Projects My Willys Pickup Project

how the hell did i miss this thread? i love it. i have been thinking of the removing leafs myself. i dont expect completly smooth either, but better. if i can only get my engine figured out. as it turns out it doenst matter how many leaf spings you have when the thing just sits in the garage. on the other hand i am now really good at making engine noises.

 

There is a lot of support for these out there, so help is available. Good luck.

 

Hi WillyNilly

I have 1960-61 Willys truck cab in my back door yard.....still trying to figure out what I want to do with it....I love seeing old Willys trucks getting used again....
I had a 1960 Willys all stock truck about drove me over the edge with all the money spent and I never did really figure it out.....
Looks like you gotta handle on it tho...

Thank you for sharing your journey with us...

MikeC

 

Your welcome. Hang in there and join the Willys Yahoo forum, lot's of helpful people there with tons of parts. Good luck, they are a very simple once sorted.

 

Saw this earlier this year when I was in Munich.




These are from 2006 on a trip to Boise.

 

Just found this thread and really enjoyed reading it. My dad had an early '50s jeep wagon (I guess you'd call it) when I was a kid. We used it for hunting and fishing all over the Black Hills in South Dakota and that thing would go anywhere. Subscribed.

 

Went to Horses to Horsepower today. Not quite sure what's going on here....







Ok, fine, but this too???






Plus, guess what the dash is from?

 

Hmm, not quite sure why the one photo is so large.

Very clean..

 

Before:



After:

 

It was a pretty quick breeze through for us, but always good to see one of the last shows for the year in our area.

 

Time to update this thread! I haven't gotten too far on the truck. I ended up having to remove some leaves from the rear springs as well. It does not even move when I jump on the bumper. So, again, I removed one of every other until I removed three leaves.



Bushings were bad, so had to wait for another parts order.



Continued to removed the leaves.



U bolts also worn, not surprising.





New parts!



Fancy press.



Pretty much done and just in time for dump day.



Saw this on the way back from the dump.

 

I went to Willys Americas Open House last year and here are some pictures from the day.

On the way through the city.







Saw these cool bikes along the way.



We made it! First time in many years with the truck!

 

Lunch!









There's always retired fire equipment here.

 

Shop is looking good too.

 

Saw these there also.





For sale, take one!















Sunflowers.

 

It was time to head back and we heard the belt squealing. I thought the belt had stretched and tried adjusting it. Well, that didn't help and the steam from under the hood confirmed a problem. Found a place to pull over.





Ooops.



Somehow the upper hose drooped enough to touch the fan.



Good thing I had those self healing/sticking silicon wraps and was able to band aid it enough to get to San Francisco to O'Reilly's.



Bought a flex hose, which I hate, but no choice, some coolant and let it cool while we went to dinner. We continued home without issue.

 

So I decided to finally tackle the overdrive transmission. I was tired after wearing earplugs on my trip to Cazadero. Rpms were around 3K at 60mph. Deafening in a truck without insulation.





Dropping old one out.







Time to take a break. Look what came to town?

 

May as well change the clutch out.


Not bad really.



Some heat cracks need attending to.



Pilot was tough getting out.



I win!





Ooops.



The pilot was so off that the input was like a hot dog in a hallway!

Froze new bushing to install into crank.





Wooohoo, rebuilt clutch and machined flywheel.



Fit nicely.





Uggghhhhh.



Most likely caused by the excess play in the pilot offering zero support.

Ebay to the rescue.

 

New parts on a modified vehicle offers all sorts of challenges. After putting everything together and putting the trans in, the clutch have no play. Seems the new clutch fork and pivot changed the distance to the pressure plate. I had to get a shorter t/o bearing.



Out it comes again.



T/O number two. Trans back in and I'm getting faster, only 2 hours to bolt it up to check. Nope, still not enough clearance. Oy!



T/O number three is a winner!



The overdriven trans has a different speedo input. Some sort of tear drop with a gear. The old used a screw on ti a conventional speedo gear. Since I'm no reinstalling the original trans, I'll modify it to work.







I crimped it and seems secure.



Trans crossmember had a pretty good kink in it that restricted access to the bolts. I tried a pry bar, c-clamps, Visegrips and nothing worked. I finally got animal with it and used a ball peen hammer and swedged it into the gap.



Not too bad.



I hate cleaning and painting, but it must be done.



While under the truck, I noticed the cab was almost sitting on the frame. The bushings were flat. Good thing the previous owner had some in the spares. They weren't the correct height and I had to cut them down, but not a bad job.





I did have to reposition the cab since it slid forward a bit, come-a-long to the rescue.

 

I realized that I also had a leak from the steering box. Geez, should have noticed it before I installed the trans since it's now in the way. I cannot get the box out with it's long steering shaft.



I had to use a bearing splitter with puller on the pitman arm.



Proof of leakage.



Since I couldn't get the box out due to the long shaft through the frame, I took the cap out and removed the shaft by rotating it.





With the shaft out, I could unbolt the box and pull it out through the floor.



And it's out.



As old as it is, the shaft did not have much wear.



Got a new one anyway along with bushings.



New bushings and seals in with free tools from Autozone's loan program.



The outer bushing needed honing to get to the right fit, as it's a crush fit into the box and made it fit tighter.

I also had to fix the lame Scotch Loc used for the horn wire. It was actually holding the horn ****on down that is spring loaded.



Much better and now seems promising the horn will actually work.



Reinstalling box.

 

Since I had to remove both the clutch and brake pedals to get to the steering box, I wanted to try to fix the wobbly pedals.

Carriage bolt worked well as the square fit the 1/2" drive socket perfectly.







I hate cleaning and painting, did I mention that?

 

Since installing the Mazda blower motor, the torn glove box no longer fit.





I bought a new one that is abs plastic instead of cardboard. I needed to remove 3" from the box so it would fit.



My thoughts were to cut it off the end and glue a new end on it, but the box is really flimsy without the support of the backwall. So I cut it out of the middle.



Well, guess what? The taper allowed the end to fit the box and wedge itself in. I just needed to slap some PVC glue on and it worked really well.







A little felt glued in and doesn't look bad.



And it fits!



So this whole update actually took six months and you guys got the abbreviated version. I could prattle on, but at the risk of losing my small audience, I won't. LOL!

 

Proof it works!

https://www.youtube.com/embed/-PSQ3UF84uM

 

Nice work Roland. I like the video.

 

Thanks Dan!

 

Hey Willy Nilly

So how did you get that Willys to go that fast with no movement of the steering wheel??...were you sitting still on a set of rollers at a garage?

I have never seen a stock wills run that fast....can I ***ume you are not running the stock motor and rear end also??...the last Willys I had was CJ2A and if it ran over 45 mph your were chasing the steering wheel...felt more like a garden tractor than a Jeep...

Thanks for posting the video...I loved it...you should check out all the guys over at the www.oldwillysforum.com they would would see your truck I am sure...

MikeC

 

Hi Mike. The video was shot while the truck was still on stands. Needed to make sure everything was working before I dropped it down. As you can see, I have pretty large tires that helped with the stock gear ratio. I am running a Buick 231 V6, which Paul, at Willys America, states is one of the better swaps for our old Willys. I agree, not too over powering and moves the truck well.

 

Took it on a little ride.