1967 Camaro assembly line

[Keith Seymore]

One other thought relative to moving all these vehicles around:

For those of you familiar with the UAW and the plant structure you know there are multiple jobs and job classifications. For example, there is an "assembler" classification with an associated rate of pay, and then maybe a "utility assembler" classification for a few pennies more an hour, on up through repair and skilled trades. Advancement through these non-skilled designations is based solely upon seniority.

One of those classifications is "driver". So - there are a particular set of people (and pay rate) whose sole function is to drive the vehicle off the end of the line, perform the roll test, shuttle the vehicle to the various short repair lines inside the building, and/or shuttle vehicle between locations outside the plant.

The assembly line would be scheduled to run a particular time period in advance (say 8 hours, or 10 hours, or 11 hours) but could spontaneously be increased (or decreased) to meet the immediate need. For example, final might go "8.0" but trim might go "8.2" or "8.5" in order to re-fill any buffers that had been depleted throughout the shift. Cab shop might go "9.0" that day for the same reason. The change would be communicated through shouts up and down the line, often before the foreman would receive the official news by phone.

After running all day teams would be assigned to work overtime, after the line shut down, to work the repair down. Often times it felt like a punitive measure, especially if it had been a tough day with a lot of repair. Hourly volunteers would be solicited to drive out back, for overtime pay and at the (typically higher) driver pay rate, and foremen would take turns in an attempt to spread the load out.

I say all this to say: you might work a scheduled 11 hour day, then get tapped to work another hour or two out back working repair. Then go home, sleep, and come back in the next day to do it all again.

K