Hi Guys,Your the experts and really need your help, first line, 04A 217172 540364 Someone Stamped a 2 in the corner...2nd line ST 68-13837 BF 11482 BODY...3rd line TR 765 158 PP PAINT...VIN 138378Z142XXX Thanks in advance,Dan

Built first week of April 1968 (Happy 36th birthday!) in Fremont, CA.

1968 Chevelle SS396 2-door Sport Coupe, unit number 11482 -- '82' being two of the digits you 'X'ed out on the VIN you posted.

Black imitation leather interior bench seat.

Original paint was 'Seafrost Green' -- actually, it's kinda steel gray -- with no vinyl top (yes!). Nice color.

Seems that ERTL makes a perfect model of your car as it appeared originally:

http://www.mikerian.com/Ertl/images/32494.jpg

Pvt.Cowboy,Thanks,Yes it's 765 then space 158. What does BF mean? Do you have a 2 Stamped in the upper right hand corner,this is stamped in not raised up like all the other numbers,thinking maybe it was stamped later,like maybe the dealership did it,does it make sense?? How do you know if a 68 had vinyl roof,what codes? Thanks.......Dan

I edited the post to give the correct interior info. Sorry about the delay.

I don't know what that stamped-in '2' signifies.

Your car is from the San Francisco Bay area. 'BF' is the Fremont California plant. Just a short drive south of where I live across the Dumbarton Bridge .

The vinyl top codes were 'AA' and 'BB' (white and black) right before where you see 'PAINT' on your cowl tag. Your 'PP' means that the roof and body were both Seafrost Green.

That color looks really cool on a steel topped car, I think. There's a member here who did a total restoration of a Seafrost Green car. Just awesome. I sure don't see any green tint at all -- GM must have named it that because the marketing weasels thought that calling it 'Gray' wouldn't sell cars. Basically, your car is/was gun metal gray. That's boss.

I believe the -158 interior means it had the Buick interior.

Cowboy I have to add on the Vinyl top codes.
My car and mild68ss's car as seen in the tag pic below are Black V-top cars and have the code as body color first denoted by a letter and a number 2 denoting the Black V-top a 1 would be for the white Vinyl top.
http://www.chevelles.com/showroom/mild68ss/Buickcodetrimtag.jpg

Here is a page from www.chevellestuff.com (http://www.chevellestuff.com) put together by one of opur TC members with paint info:
http://www.chevellestuff.com/68velle/68paint.htm

Also pics of the Buick interior can be seen in mild68ss's showroom:
http://www.chevelles.com/showroom/mild68ss/

Is that model from ERTL a diecast? Or is it a plastic build kit?

Originally posted by ACE841:
I believe the -158 interior means it had the Buick interior.

Cowboy I have to add on the Vinyl top codes.
My car and mild68ss's car as seen in the tag pic below are Black V-top cars and have the code as body color first denoted by a letter and a number 2 denoting the Black V-top a 1 would be for the white Vinyl top.
http://www.chevelles.com/showroom/mild68ss/Buickcodetrimtag.jpg

Here is a page from www.chevellestuff.com (http://www.chevellestuff.com) put together by one of opur TC members with paint info:
http://www.chevellestuff.com/68velle/68paint.htm

Also pics of the Buick interior can be seen in mild68ss's showroom:
http://www.chevelles.com/showroom/mild68ss/ Dowp! Thanks :D

The vinyl top codes were 'AA' and 'BB' (white and black) right before where you see 'PAINT' on your cowl tag. Your 'PP' means that the roof and body were both Seafrost Green.

As was noted before, the vinyl top codes are -1 & -2 for white or black. My car is a P-2--Seafrost Green w/black top.

I sure don't see any green tint at all -- GM must have named it that because the marketing weasels thought that calling it 'Gray' wouldn't [/QB]It's interesting that in the material I got from the GM restoration group that GM called the color "Silver Green" in the Exterior-Interior Color Specification pages. I guess that "Seafrost" sounded better to the marketing guys. If you park the car on green grass with green bushes behind it and squint your eyes just right, you MIGHT see a hint of green in the color. Otherwise, it's a medium gray. ;)
BL

[QUOTE]www.chevellestuff.com (http://www.chevellestuff.com) put together by one of opur TC members with paint info:
http://www.chevellestuff.com/68velle/68paint.htm
The paint chip there doesn't really look like the car. Look at
www.chevelles.com/showroom/Ark68SS (http://www.chevelles.com/showroom/Ark68SS)

BL

Originally posted by 68Baldwin:
Hi Guys,Your the experts and really need your help, first line, 04A 217172 540364 Someone Stamped a 2 in the corner...2nd line ST 68-13837 BF 11482 BODY...3rd line TR 765 158 PP PAINT...VIN 138378Z142XXX Thanks in advance,Dan Most has been answered in one way or another, but...
04A ~ April, 1st week
217172 540364 ~ tracking codes of little significance unless you can find the paper they were associated with. Then, they only prove the paperwork goes with that car.
BF ~ Fremont, CA
11482 ~ Fisher Body unit number. NOT associated with the VIN in any way. This is the number assigned to the body when GM ordered the car to be built. Generally (and only generally) body numbers are progressive throughout a model year, but that's not always the case. A car may be a 'XXX Customer Order' car and/or may get pulled from the line before final assembly causing the body numbers to be out of sequence with the date.
TR 765 158 ~ Buick replacement interior. April of 68 seemed to be a short month for Chevelle interiors and this is the first example I've seen of one at Fremont. I have several from KC and Baltimore with Buick interior codes and even one Oldsmobile. The 765 is the Chevelle number for Black Imitation Leather bench seat and 158 the Buick equivalent.
PP ~ lower body color and upper body color. In this case, as mentioned, Seafrost Green. I'm sure GM literature had many names, but this is what the color is called in my GM Parts book. Vinyl tops would either have '1' or 'A' for white and '2' or 'B' for black, such as 'P B' or 'P 2'.

The VIN:
1 ~ Chevrolet (make)
38 ~ SS396 (series)
37 ~ 2-dr sport coupe (model)
8 ~ 1968 production
Z ~ Fremont, CA
142xxx ~ Sequential production number beginning with 100001.

If you could take a picture of the body plate (trim tag), I'd like to use it on my ChevelleStuff (http://www.chevellestuff.com/index.htm) site as an example that Fremont also ran out of Chevelle interiors in mid-year production. FWIW, I'd say the bench seat is probably more 'rare' (although I hate that word) than the bucket seat models...fewer probably survived.

The color is really tough to photograph and still show the green tint but here's a real 68 SS in Seafrost Green (http://www.chevellestuff.com/68velle/gallery/p_seafrost_green_bill_lessenberry.jpg) and they really are more silver/gray than green.

Originally posted by Ark68SS:

The paint chip there doesn't really look like the car. You're right there! You know how hard it is to come up with a 6 character hex code for a color that doesn't look like itself anyway? :D