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1951 Unrestored CJ-3A W/ A lot of Fixin’s Auction Oct 14-15

• CATEGORIES: Auctions, CJ-3A, Features This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

Thanks to John for sharing this one-of-a-kind low-mileage jeep: 1731 miles … just stop what you are doing and check out these pics! Sadly, no engine pics are included. This jeep will be auctioned October 14-15th. Thought it is listed as a 1952 model, the serial number puts this as a 1951 model.

Some of the implements are unused!

https://www.broadarrowauctions.com/vehicles/tj22_124/1952-willys-cj-3a-jeep

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“Chassis No. 451GB117583

This four-wheel-drive CJ-3A Jeep was ordered in January 1951 from Wiley Brothers and Lewis Packard-Willys of West Chester, Pennsylvania, by Arthur Knorr. A producer of Milton Berle’s Texaco Star Theater and the Miss US and Miss Universe pageants, Mr. Knorr would occasionally escape to his wife Ruth Gray’s family home on Halfmoon Valley Road near State College, Pennsylvania. The Jeep was ordered to support any and all possible maintenance needs on the Pennsylvania property. Accordingly it was outfitted with all the options, including a Ramsey cable winch, both front and rear tops with side curtains, floor mats, a hood lock, a radiator cover, and a heater/defroster – but also a dump trailer, power take-offs in front and rear, a pulley drive, and a hydraulic implement lift, running attachments that included a Timken buzz saw, grass cutter, ‘bush and bog harrow’, and hydraulic 6-foot snow plow!

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Free-Lock Hub Instructions Dualmatic/Selectro Design

• CATEGORIES: Advertising & Brochures, Documents, Features • TAGS: This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.
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Later model Dualmatic-style-Free-Lock hubs. The name was originally part of the Free-Lock Hub Corporation

Ann’s longtime friend invited me to look at a jeep yesterday that they just inherited from her uncle. They were confused about the model, so hoped I could identify it.

From the front, the jeep was clearly an early M-38A1 (turned out to be a 1953), with the hinged grille and early fenders. The dash was also correct, the correct large hole fuel inlet, and it had the early M-38A1 cowl with screws. However, it also had a tail gate that didn’t appear added. The body itself was in great shape, yet the body wasn’t mounted using all the holes, in fact some holes were missing. The cowl also lacked both the “JEEP” stamps along the side of the cowl AND the passenger side indent common for M-38A1 bodies.

Thankfully, the uncle had kept receipts, one of which was an invoice for a replacement body. Aha, that’s why it did not have JEEP or WILLYs stamped anywhere.

But, more interesting to me than the jeep, was that another document they had was an original set of instructions for Free-Lock hubs (more on Free-Lock Hubs), the style that looks just like the Dualmatic hubs. This is the first time I’ve been able to document that at some point Free Lock branded hubs were made exactly the same as Dualmatic hubs.

As you can see in the two images below, we have basically the same set of instructions for both hubs, with one that is labeled Free-Lock and the other Dualmatic. The Dualmatic is dated “8-28-74”, which the Free-Lock has hand written instructions, which I believe indicates the Free-Lock hub instructions were from an earlier date.

Free-Lock document:

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Dualmatic document:

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These two pics show a few more details, including that there are two sets of screws on opposite sides of the hub.

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1940s? Willys Overland Watch $155 on eBay

• CATEGORIES: Features This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

Maury shared this pretty rare Willys-Overland watch. Base don the design, I’d guess this is from the late 1940s. The seller describes this as a “dash clock”. He does listed other models of watches that look to be “dash clocks”, but to me this looks more like a pocket watch. Anyone know more about this item?

View all the information on eBay

“Up for auction is this vintage Willys automobile dash mounting clock. It is in great working condition! Wind up mechanism. I do not have the mounting bracket.
Measures 2 1/4″. Selling as shown”

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Ceramic Willys Wagon Model on eBay $17.99

• CATEGORIES: Features, Models This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

I’ve never seen one of these. Is it a vintage item or was it produced more recently?

View all the information on eBay
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Added Walkways to the Property

• CATEGORIES: Features This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

As part of the continuing updates to our property, we’ve added some additional walkways. These serve three purposes. 1) We found that lots of dirt was being tracked into the bunkhouse, so that needed to be addressed; 2) the bunkhouse felt separate from the rest of the buildings and 3) we expect to replace the lean-to ‘barn’ to be replaced with an actual barn, so these walkways will help link everything together. So, we hoped extending the walkway would help incorporate the buildings.

