The 1962 Ionia Body Data Plate is located under the hood, below the left (driver's side) windshield wiper transmission on Dynamic 88 and Super 88 Fiesta station wagons. The Ionia Body Data Plate looks like this:
In addition to having different data plates, Fiesta wagons wear a different tag on the front door sill plates that look like this:
BUILD DATE
The build date of your 1962 Oldsmobile Fiesta station wagon can be determined by the 3 digit code located above the Style Number. The first two numbers indicate the month (01 being January - 12 being December). The letter indicates the week of the month (A being the first week - E being the 5th week). Our first example plate indicates that this body was built the fifth week (E) of January (01), our second example was built the second week (B) of May (05).
MODEL IDENTIFICATION
Models can be identified by the Style Number shown on the plate.
Fiesta wagon style numbers do not have the 62 prefix that Fisher-bodied Oldsmobiles have.
The four digit number indicates the Style Number. The first and second digits are the series designation, the third and fourth are the body style designation. All Oldsmobile Style Numbers begin with a 3. Style Numbers are as follows:
Dynamic 88 (32 series)
3235 - 2-Seat Fiesta (Station Wagon)
3245 - 3-Seat Fiesta (Station Wagon)
Super 88 (35 series)
3535 - 2-Seat Fiesta (Station Wagon)
Our first example plate indicates that this body is a 1962 Oldsmobile (3), Dynamic 88 (2), 2-seat Fiesta (35), our second example is a 1962 Oldsmobile (3), Dynamic 88 (2), 3-seat Fiesta (45).
BODY NUMBER
All Oldsmobile Dynamic 88 and Super 88 Fiesta Station Wagon bodies were assembled in Ionia, Michigan by the Ionia Manufacturing Division of the Mitchell-Bentley Corporation. Ionia built bodies for all of the full sized Pontiac, Oldsmobile and Buick station wagons. They did not build bodies for Chevrolet station wagons.
Because all bodies were built in Ionia, there is no body plant prefix for the body number. From Ionia, these bodies were sent to the various final assembly plants. It seems odd that all of these bodies wouldn't have been sent to nearby Lansing for final assembly, but we've got a build sheet for one body that was sent from Ionia to Doraville, Georgia for final assembly. Oldsmobile final assembly plants are indicated in the Serial Number.
The body number is the production sequence number of that particular body style number. Body numbers start at 0001. Ionia body numbers have a numerical suffix. At this time we are unsure of the meaning of this suffix. As you can see in the example plates, at one time this suffix stool alone, then later became hyphenated.
Our first example plate indicates that this body was the 3,969th (3969 3) Dynamic 88 2-seat body produced. The meaning of the separate 3 suffix is unknown. The second example was the 5,097th (5097-5) Dynamic 88 3-seat body produced. The meaning of the hyphenated 5 is unknown at this time.
TRIM NUMBER
The trim number indicates the interior trim option and color. Trim numbers are listed on this site under the specific model pages.
Our first example plate indicates that this body has the 393 Blue interior trim, our second example has the 387 Aqua trim.
PAINT NUMBER
The paint numbers indicate the upper and lower paint colors. Fiesta body plates appear not to include wheel or optional painted wheel disc codes. The first letter in the code is for the lower (body) paint color. The second letter in the code is for the upper (roof) paint color. Note that the early plate has a space between the two codes, while the later plate is once again hyphenated. It has been reported that Protect-O-Plate information includes wheel paint codes while data plates do not. Cars with optional painted wheel discs came with black painted wheels. The black wheels will not show on the Data Plate. Go to the Colors page to get the paint codes to decode your tag.
Our first example plate indicates that this body was finished in Wedgewood Mist lower (F) with Provincial White upper (C), our second example was finished in Pacific Mist lower (P) with Pacific Mist upper (P).
ACCESSORIES
ACC stands for accessories. These codes indicate optional equipment that would have affected Ionia Manufacturing in building the body for the car. There are two different types of accessory codes seen on '62 Oldsmobiles.
The first type are the one or two digit codes shown in the examples. These are the option codes that the dealer used when placing the car order. It appears these are the only codes that were used on Ionia bodies. For a complete list of dealer option codes, follow the Accessories links. Use the codes listed there to decode your accessory codes. There are a few codes that you may find on your Data Plate that you will not find in the accessories list. Cars equipped with the standard 3-speed Synchromesh transmission will have the code "SM" on the Data Plate. We have also seen "SMT" and "SYNCHRO". These codes told Ionia Manufacturing to set the body up for standard shift. Since the majority of Fiestas were equipped with 4-S Hydra-Matic the lack of the SM code was a default to set the body up for automatic transmission. Some cars also show an "S" as the first code. This is not a code for dual exhaust. Dual exhaust would not have affected the build of the body. At this time it is assumed that the "S" stands for Sold Order.
The second type of accessory codes that can appear on non-Ionia bodies are the IBM codes. These codes are all three digits and were used by some plants instead of the above-mentioned ordering codes. IBM codes are broken down on the IBM Code Page. No Ionia bodies have surfaced with these codes.
Our first example indicates that this body was equipped with Electric Antenna (D1), Bi-Phonic Speaker System (D3), Back-up Lamps (F), Soft-Ray Tinted Windshield (I3), Custom Luxury Trim (K5), Electric Rear Window (U9) and Fiesta Luggage Carrier (X5), our second example was equipped with Back-up Lamps (F) and Soft-Ray Tinted Windshield (I-3) - again, notice the hyphenation. Our second example, being a 3-seat, should have an Electric Rear Window. This was a standard feature on the 3-seat, designated by the body style, and so is not shown as an accessory.
