Hey all , I'm from Wisconsin and about 9 years ago I aquired my 72 CS surprised at the condition it was in for being from WI...( I should have some Pic's by tomorrow , cause I know you guys love PIC'S... ) The previous owner told me it was built in CA which makes sense cause there was very little rust , and I found to identity tags , one under back seat and one under carpet. The carpet one said it was straight out of Compton CA... I dont remember if the other one listed a city or not , but there are a couple of things that alarmed me...The bolts on the tranny are all loose and I could of twisted the bolts off of the exhaust manifolds by hand practically , they were so loose, also the engine block seems to be orange under all that sludge and the valve covers are blue. The Engine Casting # that I found to the right of the oil fill tube in big numbers was 395558 with a bigger 2 next to those numbers , I couldnt find any other numbers anywhere. I looked in the tech link and im a little confused yet. I beleive according to that it is a 68-70 motor , it does seem to have a little more power than any other old & tired 350 I ever had before. It was originally orange and was painted once from original the same color , but now its a primmer charcoal color. I seemed to have put the rust at bay for now by blasting the pockets in the trunk with a low powered sand blast and I applied metal ready which is some kind of acid ( phosphoric or something ) and finishing with POR-15. I also got tired of the ripped up seats so I installed the seats from a 68 Toronado that I parted out The seats are in good shape , no rips . If you ever tried that before in 90 degree heat , let me tell you it was fun. I had to kind of mangle the footing flanges and add a plate on each foot of the seat in order to make it line up. The back seat looks awesome with that speaker in the middle of the seat and how the seat flares out on the sides , but now only my kids can sit back there because there isnt enough room for an adult LOL. I also converted from single exhaust to dual. Anyone looking for baige Toronado interior parts I have almost everything from the interior and its all in good shape , including the dash with cluster gauges and have front bumper in good shape too with marker and blinker lights on bumper. I also have the supposed 400 HP 455 in my moms garage with 60,000 on the rebuild that I want to maybe put in the Cutlass. There is way more to say , but for now ...signing off.

 

It's not where the car was built, but where it lived. A car could have been built in any of the factories where that model was made and sold most anywhere in the country. The fact that your car probably LIVED in California its whole life is what matters. If the previous owner could document THAT, then you would have something.

 

If it has a Z in the VIN it was built at the Fremont, CA assembly plant. I'm guessing you saw a Compton, CA dealership on the build sheet as the one taking delivery on this car when it was new. Gotta love the dry western cars. If you have a fairly rust-free car of that vintage in Wisconsin, that's pretty good evidence that it didn't spend many winters there.
Terry

 

Nice story - looking forward to the pics.
The 395558 2 is the same block number on the original 350 in my '72. For 72, the 350 should have been painted gold.
What heads do you have? It is possible they could be different.
Also, a character in the VIN number will tell you where the car was built.

I think learing about the car's hidden secrets is part of the fun of this hobby!

 

This is my 1st restoration attempt , ive done alot of work on cars , but never tried to restore a car before.....so im learning as i go........The vin # has a "K" in it , and as soon as I can figure out how to put pic's on here they will be uploaded in a min....Heeeeeelp I have pic's transfered to my puter , but have not yet figured out how to get them on here

 

What's the entire VIN? There are several places in a 1972 Olds VIN that could have a letter. There are 13 characters overall. The second one is a letter indicating the series. With your car being a Cutlass Supreme, this character should be a J. If it's a K, it means you have a Vista Cruiser.

The fifth character indicates the engine, and a K indicates a 350 V-8. The 7th character indicates the assembly plant, and a K would indicated Leeds (Kansas City), Missouri. If your car were built in California, the 7th character would have to be a C for Southgate, L for Van Nuys, or Z for Fremont. I don't know that Cutlass Supremes were built at all of these plants. I doubt they were. But those were the possibilities for any Olds built that year according to the VIN decoder I'm looking at.

 

3j57k2z106564

 

Cool. You do have a California car. That VIN says specifically a 1972 Cutlass Supreme 2-door (Holiday) hardtop with a 350 4-bbl built at Fremont.

 

Wow , thats great , thanks for the info....now its just a matter of figuring out the picture thing...

 

This is not difficult. If you have the photos in digital form somewhere on your computer, then, when you're composing a message, scroll down the page a bit and look under "Additional Options." There's a button in the middle to "Manage Attachments." Click on that and a window opens allowing you to upload up to five images. You have to know what directory they're in and how to navigate to it. These will appear as thumbnails when you post your message, and people can click on them to see the full-size image.

 

I tried all that , and the upload fails everytime no matter what I tried. The pictures were succesfully loaded in my computer and I was looking at them too.

 

When you reply make sure you are in “Advanced” If it says post a “Quick reply” hit “Advanced”

Scroll down below the box you type in and hit “ Manage Attachments” A new box will pop up.

Hit “Browse”

The hit “Upload” and wait a few secs for the pics to up load. Then close this box.
Next you can hit “Preview Post and your pictures should be there.

There is a size limit on pics

 

jaunty's right. It's where your car lived. My car was built in Lansing and after 33 years "look ma, original body panels"

DSC_4165.jpg

DSC_3985.jpg

DSC_3979.jpg

 

Yea Jamesbo , I tried what you said on the pictures and it told me it could not proceed because of missing security measure or something and said to contact an Admin to correct it. When I tried to upload just one pic in advance it gave me the upload error again....442Much nice ride, yea those panels are in real good shape , once I get the pic thing solved ill show you my panel lol.....I got the block # off of my 455 from the 68 Toronado and it is.....396021 F....lol I seen the F and thought of those big block heads that cost a fortune to buy.

 

If your pictures are over 1.5 MB in size, then uploading will fail. You will need a photo editor to shrink them down.
I set my camera to take pics on the average of 1MB, so they will always upload without tweaking them.

 

ahhh, I thought they were the right size , but that has to be it , thanks in advance

 

 

phpL5qZZUPM.jpgphpK0D1sxPM.jpg

 

Welcome to CO Bry!

 

.....You do have a California car. That VIN says specifically a 1972 Cutlass Supreme 2-door (Holiday) hardtop with a 350 4-bbl built at Fremont.


Just like mine, lol!! Welcome to our site, by the way!!

 

phpbbHv9kPM.jpgphpq8Ae8NPM.jpgphpWLAIp5PM.jpg

Damage on front fender from someone trying to get hubcaps off with tire iron , the trunk had small dent and after my 5 minute bondo job , I accidently cover some of the letter holes on the trunk lid, LOL , also a small amount of cancer on both rear quarters.....The attachments on the post before this one shows the 68 Toronado seats I put in the car and the trunk pockets had to be blasted and added POR-15

 

Looks like your car was equipped with the california emission control package, too. The EGR valve was not on the 49 state models