After38Years

About 20 years ago I bought an assembly manual (paper) for my '66. While it has been useful, it looks like a 4th generation Xerox copy. Are any of the manuals now offered on CD of any better visual quality?

Thanks

After38Years

Shameless Bump!!!

ChattanoogaJSB

Mine looks like yours, came with the car.

Jud Chapin

I believe they are all copies of copies of copies.

leif.anderson93

yup!!!

Revfan

I have a side project of scanning my 67 AIM into Adobe illustrator, cleaning up the lines/numbers and making a digital copy... its a slow process though.

Here is an example, using AIM G81-D3 Windshield Wiper motor page
old AIM


My Cleaned up Version

Easy Rhino

Make a large print copy and I'll take 5.

Good idea, though.

ChattanoogaJSB

That's pretty awesome Greg!

After38Years

Wow - that's a huge "side project". You are a patient man!

Just curious - were dealers supplied with a copy of the assembly manual, and, if so, were theirs as bad as the copies that are out there?

5thvet

I think I read on a different thread on this subject that the ones you can buy from the NCRS are some of the best copies. ( I've never seen one) Mine was from Corvette America and is mediocre.

Don

W Guy

I know some of the original AIMs had fold-out pages which couldn't be reduced to one 8.5x11 sheet and still be readable, so for cost purposes, those pages were simply left out of the reprints.

Verne

Jud Chapin

Very nice. Maybe you can get approval from the General to sell such.

JohnZ

Nope. The dealers didn't know the Assembly Manual existed, and neither did anyone else outside of GM - it was strictly an internal document between Engineering and the assembly plants. They didn't come to light until the late 70's when Mike Yager got his hands on some, copied them, and started selling them out of the trunk of his car at shows (he's come a long way since then).

waynec

I believe the answer is no, assembly manuals were only used by factories for assembly. But, yes, the quality the factory saw may have been nearly as bad as what we see today, although I think we are probably seeing copies of copies of copies made since the factory days.

Back in the 1950's, the xerox process was in it's infancy, expensive and only one of several competing technologies for copying... Mimeograph and Ditto were still in wide use. The printing press (using etched metal plates) was/is the best and most expensive, therefore only used for copying when thousands of high-quality pages are needed.

My guess is that the pages were originally pristine, but likely any engineering changes were made on copies and then recopied to send to the factory. At the factory, those copies replaced the original pages in books located in several departments (that was one of my trainee duties when I went to work at Fisher Body). By model-year end, many changes had been made, likely multiple times to almost every page. All/any changes are denoted & dated on each sheet; so, the most accurate information is on the least-legible copy.

But, back then copy machines were not anywhere near as sophisticated as they are today... I can vaguely remember the Ditto process used in a Fisher Body factory in about 1958. It went something like this: a large-format (8.5x11) camera photo was taken of an original drawing, onto a chemically-treated metal sheet, then that negative sheet was processed by hand in a box that somehow magnetized only the light portions of the photo (the image). Next, black metallic powder was washed over the plate, sticking to the magnetized image, then the plate was baked to harden the raised image, and the plate was then used to press a mimeograph master which was in turn used to produce paper copies. Mimeograph masters were not super crisp images and they tended to deteriorate quickly as they produced copies, resulting in poorer and poorer quality as the copy run progressed.

So, the quality we see now may be close to the quality the factory saw.

SI67

Nice work. Quite a project for the whole thing. Like monks transcribing illuminated copies of manuscripts.

Steve

Gary's '66

Well hell get with it man!!! I'll pay you triple what that illegible POS I have now cost me. I absolutely HATE trying to read/decipher that thing!

leif.anderson93

It's like deciphering the Dead Sea scrolls. Are you going to add all the part names and numbers like the original AIM? Seriously, if you are going to go to all this work to re-do the AIM I'm a serious buyer.

vettluver

I'd pay for one too!

Revfan

Yes... my intention is to "Change" the format some to make it more "restorer" friendly.

One of the things I would like to do, is find some sort of bolt equivalency list, so that on the page I could put the "traditional" GM part number for a bolt, but also have normal bolt name too.
Also, I'd make one hell of an index in the back, so you wouldn't have to bother JohnZ with where stuff was in the stinkin' Aim.

If this one works out like I hope, I'll probably do the rest of the mid years too.

Any other suggestions?

MarkC

Wow what an improvement. I really thought I had a bad copy. Put me down for one.

Greg, we are in the middle of our 3rd snow storm in less than two weeks. We have another 8 inches on the ground this morning. It is going to warm up next week and rain. I never thought I would hope for rain.