[north]

Some observations:

No duplicate Pattern DON's from same zone even regardless of plant of assembly.

Regular DON's from each zone seem to follow a regular sequential pattern as the year progresses regardless of which plant the car was built in.

Interesting how most zones up with regular DON's just under 100,000 at the end of the run but they seem to start at a different number from each other. I wonder if it is because they adjusted the starting number so that the target number for each zone manager was 100,000?

Apart from the pattern cars the regular zone versus dealer (Z versus P in the invoice number prefix) ordered cars seemed to follow the regular sequential order of DON's

If you guesstimate the total number of DON's (say 75,000 times 28 zones you get an odd number, a bit over 2,100,000. I say odd because the number is way too high to be just Pontiac (about 870,000 cars that year) but way too low to be all GM cars (which were about 5,000,000 that year). Hmmm.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

Originally Posted by north

BTW2, here is a list of the zones that received cars from each plant (some overlaps):

Atlanta: 09, 16 through 21
Baltimore: 01 through 19, 21, 24, 29 plus a 38 (Canada), and 60 (sold to the Baltimore assembly plant, probably for a forensic audit?)
Framingham: 01 through 08, 11, 12, 16, 29
Pontiac: (no pattern cars) 01-12, 15 through 19, 29
Arlington: 11 trough 15, 17 through 22, 24 and 27
Fremont: 13, 15, 21 through 25, 27

So these are not all Pattern Car samples ?
Can see the PMD samples are not.
Not sure what the others actually represent.

I'm interested in debunking either Deloreans 2,000 approx cars , or the Memo 1,000 approx cars.
They can't both be right.
I'm leaning way to the 2,000 figure as being the closer to correct. Always have.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

If you can post a sample of each variation - I should be able to determine their place.

#1 - 3 cars with apparent second billing and No Order Number
#2 - 5 cars with apparent second billing and Regular Order Numbers

Initially will say the 3 cars were discounted use cars.
With the vague nondescript discount code in left corner of invoice

The 5 cars most likely were cars built that didn't have a dealer in waiting.
More of general zone inventory type for any dealer , semi left overs.
No discount code.

02B was the cut off basically , 02C was when the open orders started being built.
But still Orange Only at that point.

Would be interesting to see the samples regardless.
Have been away from invoice studies for quite a few years now.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

The Internal Memo was something to the effect of Judge Sales or Judge Production month to month on into maybe April or May .
Been years since I last saw it.

[north]

Originally Posted by Baron Von Zeppelin

So these are not all Pattern Car samples ?
Can see the PMD samples are not.
Not sure what the others actually represent.

I'm interested in debunking either Deloreans 2,000 approx cars , or the Memo 1,000 approx cars.
They can't both be right.
I'm leaning way to the 2,000 figure as being the closer to correct. Always have.

For the list of zones serviced by each plant I am referring to all my GTO invoices. I was just getting a feel of how many zones could be ordering cars from more than one plant.

As for the 2,000 versus 1,000 the best indicator is that I have 131 pattern cars out of 566 judges or 23%. 23% of 6,833 Judges built equals 1,581, unsatisfactorily halfway between the two claimed numbers. My guess is both are wrong and the actual number is around 1,500. Maybe the 1,000 and 2,000 numbers were what was planned or expected at different moments in the process of launching the Judge but in the end the actual number was simply what dealers ordered in the timeframe that Pontiac allotted for distribution of the pattern cars. It works out to about 1 pattern car for every other dealership, not indicative of it being as successful as they hoped.

[north]

Originally Posted by Baron Von Zeppelin

If you can post a sample of each variation - I should be able to determine their place.

#1 - 3 cars with apparent second billing and No Order Number
#2 - 5 cars with apparent second billing and Regular Order Numbers

Initially will say the 3 cars were discounted use cars.
With the vague nondescript discount code in left corner of invoice

The 5 cars most likely were cars built that didn't have a dealer in waiting.
More of general zone inventory type for any dealer , semi left overs.
No discount code.

02B was the cut off basically , 02C was when the open orders started being built.
But still Orange Only at that point.

Would be interesting to see the samples regardless.
Have been away from invoice studies for quite a few years now.

Unfortunately, I deleted the modified copy of my spreadsheet already (I'm always afraid to confuse it with the original and post new cars on the wrong list). I'll create a new one later this week and post examples of the invoices you refer to here.

[north]

Originally Posted by Baron Von Zeppelin

The Internal Memo was something to the effect of Judge Sales or Judge Production month to month on into maybe April or May .
Been years since I last saw it.

I remember the Memo you are referring to but I can't recall where I saw it? Here on the site somewhere or in one of the GTO books printed over the years?

The gist of it was that Judges were running at 20% of GTO production in those months. Not sure if that was considered a success or failure.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

If we determine that Pattern Cars went to 27-28 different zones ,,,
And each zone count could range the count starting at 17 and going as high as 119

That is a "high side" base number of 102 per Zone
Multiply by 27 or 28
2754 // 2856 Patterns - full high side (not the best reasonable equation)

That's why I'm interested breaking down how many zones actually got Pattern Cars.
And highest order number in each zone.
We can come up with varying reasonable equations after that.

2,000 was a number Delorean threw out as the initial plan - as a guest speaker at a POCI convention in the mid to late 80s. approx 20 years after the fact.
That had been the staple number for decades.

