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Welcome to eWillys.com, a website for vintage jeep enthusiasts. I update this website nearly every day with jeep deals, jeep history, interesting reader projects, jeep related info, and more.
These quick searches can help you find things on eBay. People list in the wrong categories all the time, so don't be surprised to see brochures in the parts area for example.
The links to posts below show jeeps grouped by models, condition, and other ways. Some of these jeeps are for sale and others have been sold. If you are unsure whether a vehicle is still for sale or not, email me at d [at] ewillys.com for more info.
There are plenty of interesting, unusual, historic and surprising stories related to Jeeps and their owners. In addition, some of these features have nothing to do with jeeps. This link will display all featured stories starting from the latest.
Looking for parts and not sure where to go? There are a variety of large and small new and used parts sellers both online and offline.
Importantly, the allure of buying a project jeep can be romantic. The reality of restoring a jeep can be quite different, expensive and overwhelming without the right tools and resources. So, tread carefully when purchasing a "project". If you have any concerns about buying a vintage jeep, or run across a scam, feel free to contact me for help, comments or concerns .
Steve spotted these rarely seen wheels for sale. They were made by Fremont (MII40IK … Model #?).
View all the information on eBay
“RIMS ARE 20″ DIA X 4.5 WIDE WITH A 3 1/8″ BACK SPACE LOCAL PICKUP FROM PEMBERTON NJ 08068 OR CAN DELIVER TO HAGERSTOWN MB/FINDLEY OHIO MILITARY VEHICLE SHOW”
So, this happened the other day ….
Per Ann’s FB post, “Today the girls went to Doggie Details Pet Grooming where Shana, as usual, did an AMAZING job on them. They were soft and pretty and smelled so nice for all of about an hour.
Lizzy proceeded to escaped David’s fence redesign (expanded while the dogs were being groomed). Then, Lizzy got into the Pasture where a cow pooped on her. David then chased her back into the yard where a pensive Betty Page excitedly attacked her before they both bolted through the doggie door, into the house and across the white couch.
Needless to say I had to disregard Shana’s warning about too frequent bathing and bath them for a second time today. We’ve also had to shampoo the sofa, clean the floors, clorox the entire bathroom, wash the slipcovers and finally we got ourselves cleaned up.
I think it goes without saying…..Lizzy is so grounded.
Before the pasture:
After the pasture:
This brochure sold on eBay. It shares a Jeep-Approved bumper for CJ-5s, CJ-6s, FCs, Trucks, and Gladiators. It is form F144W.
These hubs have seen some serious wear on their faces. Evidence suggests it was Husky that private labeled this hub for Allstate (more on Husky history here).
What is interesting to me is that the back side of this hub looks identical to the backside of the early Husky, Dualmatic, and Free-Lock hub, too. I don’t have enough information to compared the eternals of each of these, but I suspect that some of the Husky and Dualmatic hubs reflect evolutions (or copies) from the early Free-Lock hub.
View all the information on eBay
Bottom of an early Husky hub (with more splines, but same underside design with the lock ring):
This version of the Husky hub, also appears to be identical on the backside (also private labeled with Allstate). See the rebuild of this hub here:
We had a surprise overnight visitor last night. Mitch was driving home from Moab yesterday, but the cold temps and long drive, especially over the Blue mountains, helped decide to camp at our place last night. It was a great surprise! So, no updates on this Sunday morning.
Here’s one of the accidents Mitch saw on his trip north. For those that have driven it, you’ll recognize this spot as the beginning of the downward stretch of the Pendleton grade when leaving the Blue Mountains on I-84.
Grant shared this narration of landing and driving inward into Italy during 1944. It includes a variety of jeeps.
“This black & white film shows the early stages of the Allied forces invasion at Anzio, Italy in 1944. The film lacks credits or other information, but likely dates to 1944. The Battle of Anzio took place from January 22 to June 5, 1944, when Rome was finally captured. The operation was opposed by German forces in the area of Anzio and Nettuno. The landing operation was commanded by U.S. Army Major General John P. Lucas of VI Corps… ”
Blaine shared this jeep/trailer from Marx.
https://boise.craigslist.org/atq/d/boise-vintage-willys-jeep-and-trailor/7470495346.html
“Nice Willy’s Jeep and trailer. Well looked after toy. Trailer is missing it’s tailgate. Everything else is there”
It’s a good-sized model for the price.
https://sfbay.craigslist.org/pen/clt/d/redwood-city-us-army-jeep/7464452477.html
“Vintage toy army jeep. 7″ x 4″”
During 1961, along with non-animal-related brochures, Willys Motors produced this series of ads using different animals. It appears they were only produced between January and September of 1961.
