I am new to this site and this is my first posting so hopefully it is in the correct location, etc.
About 20 years ago I purchased a black 70 LS6 El Camino down in Horseheads, NY and when I pulled it onto the trailer, it started to break in half from rust eating the frame thru. After getting it home, I tried to track down the original block (most of the remaining drivetrain parts were there; the original owner rebuilt the M22 in 72 and at the same time decided to freshen the motor, which unfortunately he did by buying a 72 service block that was coincidentally cast on Feb 29, 1972) to no avail.

After a few years, my wife was on me about the rusting hulk in the back yard, so I took all the remaining drivetrain parts and sold them thru swap sheets, as I remember the LS6 distributor went to a guy doing a rag LS6 in Mass, the M22 went to a street rod and the 12 bolt 3.73 went to a street racer, etc, etc.
Most of the car was then junked except for the cab which I towed to a friends back forty probably 15 years ago. I just recently found all my original paperwork for this car with the first 2 or 3 owners' names & last known phone #'s, a registration, a build sheet from 2 or three VIN's away (all I could figure at the time was that someone working on the line, built up several identical black seats in advance for several cars and stuffed the wrong build sheet into them before busting out for an early liquid lunch (I used to work at Flint V8 plant in the 80's and remember the long lunches). Also have some notes of what the original owner rebuilt when he damaged the original M22 internals as well as several leads on who purchased the worn original block over by the Finger Lakes.

Anyways (sorry about the long post), I have been away from the Chevelles/Caminos for 15+ years and was wondering if there is any service similar to the ones available for certain year Mustangs and Mopars where original invoices are available for El Caminos from this era. I have been unable to locate a similar service for El Caminos on the internet, but am hoping I am missing something. I need to go thru my paperwork, but if I remember correct, the car was built in Baltimore. At one time, I had the name of the original selling dealer and hopefully will find that again as I go thru my file cabinets. Any help in finding/purchasing a copy of the original invoice or protector plate would be fantastic and may justify trying to resurrect this beast although I fear it is too far gone. Any advice or leads on this documentation would be appreciated. I plan on getting over to my friends house and going up in the woods to see what is left of the cab; at that time I can record data off of the firewall tag if that would help.

There is something called GMarchive or GMmediaarchive where original invoices can be purchased for $50. I'm not sure if they go back to 70, except for Cadillac.

Thanks for the tip, just searched it and found it only goes back to mid to late 70's. Close, but no cigar. The link is http://www.gmmediaarchive.com/# if anyone else is interested. Thanks again.

There are no records before 1977 UNLESS the car was built in Canada. But it appears no LS6s' were because of all the owners who have them that were sold in Canada, they all were imported from the USA, Baltimore Assembly. Also it appears no El Camino's were built in Canada till at least the 1972 model year.


GM of Canada has records on all cars built or imported into Canada. They are not original invoices but shipping and import records with most all info about the vehicle including options. But invoices, build sheets do not exist anymore, they were never kept till because at that time there was not way to condense the records.

This article appeared in the National Corvette Restorer Society's "The Corvette Restorer" magazine, Volume twenty-seven, number three, Winter 2001 issue. It's an excellent article with insight into the existence of, or lack there of, Corvette build records etc, written by a retired GM employee.




Terry McManmon has asked me to write this for The Corvette Restorer with the intention that it may put to rest some, if not all, of the speculation about the Corvette build records. I worked for GM for 37 years and retired November 1, 1999; 24 years were at Chevrolet Engineering and the rest for GM Legal Staff. During this time, I became an expert on GM records, especially the Corvette, as it was my primary research vehicle. I therefore can speak with some authority on the subject.

About four years ago, Jim Perkins, then General Manager of Chevrolet Motor Division, put me and another employee on a Special Assignment to search anywhere and everywhere within GM for the Corvette and Camaro build records that have been so sought after. We spent two months searching the bowels of GM including dusty old warehouses, assembly plants, GMAC, financial departments, accounting departments and many other departments within GM that we thought might have a remote chance of having such documents. We also searched outside GM storage facilities such as Leonard Brothers Archives in Detroit and the Boyers storage facility in Pennsylvania that contained GM data. This was an all encompassing, no holds barred, search that Mr. Perkins authorized. We used his name and position to gain access to various departments. The departments then queried their employees and searched their files and reported to us. Since the request was from the boss, they responded thoroughly and promptly. We then followed up on any promising leads.

The results of our search will not please the Corvette world (and didn't please us either) as we were NOT able to locate the Mother Lode!!! We did find a few production records (about 2 1/2 years worth), not build sheets, back to mid-year 1976. GM already had (has) them back to about 1978.
Although the Corvette was and still is, a low production vehicle, the Engineering Records (of which the build records are just one) were NOT kept separately from other Chevrolet vehicles lines, i.e. Camaro, Corvair, trucks, etc. Chevrolet produced more vehicles than all the other GM divisions combined, and therefore generated a much higher volume of records which were a storage problem.
After final year production, the build records have very little business value to Chevrolet and therefore were not considered to be high priority for retention. GM record retention policy required the assembly plants to retain said documents for only about six months. Some records (including build sheets) were retained longer at the Corvette assembly plants, St. Louis and Flint. However, when Corvette production ceased at these locations, the records were pitched. It should be noted that the current Corvette Assembly Plant in Bowling Green, KY, retained the 1981 - present vehicle manifests that are available now through the NCM (http://www.corvettemuseum.com/). This was against all odds, as there were many movements over the years within GM to destroy them because they had no business value to GM.

Meanwhile, back at the Tech Center in Warren, Michigan, the Chevrolet Engineering Records Retention Policy called for periodic destruction of non-essential records, of which the build documents were one, and this was carried out on a routine basis. The other GM divisions, Cadillac, Pontiac, etc., had much smaller production volumes and interpreted the GM Records Retention Policy differently and therefore retained said documents.
GM Legal Staff did not and does not dictate the retention period of documents. GM has a procedure manual which outlines retention periods for various documents. GM Legal Staff does require retention of specific documents that are involved in litigation, but that concludes as the litigation ends.
Art Armstrong
NCRS Member #14981
NCM Founding Member #1268

Owner and restorer (frame-off restoration) of a 1965 L76 Roadster

P.S. I don't have my Corvette's build records either!!!