Quote:
Originally Posted by William
When the quarter panel tooling for the 1970 Camaro failed, Norwood had to scramble to keep '69s in production. Exactly when this became known isn't clear. Through about 09A Z/28s mostly had June/July dated transmissions. Starting 09C, May dated transmissions show up. It appears that at some point, surplus Muncie transmissions were rounded up from other assembly plants and shipped to Norwood. I have another 10E Z/28 with the same date as yours; another has a trans dated May 7. Same for COPOs. Know of a 10A car with a May 23 trans.
Muncie still produced 1969 model year trans for Norwood [P9R; mostly October dates] but there are a few like yours with much earlier dates.
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The entire basis for the 1971 Camaro being advanced to 1970 was based entirely on the draft proposed rule making then contained in the pending 1970 FVMS 208 "Occupant Crash Protection", the original draft then set for a January 1970 revision as promulgated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).
As a courtesy to the manufacturers the circulation of draft rule-making distributed for comment is normal, and in this case NHTSA pulled a fast one creating regulatory conditions that caused GM to kill the 1969 body style way ahead of schedule.
Adding inury to insult - NHTSA proceeded to then redact the draft FVMS 208 rule-making significantly and also delayed it until nearly 1971-taking the very conditions causing GM to kill the gen 1 car early completely off the table.
Discussed in Echoes of Norwood on pages 134-135 and on 139-140.
Attached are research excerpts from three different dates and three different newspapers all reporting that the 1971 cars were actually being advanced to 1970 production.