The Stovebolt Site Forums The Parking Lot Panels 'N Burbs Did Subs come with factory undercoating?

I just saw a '51 Suburban for sale on Ebay that claims to have had the "original undercoating." I've seen other panels and Subs with undercoating that, if not factory original, was obviously applied decades ago and seem to have preserved the metal beneath very well.

So did Subs come with "original undercoating?" Was it factory applied? Was it an option? Or was it applied aftermarket?

** The 53 Suburban I purchased from the orig. owner some time ago was undercoated. **

Correction #1: I think mine came with an undercoating.

My Suburban had undercoating when I bought it in 1971. I can find no documentation that states that GM put this on at the factory. I doubt that the original owner put it on, but the dealer might have put it on.

Correction #2: Third try lucky: the Factory Assembly Manual shows the undercoating locations.

It was common practice back in the day for the dealer to offer Undercoating as an upgrade to the sale. They would either apply it themselves in their body shop or farm it out to a local shop. We did hundreds of them in the mid 70's when I worked for a large nationwide chain store (now defunct) for the local Chevy dealer. Messy job and my mechanics hated to be the lucky one to draw the short straw.

Thanks, Martin, for clearing up my mistake in the post above. I have edited my post above.

Undercoating was definitely a dealer applied product.

The factory did use a tar based undercoating on the interior side of the body panels during assembly { same thing that was used to coat the headlight buckets }
But....given the propensity of the quarter panels to rot from the inside out on these bodies, I wished they had applied more of it to the interior panels.

I am wrong again - simplex tweeked my aging memory cells - the Factory Assembly Manual shows the locations that sheet metal received "under coating".

I remember that F.A.M. reference also Tim but, the sheet says that it only applies to the truck cabs.
I have never seen any documentation specifically addressing undercoating on the single unit body burbs & panels.