[Milsurplus] Navy Manufacturer Codes

[Mike Hanz]

On 1/6/2012 6:47 PM, WA5CAB at cs.com wrote:
> Someone else sent you the contractor names matching the three codes.  As to
> why the Signal Corps used Navy Contractor Codes on many nameplates, I don't
> know and don't know of anyone who does.

No smoking gun, but there are some tantalizing clues in NAVSHIPS 900,109 
dated September 1945 (signed out 1 August 1945) that relate to this 
question.  In the preface to 43 pages of manufacturer codes, there is a 
description of the process used to assign codes to the various 
manufacturers.

This particular sentence is pertinent:  "Once assigned to a manufacturer 
the same designating letters remain the permanent identification of the 
company..."  This is in the section describing the Navy five digit type 
numbering system that had been in place since 1935, so there appears to 
have been a well oiled mechanism for the assignment of manufacturer's 
codes for at least that long.

In the wartime reorganization of the naming convention - the AN 
Nomenclature system that was adopted formally by the Navy on 17 February 
1943 (by BuAer, at least) - it was fairly obvious that it had to be 
accomplished through the use of a joint Army-Navy committee that hashed 
out differences and made recommendations on the final details to be 
adopted by both Services.  Since the Navy had the longest experience 
with those codes, it is highly likely that they pressed to keep the 
manufacturer code portion unchanged, and final adoption merely reflected 
one of the give and take compromises that all such committees usually 
reach to get a report out by the due date.

In the title page of the 43 page list, the description reads,

Manufacturer's Designating Symbols
for Navy Type and Drawing Numbers
and Name Plates for Army-Navy Equipment

Interestingly enough the process of assigning a code did not trail 
manufacturers through buyouts and name changes.  For example, the Yaxley 
Mfg Co prefix of CYN was changed to CMA when P. R. Mallory bought them out.

73,
Mike  KC4TOS