January 1961: Dog
February 1961: Busy Bee
March 1961: Horse
April 1961: Lion
I finally found an original of this brochure on eBay, so here it is. It’s another of the “animal series” of brochures that was published in 1961. This is Form DM61-07.
This is the front page.
This form is opened vertically to reveal this page:
The brochure is opened horizontally to reveal this page:
This is the back when unopened:
Forget April showers, it’s snowed here the last couple of days in Prosser, setting an April record for snow. We lost power for most of yesterday morning. Updates Wed morning.
Meanwhile, the snow followed Mitch Carter down to Moab, so the usually sunny Easter Jeep Safari week started with a blanket of snow.
At he got some good jeeping on Monday pre-snow (more pics on FB):
Barry Thomas’ photo of this farm working CJ-5 landed on the cover of this month’s Farm Collector Magazine. Congrats to Barry! (it is great photo).
If you have a subscription to Farm Collector Magazine, you should be able to read Barry’s article, too.
UPDATE: Just to be clear, this is not preassembled. It is a kit that needs assembly.
John forwarded me this link to a scale model jeep kit, roughly 22″ long, being sold through MegaHobby.com. At $260.96, it isn’t cheap, but it appears to be a detailed larger scale model. The model is produced by Dragon, which is short for Dragon Models Limited, a company out of Hong Kong, that has been making military diecaet models since 1987.
https://www.megahobby.com/products/1-4-ton-4×4-truck-w-50cal-machine-gun-1-6-dragon.html
A few months ago Nate shared a few pics of a Willys Electric Light Plant. Below are a few more. He has even more pics and info on the earlyCJ-5 page: http://www.earlycj5.com/xf_cj5/index.php?threads/151693/
For those going to the Willys Picnic this year, it sounds like he will be bringing it along (June 12th Kempton, PA).
Dave asked me about the type of adapter used on DJ-3As and FJs to connect an automatic transmission (which may have been the Borg Warner model 12 according to David Sapp mentioned in his comment to this post, though I have no documented evidence of this, but it should be out there somewhere). Essentially, a adapter plate is bolted to the back of an L-head/F-head engine, to which the transmission bell housing attaches.
After some searching, Dave spotted the adapter in an FJ supplement book. Here are the pics.
Meanwhile, a discussion from 2012 on the topic of DJ-3A automatic transmissions yielded these pics showing a BW transmission connected to an L-head with a similar looking plate.
As for the rare shifter that’s been captured in some pics, this pic is the best I have (from a DJ-3A automatic). It confirms Barry Goodwin’s comment on another post that the transmission lacked a “Park” feature. Instead, the driver would put it in neutral when parking (and I assume pull the parking brake).
If anyone has a document that confirms it was the M-12 BW transmission that was used, or has more pics or is aware of other useful discussions on this topic, please let me know. There isn’t much info about these setups on the web.
FYI: Based on my research, it appears the Willys Aero cars of the 1950s used a GM Hydramatic rather than a BW transmission.
This neat quarter-sized Sacramento Jeepers pin is available on eBay for $14.95 (or make offer) and free shipping.
View all the information on eBay
“US Quarter is there to show size. This item will be packed well and Shipped with USPS First Class with tracking.”
Mike shared this video of a brief MD Juan factory tour. The video, in part, demonstrates the scope of equipment necessary to make some of the parts. It’s not a trivial investment in stamps and computer equipment.
One of the rarest type of jeeps hubs are the Kurland hubs. I’ve only had one pic of these hubs (thanks to Ted Jordan) until yesterday when Richard Darr forwarded me a photo of a set of hubs he acquired. This led me to a quick dive into the internet, which yielded the following.
A variety of searches related to “Kurland” and “Kurland Motors” yielded results in both Los Angeles (a city whose name appears on the hub) and Denver. In fact, there were Kurland Motor companies in Los Angeles, Denver, and Grand Junction, Colorado (also known as Kurland Junction Motors).
The Denver location was opened as early as August 1946, as an ad in the Windsor Beacon out of Windsor, Colorado, mentioned the new Universal Jeep arriving for delivery (soon).
I couldn’t location much information about this Denver Willys distributor, other than Kurland Motors was instrumental in the launch of the Mile High Jeep Club in 1956 and that Kurland Motors, at least for a short time, marketed Kurland-branded bumpers about that same time.
Regarding Kurland Junction Motors, I was able to locate this ad from February 22, 1948, (The Daily Sentinel, GC, CO):
Now, were the Denver/Grand Junction Kurland dealers connected to the Kurland Motors of Los Angeles that also sold Willys-Overland vehicles? If they were related, I have yet to find a connection. But, at least I was able to unearth more information about the LA Kurland.
