Subject:
Van Nuys suppliers and timelines for parts delivery.
Curiosity has finally hit me after a long thought about how Van Nuys received GM parts from its suppliers.
I briefly asked Kurt about the subject and suggests there were many suppliers to GM.
I'll start, for example, as I have a 1969 VN Camaro.
Could multiple suppliers provide the same parts installed from different regions.
I thought about the driveline parts.
I read an article stating that train cars carried parts from distances.
I suppose we could break it all down to year by year & model to model; but for now, the beginning of my discussion lies on 67-69 Camaros.
So we see both plants :
Van Nuys & Norwood plants.
Just to single out just my car for the moment, I'm finishing up some dates and timelines of parts installed.
What has crossed my mind is, is there any chance that delays of parts arriving could dictate a wider variance of installed dates versus Norwood built cars?
My desire is to ask for contributions of known issues and thoughts to present here in order to help define more of what happened during each years' assembly runs.
Thx
When I started working at the Van Nuys Plant in 1978, I was told that it cost $400 per vehicle more to produce a car when compared to the Norwood Plant due to the cost of shipping parts to the West Coast. Most of the parts were shipped by rail in box cars, although the front sub-frames manufactured by Checker Motors wtere stacked on open rail cars. Whenever possible, GM would buy parts from local suppliers and the one that I remember was Western Wheel. While the time to transport engines from Flint, MI to Norwood, OH would be shorter than shipping them to Van Nuys, CA, the time difference would be measured in a few days. We closely watched our transportation charges and our Material Department would often challenge premium freight charges if it was the supplier's fault due to their production problems. Even though the Van Nuys Plant was over 100 acres, there wasn't a lot of storage, so most components arrived close to the scheduled vehicle production date. I remember having to go out and inventory critical items at 4:30 am (the Van Nuys 1st shift started at 6.12 am) and fortunately only had to do this a couple of times.
High Priority Rail was surprisingly FAST.
Auto Mfr. Paid for premium services. Do NOT let a Dime hold up a dollar.
Van Nuys Assembly Plant
Good Reading Related to (LOS) [VN]
Link
https://splives.org/blue-streak-merchandise-bsm/
Yes, LOS is farther from most suppliers than NOR. But Logistics just compensated by adding a couple of days to the shipping time.
Many parts had multiple suppliers, which added more flexibility.
I remember when GM had to charter a 747 freighter to send engines from Michigan to Van Nuys as it was determined it was cheaper to pay the shipping charges rather than stop the assembly line. After a year, the divisions were still debating who was going to pay for the shipping charges!
We were launching a new starter and they helicoptered the parts to the airport rather than truck them. After the first time, they painted helicopter landing lines out in the parking lot.
You really don't want to be the supplier that shuts down the assembly plant....
I'm curious to ask what majority of parts and their manufacturers were anchored in the east to Midwest.
For example, my car uses the YJ rims.
Were all supplied by one manufacturer?
Curious as to how GM determines how they selected distribution.
I suppose that my engine arrived from Tonawanda via rail?
I'm curious as to painting a picture as to how my car was built.
Fascinating to me on how all this came together.
Quote from: 169INDY on December 14, 2025, 07:43:08 PMHigh Priority Rail was surprisingly fast.
Van Nuys Assembly Plant
Good Reading Related to (LOS) [VN]
Link
https://splives.org/blue-streak-merchandise-bsm/
Interesting read.
Thanks for that.
Will try to stay on topic with this but another thought came to mind.
So, both plants have assembly lines.
How much prior scheduling did the 2 plants prepare for in relations to amount of vehicles built per day/week?
Then I'll add in special build orders and ,
for example :
fitting in the corporate requests for the PaceCar builds; or any others that apply?
I'm going to guess the other inclusions for these possibly modified supply deliveries?
The scheduler made sure that the parts were on-site to build the cars. If they were going to be short YH rally wheels, he would contact the supplier and/or shipper and have them expedited. If they were actually short the parts, then he would move the Z28's to later in the schedule when the wheels would be available. This applied to all parts - blue seatbacks, vigilite cables, brake pads, 3.31 posi axles, you name it, the scheduler monitored the inventory levels.
He also knew if a corporate order was hot or not and the volume required and scheduled accordingly.
What a pressure packed position!
Putting smaller commonly used items aside (ex: hardware, paint, wiring, etc...) how were the larger components like engines, transmissions and differentials stocked? Was there on-sight inventory or did GM adopt a just-in-time inventory delivery by then.
Mike
Having spent a chunk of my working life in supply chain, here's my 2ยข.
Planning starts very early, at the top. Marketing determines how many Camaros the plant will build for the MY. From that a Master Schedule is developed: Coupes, convertibles, base drivetrains. Some common options like A/C, power steering, are also easy to predict. From this, tooling capacity for parts common to all models are determined. Tooling capacity is mostly fixed; there's always overtime. That gets expensive and if not carefully planned can run the line dry later in the week. So there has to be inventory (safety stock) to cover; both at the source and in-plant. Inventory is a double-edged sword. Great when you need it, a waste of resources when you don't. Plant Managers were graded on obsolete inventory at the end of a model run.
For parts used on all builds, suppliers get the Master Scheule a few weeks out and produces accordingly: 3,000 frames this week, 4,000 next week. Drive train plants do the same; every week they ship base and probably a few common options in the quantities Marketing predicted. Since all this stuff takes up valuable space, Production Scheduling has to ensure they consume it. Dealers were encouraged and reminded to order their inventory accordingly.
Some suppliers of common parts are required to be within a certain distance from the plant. I recall John Z mentioning that fuel tanks for Van Nuys were produced there, as were jacks certainly other components. Drive train components were not, VN had to maintain a larger inventory to cover. For 02A VN Z/28s the engine date to final assembly gap is 10-18 days; at Norwood it's about a week. One or two days is not unusual.
Optional equipment was definitely a problem. Hard to predict and once locked into tooling capacity, nearly impossible to change. November 1968 Chevy stopped taking Z/28 orders as 302 engine production through the end of 1968 was spoken for. If an option was well under it's take rate, dealers were strongly encouraged to order it. When John De Lorean took over as Chevrolet GM, one of his first edicts was to discontinue any option with a take rate of less than 5%.
You should try to find his book, "On a Clear Day You Can See General Motors." Much of Chevrolet's trouble was due in large part to excessive low volume options and poor production planning. One example mentioned in his book is 2,720 possible combinations for the 1969 Camaro dash cluster. I have been able to get to that number but believe it has an error. Actual number is probably 1,880. By 1972, there were only 96.
...and that's why we keep Bill around. ;)
Van Nuys started using the just-in-time (JIT) inventory system when producing the 3rd generation Camaro/Firebird. Due to the initial high demand, the plant was producing vehicles on two nine hour shifts daily. As part of the JIT system, critical item reports were produced each day and due to the additional computer programs, we only had a 1 1/2 hour window to complete all of our processing. The actual production report was transmitted using a phone modem. The first thing I would ask each morning was whether the production report was sent to Corporate as the executive committee reviewed GM daily vehicle production as part of their set agenda.