Is there a BOM (bill of material) somewhere in the assembly manuals that tells you the information for the p/n's listed? For example, my 68' assembly manual gives me a p/n for a bolt, but I have no idea of knowing what fricken size the bolt is?? Is there a place I can look-up the various p/n's in the assembly manual to get more information?

 

Question 1, no.
Last question, yes, the Parts Catalogs. Not guaranteed to find it there, though. It will list the part, but won't give you the bolt detail.

 

Are these GM issued catalogs? Does anybody reproduce them that you know of?

 

Surprisingly, some of the listings in the Parts Catalogs DO give details. Sometimes this is the best way to find information, such as pulley diameter, belt length and width, etc. Of course, the downside is that the Part Catalogs usually don't have a crossreference by part number. So you have to find the part's listing by knowing it's official name and finding it in the index, or by manually searching page after page of the "groups" to which it might belong. Still, I do recommend picking up any Parts Catalogs you find at a reasonable price. As far as I know, no one reproduces these, so you have to look at swap meets.

Incidentally, while the whole-car assembly manuals don't list details like bolt dimensions, the Engine Assembly Manuals do. Each bolt and nut dimension is detailed on the page which shows its assembly. Theres also a complete parts list in the back, listing every engine component (though this list doesn't provide the dimensional details).

One last suggestion:
If you have a GM part number, type it into Google and see what you get. I was surprised once to find that an original 1970 bolt was still available through its GM part number, not from GM, but from a supply house that specializes in aircraft parts. And even if the part is obsolete, you might find dimensional details about it using Google.

 

Yes, they are, and though out there for sale, there are are a few available FREE OF CHARGE at Wild About Cars:
http://wildaboutcarsonline.com/cgi-b...aldisplayed=50

Wild About Cars. http://wildaboutcars.com. An information supersource, especially Oldsmobile. More Olds content than anywhere else on the internet and continuing to grow.
You'll find Chassis Service Manuals, Product Information Manuals (AKA Assembly Manuals), Inspector's Manuals, and other documents that will contain this and much much more.
Dealer Brochures, magazine ads and articles, and the Automotive History Preservation Society library growing daily.
Free to join, free to learn.

 

Brian, sometime in the near future, Wild About Cars will have Parts Catalogs that will be searchable. We have some pretty powerful OCR software now that can be run on digital copies that will put them in searchable form. We just have to find the time to get it done. Or have someone volunteer to work on it, of course.

 

Thanks!

 

Cool! That must be some pretty special OCR software. The next question is: do you have original parts catalogs in good enough condition to run through a scanner with automated feed? I've got three different editions, but I'm not sure I'd trust them to survive the machine.

Another interesting book I have is a GM parts Price Book for, IIRC, 1975. Two things make this a useful tool. First, it is indeed organized by GM part number. Second, it has a field which lists a single character for each GM division that used that part. So a part used by Buick and Chevy in addition to Olds would have a B, C, and O. (Actually, it might do this by division number, 1=Chevy, 3=Olds,... I can't remember.) This is neat in that, when looking for a rare Oldsmobile part, I can see of perhaps it was also used by Chevy, which makes it not so rare.