About 5-6-7 years ago Mike Noun found an internal memo in the Pontiac Museum archives from one exec to some other execs with supposed production or sales numbers month to month.
John likely has the memo in his files.
I would definitely have it but my files are currently crashed.
Some agreed 1,000 Patterns was more reasonable.
Memos are not always precise measurements, can be done on the fly or without full diligence.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

Originally Posted by north

I remember the Memo you are referring to but I can't recall where I saw it? Here on the site somewhere or in one of the GTO books printed over the years?

The gist of it was that Judges were running at 20% of GTO production in those months. Not sure if that was considered a success or failure.

Mike posted it on here , somewhere .
It was only about Judges.

[north]

Originally Posted by Baron Von Zeppelin

If we determine that Pattern Cars went to 27-28 different zones ,,,
And each zone count could range the count starting at 17 and going as high as 119

That is a "high side" base number of 102 per Zone
Multiply by 27 or 28
2754 // 2856 Patterns - full high side (not the best reasonable equation)

That's why I'm interested breaking down how many zones actually got cars.
And highest order number in each zone.
We can come up with varying reasonable equations after that.

2,000 was a number Delorean threw out as the initial plan - as a guest speaker at a POCI convention in the mid to late 80s. approx 20 years after the fact.
That had been the staple number for decades.

About 5-6-7 years ago Mike Noun found an internal memo in the Pontiac Museum archives from one exec to some other execs with supposed production or sales numbers month to month.
John likely has the memo in his files.
I would definitely have it but my files are currently crashed.
Some agreed 1,000 Patterns was more reasonable.
Memos are not always precise measurements, can be done on the fly or without full diligence.

If you see my big post today I do list the DON's for each zone. There is a large variance in the number of total GTO's per zone and Judges and especially pattern Judges (in two zones I have no pattern judges ordered).

[north]

[QUOTE=north;6586488]

Zone (zone Area) / plants / special pattern DON's / reg DON info

I just realized I mixed up the header at the top of the list of the zones, below is the corrected sequence:

Zone (zone Area) / special pattern DON's / assembly plants / reg DON info

In hindsight I put too much data in that one table.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

We can come up with an absolute "minimum number" of Pattern Cars equation --
-- if we have those above parameters per Zone.
Not an exact number , but a bare minimum number.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

Originally Posted by north

If you see my big post today I do list the DON's for each zone. There is a large variance in the number of total GTO's per zone and Judges and especially pattern Judges (in two zones I have no pattern judges ordered).

I looked at it a little but it was too congested.
Only concerned with Pattern Cars.
Selfish , I know .

[north]

Originally Posted by Baron Von Zeppelin

We can come up with an absolute "minimum number" of Pattern Cars equation --
-- if we have those above parameters per Zone.
Not an exact number , but a bare minimum number.

True, assuming all special DON's were used and no orders were cancelled before shipment ;-)

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

We can do a good number that at least you and I can feel is acceptable overall .
As a "minimum range" .

If Zone 12 highest Pattern is 62 , run with that.
Zone 23 highest 112 , run with it
etc...

Edit - of course deduct 17 from each count.


But , it's your data and your time.
And you don't owe us anything at all.
But it would be semi-monumental .
A lot of us have been trying to crack it somehow for almost 20 years. lol

Edit #2 - Most everybody gave up on it years ago though.

[north]

I took the highest number from each zone and deducted 16 from each and that gives me about 1,150. If I give each zone with none or only one or two examples a minimum of 30 it bumps the number to about 1,250. If you add another ten percent for missing higher DON’s in each zone you end up at 1,375. Then add 10% for Canadian market cars you are 1,550. Roughly matching my pattern to total judge invoices calculations.

[north]

Seems to me that the intent of the pattern cars was to establish a different image for the judge as compared to regular GTO’s. They wanted to cater to a younger more performance image conscious buyer almost like it was a separate model from the GTO.

I suspect they were worried that dealers left to their own habits would dilute the initial impact if they ordered too many judges in calmer colors, with things like vinyl tops, bench seats and other options that blunted the special nature of the car.

It was probably a wise decision as the judge could have been seen as just a GTO with a spoiler option rather than a distinct and differently targeted car.

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

1150 bare minimum with supporting documented data is great progress .
1550 approximation isn't an unfair number with that.

You were the one that proposed the Pattern Order Numbers were potentially a count of cars per Zone.
That was progress.
Determining there were no repeating interlopers in a given Zone adds solidity for sure.
Heavy progress.

If you have a chance to list each Zone - with it's highest Pattern Number currently on file ,,,,
John can check his files for any higher Pattern Numbers or any Zone you don't have a sample for.
And John and I can keep our eyes open for further cars that develop.

In some cases just one or two cars could bump the numbers considerably .
Thanks North !

[Baron Von Zeppelin]

Categorizing them by Plant isn't as beneficial as by Zone. (them = Pattern Cars)
The Judge Registry has them by Plant , but doesn't distinguish Pattern Cars in every example or have Body Dates for every example. Last time I looked.

[johnta1]

I put the pattern # in the comments section. I put the PHS shipped date but sometimes don't have the cowl tag data to add.


I might try and add a dealer zone section. Thought of adding the zone office # also.