Quote:
Originally Posted by 64woodwheel
I did some more digging and found another letter, basically just a reiteration of the topics of the first letter. It does clearly state the reflex lens will soon be moved to the inboard end.
I still think this was a misunderstanding on Mr. Roberts' part. I think Mr. Roberts was anticipating the possibility of the bulbs being in the wrong location when the cars arrived at the dealers and was informing the General Service Manager, Mr. Bates. Mr. Bates in turn disseminated the information down the line.
Since the change is described as happening "soon" that indicates to me there was more involved than swapping lens location left to right. If that had panned out could you imagine the confusion in the MPC listing for left and right lenses? It would have to read either lens could be used for left or right depending on when it was built, etc. That was not the case. New molds were made, (with the reflex in the center position) and existing inventory of the old L/R lenses presumably would have been used up or saved for service replacements.
So back to the original question. The only evidence I can find indicates that the change occurred "soon" after Oct. 21, 1963. I have combed through all of my references and these two letters are the only mention of it. It's too bad the '64 assembly manual is still in hiding.
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Chad, pic is too small, very tough to read and no zoom feature. Can you attach as a jpeg directly here?
You didn't comment to the evidence I gave.
If this new document dated 10/21/63 also says the reflex lens would be moved from OUTBOARD (as seen in the pic I posted) to INBOARD (as assembled on my late Nov car) soon, why do you think Mr. Roberts got it wrong?
I understand what you mean for the MPC.
BUT...there is picture evidence of an early car with OUTBOARD reflex lenses and actual evidence of my car & I think Bill's car with INBOARD reflex lenses.
The change of reflex lens position from OUTBOARD to INBOARD is noted in the two documents that you've found.
So evidence exists that the change which you think might have been confusing in the MPC actually DID pan out. At least I'm convinced that it did based on actual evidence.
We can speculate that the early LAMP ASSEMBLIES were either assembled wrong or that they simply decided to reverse the reflex positions for the reasons suggested earlier (llaw required it or somebody thought it would look better). Unlikely they would have tried to address an assembly mistake (if that is what it was) on early production cars in the MPC.
No actual evidence has contradicted Mr. Roberts.
The evidence actually supports him.
Joe B, might be useful to know how your NOS lenses are marked.
Did some searching, found this:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1964-Pontiac...p2047675.l2557
The p/ns match to the MPC listing for the 1st type lenses, 5955621 for LH and 5955622 for RH. But the seller states both lenses are identical and marked "STDB 64".
At first, I suspected he had boxes for the 1st style but 2nd style lenses, taking him at his word that the lenses are "identical".
But I decided to pull out BOTH my Lamp Assemblies just to check.
Turns out, mine are marked the SAME as he says these are marked.
There is NO Right and Left marking on the lenses. Perhaps there is a marking on the backside of the lens, but nothing external that I saw when installed in the lamp assembly.
So they are NOT really identical, reflex sections are at opposite ends.
But the choice to reverse them side to side would be a no brainer.
And yes, there would be the potential for confusing them in production of the lamp assemblies. For service, it would have been a problem for anybody replacing just one lens, as it depended on whether the originals used the OUTBOARD or INBOARD installation.
My guess, PMD ignored that problem. For the rare case where the "wrong" one was supplied, either it could be swapped or more likely, nobody noticed if you had one OUTBOARD reflector and one INBOARD reflector after a repair.
I am 95% sure my lamp assemblies are original and so are the lenses in them. No indication they've ever been taken apart.
Regardless of whether Mr. Roberts was correct or mistaken, seems to me the 2nd type lens did not enter production until after my car. I realize this may have been a transitional change and actual initial installations of the 2nd style lens might have varied by Plant.
But I don't think we have found enough evidence to say even approximately when the 2nd style lenses started to appear.
And unless contradictory evidence is found, I'm convinced the 1st style lenses were still correct at least a month after the 10/21/63 document. Gotta believe the 2nd style lenses would have entered production a lot earlier than late Nov. if they were already being prepared for release when the 9/26/63 letter was written.
I just can't agree that Mr. Roberts was most likely misunderstanding the issue.
If anything, I would think Mr. Bates was slow in disseminating the info he got from Mr. Roberts. His idea of "soon be moved" might have been flawed. That change may already have been accomplished around 9/26/63 when Mr. Roberts stated "at the present time", doubt that it took 4 weeks or more to accomplish reversal of the lens positions.
I agree that the primary service intent at that point was to confirm that the single filament bulbs were in the appropriate location regardless of whether the reflex section was INBOARD or OUTBOARD.
It is easy to imagine that
if the lenses were crossed up as an early production error, PMD may very well have decided to simply solve the problem by changing bulb socket positions at the dealer level, for which I doubt they reimbursed the dealer.
If they had decided to have the dealer swap the lenses around instead, they surely would have had to pay for the dealer labor.
Rather than speculate back and forth, what we really need is actual evidence.
Just need to tell us whether the lens is INBOARD, OUTBOARD, or CENTER, Plant where assembled, and the build date of the car per the Data Plate would be easiest way to try and pin down the approx date of introduction of the 2nd style lens.