This is one of the few tasks that we decided to hire a contractor to complete. Unfortunately, our calls to local contractors proved frustrating. We couldn’t get local folks to respond. Finally, Ann reached out to Wine Country Landscaping in Milton-Freewater, about an hour away. They gave us a free estimate and had great reviews. It’s a young company, but they are eager to grow, easy to work with, and did a great job. In fact, the guys repaired some concrete for free just to make everything look better, something they were not required to do.

At this rate, I see no reason we can’t hold some kind of jeep event next year. I’ll announce something  by January.

Here are some pre-concrete photos. This first one shows the gravel in front of the shop, an annoyance when moving something with smaller wheels from the concrete to the asphalt. To the right of the shop is a form for the new propane tank pad.

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After: The concrete now runs the northern side of the shop. The white building in back is a series of lean-tos that are super inefficient space wise. We will repurpose the lean-to materials in to a hay barn and shelter for the cows and a barn will replace the existing structure. To the right is the guesthouse.

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Another Willys Electric Light Plant

• CATEGORIES: Features This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

A reader shared a rare look at a Willys Electric Light Plant, including the sleeves during cranking. In the pic below, the Willys Electric Light Plant is on the left and a rare Alamo (electric light plant?) is on the right.

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Here is a video of the sleeve functioning:

Some more pics:

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Qualls’ Roadtrip III

• CATEGORIES: Features • TAGS: This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

(<– See Part II of the road trip)

Over the past few days Randy and Carson made good time, yet saw plenty. From Yosemite, they traveled southeast until camping somewhere in Nevada.

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The next morning, they drove to Las Vegas, Nevada, where they hit the Vegas strip. At some point, Carson broke a fan belt, so they got to spend more time than planned in Vegas.

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Back on the road, they drove to Utah. There, they met up with Jake White and others to take the offroad trip to Toquerville Falls, Utah.

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German Made WWII Jeep Model

• CATEGORIES: Features, Models This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

This model just sold on eBay for $108.51. At six inches long, it’s a good side. I was going to bid on this, and even set my alarm, but got too busy rendering 15lbs of pork fat into lard (we just had our pig butchered), so when my alarm went off to go to eBay, I turned it off, got distracted and forgot. Sigh. This is a cool one.

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1946 Vintage Engine Marine Conversion Kit Catalog on eBay

• CATEGORIES: Engine, Features This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

This unusual and rare booklet from 1946 offered marine-conversion kits from the Osco Motors Corp out of Philadelphia for standard engines from several manufacturers, including Willys-Overland. The were called “Convo-Kits”.

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“Vintage 1946 Booklet * Convo-Kits For Marine Conversion Of Ford And Jeep Motors .
Vintage Booklet – Has Lots Of Wear But Complete – From Osco Motors Corp. Philadelphia PA.
Measures App. 9 X 6 – 14 Pages .
Loc. A-39.”

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Year? CJ-3A? Laurel, MT $3500

• CATEGORIES: CJ-3A, Features, Unusual • TAGS: , , , This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated.

Jerry’s father is selling this jeep he found in Wyoming (contact Jerry via FB — https://www.facebook.com/groups/18657808157/permalink/10160120357838158).

Jerry was told this was one of about a hundred that were built by an unknown company. I looked through my archives, but could not find anything exactly like this one. Anyone ever seen one like this?

For all the work that was done to create it, it seems possible that more were made. Jerry indicates that the body is galvanized. The entire top is custom, along with the fenders, and it looks like the work is reasonably good. The doors are suicide doors. The hood looks like an original part. The cowl and dash may be original, but the dash has been modified. The fan shroud is galvanized with an old electric fan.

If forced to guess, I’d say if several hundred were built, that they were older jeeps that were stripped and rebuilt. If all like this one, they were designed for colder and wetter climates (permanent hood, perm dash, and a perm heater blower), so I could imagine these would have been constructed out of Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, or Northern Idaho.

Another theory is that if several hundred built, maybe they weren’t all built the same? Maybe some were more custom than others or more creative than others? That might explain some of the odd designs that we’ve seen over the years out of the northern Intermountain West? My assumption had been these were all home built, but perhaps not?

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