1970 L-78 Engine Code & Car Vin # Question

[YENKO DEUCE REGISTRY]

I am not sure on the '2' in question. The VIN starts with the '1' above, the '0' being the year, the first '2' after that dontes the model??
M

[CamarosRus]

El Camino, To further my education did all 1970 Willow Run, MI Nova VIN's start with the number 2 ?? Alan Colvins book reads to me like Chevelles and Nova VIN's started with the # 1 and Camaros started with the # 5 in 1970. Somebody else said Willow Run stamped VIN's on the deck so I'm inclined to go with the Nova theory.
I also have in my garage a Sept(assy date) CKO engine with VIN stamped on BELLHOUSING FLANGE 10 1xxxxx.....anyway where a letter should have been struck for the car factory, it didnt strike the metal hard enough to read. Might this CKO engine been from a Chevelle????

[JoeC]

ElCamino - Thanks for your input. I believe you are correct that it is a Nova L78. I disagree that the digit 2 is "just" a sequence and does not indicate any model information. The first digit of the sequence number can be different for different models. For example the 1970 Nova VIN sequence begins 100001 the 1970 Camaro begins 500001 and 1970 Monte Carlo built in Arlington begins 200001. That made the "2" digit look odd. The vin W274985 is the 174985 Nova built but the engine date code is February. I thought that also looked odd because of such a high VIN number until I looked up the total production units of 1970 Nova's. Willow Run built over 307000 Novas. That's a lot of Novas. I guess this car being the 174985 unit built could have had a February engine date since it would have been assembled during a little over half the production year.

[JoeC]

CamarosRus - According to my books the 70 Nova vin sequence started with W100001 and went all the way up to W4xxxxx. Your other CKO block with the 1xxxxx sequence no. could be a Chevelle, Nova, Chev/Pass, or Monte Carlo (built in plant other then Arlington). You may be able to rule out the Nova if it is true that Willow Run only used the block deck vin number pad.

[elcamino]

I stand by answer!! It is a Nova Engine, no doubt what so ever for me!!

As for the other engine being Chevelle I can't say just by where the VIN code is stamped allthough Camaro plants were doing this before others but it appeared to be to speed operations because engine accessories were having to be removed to stamp the code on some models. As you can see from the image there were quite a few assembly plants putting cars together. They did not always do things in harmony. The reason for stamping the VIn code on the rough surface was to prevent theft (called the cop VIN). For someone to alter the VIn they would have to disturb the rough surface and would be a dead give away of tampering.

274985 is just a sequence number, i.e. the last 6 digits from the Nova's VIN. It has no reference to the car line what so ever, the books are not always right, they very often changed the methods because of sellin more cars than predicted. Just because that 2 does not agree you cannot throw out the other code meanings. The VIN code on the engine is in a diffferent form that on the VIN tag and title.

Here's what my book says on the Engine numbers.

I scanned in some info about this, take a look and print it out (it will gone soon). I had to cram the info onto one sheet to make is easy for me.

www.synthetic-oil.com/images/70.jpg


[Edited by elcamino (01-26-2001 at 08:33 AM).]

[YENKO DEUCE REGISTRY]

JoeC;
I have also read Colvin's book regarding decoding the engine stamping, and also think that the first digit of the last six should start with a '1' to denote the Nova line.

I agree with both you and Elcamino, the Willow Run plant only built Novas in '69/'70 to my knowledge, so the engine is out of a Nova. The last six digits probably started off with a 100001. By the 4th week of May when the '70 COPO Novas started production, the last six digits are in the '348900' range, and the COPO run ends with the last six digits in the '370900'. The 175 Yenko Novas and the 2 Canadian COPO Novas are sprinkled throughout this range of approximately 22,000 VIN's.

As for the VIN stamping location, I have never seen a Nova VIN stamping anywhere else but the cylinder pad. All original engined Yenko Novas have the VIN stamped on the pad. I cannot speak for Camaros, Chevelles ect, but the Novas seem very consistent with this location.

Marlin

[Steven J]

According to information from another reliable source, it's a 1970 Nova with a full VIN of 114270W274985.