Magnumcharger]

Or, the guy was in the car, applying seam sealer, and he leaned out through the front windsheild opening (before dash and glass installation), over the cowl and wrote his message.

The drivetrain incuding the engine, transmission and front K member along with the suspension would have been underneath as the body was dropped down on it. Perhaps it was a message to a buddy down in the engine installation line?

Just a thought.

[CornDogsCharger]

Or, the guy was in the car, applying seam sealer, and he leaned out through the front windsheild opening (before dash and glass installation), over the cowl and wrote his message.

The drivetrain incuding the engine, transmission and front K member along with the suspension would have been underneath as the body was dropped down on it. Perhaps it was a message to a buddy down in the engine installation line?

Just a thought.

That's just what i was going to say.  It would be very easy to do from inside the vehicle leaning out of the windshield opening.

Justin
"CornDog"

[Ghoste]

It could have also been a message for a supervisor or qc inspector.  Or even just some guy with a real poor outlook and it was a message for us all.

[odcics2]

Or maybe mad at the plant manager for pushing the line speed well beyond quality capabilities, just so he can get his HUGE bonus check for total units produced. 

[Ghoste]

I don't know maybe.  Then again I suppose he had time to do that so he couldn't have been too busy.

[404NOTFOUND]

Maybe it was a message for anyone who would dare to remove the numbers matching engine. The message may have even come from the car itself. Sort of like the girls stomach in the movie "The Exorcist".

[resq302]

Thats just too funny.  I agree though that it probably was written when the windshield had not been installed yet.