CREDIT: December 05, 1948, issue of the Los Angeles Times
As the article suggests, the Transport Motor Company lost some key personnel. Perhaps Transport Motors had decided to exit its Willys-Overland relationship?
At some juncture, it appears Kurland launched a line of free-wheeling hubs. These hubs were stamped with 1) KURLAND, 2) Los Angeles and 3) Patent Pending. Unfortunately, I could find no patents related to the hubs. In fact, the only information I could find related to the hubs was a reference to a CJ-2A being sold with a set of the hubs.
November 10, 1955, Independent News, Long Beach, CA.
Here are the only pics I have of the hubs:
CREDIT: Richard Darr
CREDIT: Ted Jordan
In 1951, Kurland Motors provided the Los Angeles Times automobile editor, Lynn Rogers, a wagon for a journey down to Ensenada, Mexico. A description of the trip was printed in the October 21, 1951, issue of the Los Angeles Times.
Bill shared a video via Autorevolution.com that highlights the saving of a locked-up CJ-3B.
Thanks to Chuck for sharing this video about saving a CJ-2A.
Will shared pics that show some of the differences between a Warn overdrive with a Husky overdrive. Regarding finding Husky parts, my best guess for parts would be Herm Tilford.
Will writes, “A little while back there was a discussion on the different overdrive units. There where several different units produced and maybe others but the ones I’ve seen are Warn, Dualmatic, Saturn, Husky and ATV overdrives that all looked similar. Saturn is a direct decedent of the Warn as Advance Adapters purchased the tooling from Warn to make the Saturn. I don’t know much about the Dualmatic or ATV except ATV is still produced as is Saturn.
Anyway I had mentioned that the Husky had a different angle to the planetary gears, Sun gear and bowl gear than Warn. These pictures show how the Warn had much more tooth angle than Husky and as such these parts do not interchange and Husky parts are near impossible to find.”
UPDATE: This was first posted in August of 2016.
This September 13, 1958, article from the Toledo Blade told the story of four italians who drove what appears to be a WWII jeep a distance of 80,000 miles from Italy to Toledo. The men, all newspapermen, planned to drive another 15,000 miles back to Italy. What a trip! I wonder if their counterparts in 2013 knew of their countrymen’s adventure?
In another of the series of why-I-am-not-working-on-jeeps-right-now posts, the warm weather has allow me to get busy the last couple of days regrading the lawn next to the guest house. The previous owner had put a garden next to the shop. We wanted that to go, because it was in the shade most of the time and because it didn’t make sense for us in that location. In addition, there was a negative slop into the south side of the guest house. Finally, we want to add a walking path along the lawn side of the shop and install some new sprinklers (line were laid for this area, but, we have discovered, the growth of the lean-to-structure (at back) and the construction of the guest house a few years ago appear to have been built, in some cases, over the original lines. So, we are having to locate this sprinkler line as we go.
Here’s what it looked like when we bought the place:
All those issues led me to regrade the area this weekend. Pulling up the grass turned out to be the most difficult part. So, I used my fork-lift forks to stab, then lift the grass. The result was this jumbled mess.
Eventually, I got all the area roughed out, with the sod and dirt piled in one big pile.
With the roughing-out completed, today I will spend some time using a level to see what other work needs to be done, mark the future walk-way path, and layout some additional lines and sprinklers.
Now I just have to find a place for all that dirt!
Dave’s been trying to figure out some wagon seats he has, but he’s got one seat that he can’t identify (he isn’t sure it belongs to a wagon).
He writes, “I do have one seat that I don’t know about.
Thinking it’s a jeep seat as I got with other jeep stuff but that’s no guarantee.
32” wide. Non folding. Some of original brackets cut.
Believe that part of rear bracket is original. Threaded holes into uprights.”
Here are some pics:
Meanwhile, Dave was investigating wagon seat differences in general. Neither of us could locate a good source of information on the differences through the years. However, using some of his wagons, he was able to surmise the following. Can anyone provide additional details on the seat differences or point to a good source??:
Per Dave, “Drivers seats are approximately 32” wide, on sliders. Early wagons did not fold (I only have a ’49 with which to compare). Some slightly later wagons driver seats do fold, but I don’t know when that stopped.
Passenger seat seems fairly consistent all throughout, about 15″ wide, long legs fold and tumble. Intermediate or rear narrow seats also about 15” wide, shorter legs fold and tumble.
Wide rear or intermediate seats as stated in parts book, 25” wide. Early ones were non folding, rear legs stab into floor brackets. Maybe also before mounting change became folding. Later fold and tumble.”
