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Does anyone know what this engine stamp means: CE6P20000? I found that CE is chevy warranty engine or over the counter buys but I didn't find ones with the 'P'. Is it a 1966 engine?
The CE engine program satrted in the fall of 66 as a way to track engine replacements under 1967's 5 year/50,000 mile warranty program.
CE engines decode as follows:
First position: "C"- Chevrolet
Second position: "E" - Engine (a warranty trans would be stamped CT for Chevrolet Transmission)
Third position: Year of manufacture
Forth position: Engine serial number -
00001 to 19999 was assigned to Flint 6 cylinders
20000 to 39999 was assigned to Flint V8's
40000 to 59999 was assigned to Tonawanda V8's
When they ran through the assigned serial numbers for a plant and engine type, they started over with a letter prefix, so once Flint build V8 serial number 39999 was built the next CE engine would be serial number A20000. A39999 would be followed by B20000, B39999 would be followed by C20000 and so on.
Considering the CE program didn't start till late in 66, it's hard to believe that engine could have been a 1966 engine. "P" would have been around the 320000 replacement engine built, and it's highly unlikely that Flint would have made that many CE engines in 66, in fact It's rare to see a CE with a serial number starting after "C".
As Nowhere Man asked, what's the casting number and date on the rear of the block? The numbers on that pad don't make sense to me. The CE stamping looks typical of a CE block, but the other stamping "S1016CFB" is new to me on a CE block. "S" is the Saginaw MI casting plant, "1016" is the assembly date October 16th and "CFB" indicates either an 82 305 4bbl engine from a passenger car or an 85 305 with Tunned Port Injection from a Z/28 or Trans Am.
The numbers on a CE block only provide the year and it's consecutive serial number and give no clue as to the engine's horsepower or specs. Admittedly I'm really only familiar with the CE engine program in the 60's and 70's, so maybe for CE engines built in the 80's did have a code to identify the engine's internals, I just don't know? If I had to make an uneducated guess, I'd say the engine appears to be a 305 warranty or over the counter engine from 1986, but this would be just a guess coming out of far left field. The thing that doesn't fit with it being an 80's block though is the shape of the stamp pad. Chevrolet stopped using the long pad around 78, replacing it with a shorter, squarer pad, and a serial number of 20064 would be a Flint engine from what I know, not Saginaw. Also, I know Saginaw cast engine blocks, but I don't know if they assembled them?
Hopefully someone else has a better answer as to what's the story behind the engine.
By the way, "P" was the Pontiac MI assembly plant where they built mid size GM cars such as Cutlasses and Monte Carlo's, as well as other cars, but not engines.
Pontiac Motor Division cast blocks and most other required parts, machined them in Plant 9.
And built cars Plant 8>>>> Pontiac's most of the time since being absorbed into GM from Oakland Motor Car Company about 100 years ago and continued building PONTIAC....up until the GM CPC BOC time frame of the 80s
Bumper plating was Plant 2 Stamping 14 Axle asy 54 and most ever number in between - Fisher Body made the bodies up until its conversion to Fiero build & asy
Saginaw did not do engine asy Saginaw Steering machined & assemble steering gear blxes, again heavy machined castings and precison machined gears - up to the R&P days when it was spun off to China and has since been at risk for closure.
Engine machining & asy plants are big with highly automated
Originally Posted by gbvette62
The CE engine
By the way, "P" was the Pontiac MI assembly plant where they built mid size GM cars such as Cutlasses and Monte Carlo's, as well as other cars, but not engines.
From the Mortec site:
CASTING#.....SIZE...YEAR...MAIN CAP BOLTS....NOTE
S3959512... .327... 62-67... 2... Was also used for some "CE" replacement blocks
The place above the casting number I only see two circle with lines thru them and a 1 or / between them. On the other side of the block there are two more circles with what I think is 1/96. It's hard to tell if it's a / or something else.
I believe January 66 is too early to be a CE engine, and nothing that's stamped on that pad appears to be done by GM, at least not to me. The assembly date that's stamped on the pad is 1016, October 16th, which doesn't fit with the January casting date. It's highly unlikely a block cast in January would have sat around 10 months before being assembled in October. Also as I said previously the suffix code "CFB" stamped on the block was only used for two engines, both in the 80's. Chevrolet wasn't using three letter suffix codes in 1966, the first three letter codes appeared in 1970.
Who stamped that pad, and why they stamped what they did on it, I have no idea, but I don't think anything on the pad was stamped there by Chevrolet. There are known variations to how CE blocks were stamped, but CE blocks were not known to get assembly dates and suffix codes.
My CE block was purchased from a local Chevrolet dealership in 1976 and is stamped CE6P22988 S0517CFB, so very similar to yours. Cast date on mine looks like "C 19 6". Stamp pad: CE6P22988 S0517CFB Date appears to be "C 19 6"
“CE” CHEVY V-8 ENGINE CODE
Many Chevrolet V-8 engines are stamped with a “CE” engine code
on the front pad. This “CE” code is usually followed by a series of
digits. The stamping on the front pad does not follow the usual
pattern of the engine plant, followed by the engine assembly date,
followed by the engine suffix code.
The “CE” engine code is not really an engine code. “CE” stands for
“Chevrolet Engine” and indicates that this engine is a service
replacement engine. “CE” engines were used by dealerships to
replace bad engines under warranty, as well as being sold to
customers over the parts counter. The majority of “CE” engines
were manufactured during the 1960s and 1970s.
It is not possible to determine what the engine type is on a “CE”
engine. Chevrolet stamped the majoring of their replacement
engines with “CE”, regardless of the engine type.
Ce engine stamp question
