CAMAROFACTS Field guide · 1967–2024

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Engine & drivetrain

A “numbers-matching” claim rests on three separate records that answer three different questions. The casting number says what family of block the foundry poured. The stamped suffix says what the engine was assembled as. The VIN derivative says which car it belongs to. Nothing is uploaded — decoding runs entirely on your device.

Where to look. The pad is a machined flat on the block — forward of the passenger-side head on a V8, near the distributor on an inline-six. The stamping reads fmmddaa — f is the engine plant, mm the month, dd the day, and aa (occasionally three characters) the application suffix. The casting number is cast into the block, not stamped: right side on a six, rear-left near the bellhousing flange on a V8.

1967–1969. Later years are not tabulated yet. The stamping format decodes; full per-code tables are not published yet. Not published yet — the source table runs to 60+ codes and has not been captured in full.

Why it matters

The same two letters, a different engine

Suffix codes were reused. MO is a 302 Z/28 in 1967 and 1968 — and a 427 COPO in 1969. MR is a 375 hp L78 in 1967 and a 350 hp L34 in 1968. Read against the wrong year, a code turns an ordinary car into a rare one on paper, which is precisely the error that shows up in sale listings.

This decoder will not do that. A suffix is only ever read against its own model year, and a code that is not in that year's table is reported as absent rather than borrowed from a neighbouring year.

None of this settles authenticity on its own. Cross-check the pad against the cowl tag and the VIN, and read the full identification workflow before acting on any of it.