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About eWillys
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. This section used to be split into jeeps, parts and other categories, but recent changes to eBay will require this information to be recoded.
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.
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 .
Nineteen Year Old Erik and I have been tossing a few emails back and forth over the past two days. He’s another one of these young kids who has found time to rebuild multiple jeeps. He shares his story and his jeep below:
Erik writes, “I started getting interested in restoring jeeps when my neighbor got a 43 MB and convinced me to start WW2 Reenacting. I decided that I wanted to get one too and began saving to buy one, This led me to your site were I spent almost every day looking for just the right one. As I was only 17 at the time I didn’t have much of a budget to start with so I wanted to get one that wouldn’t need too much work. I ended up finding one in california and had it shipped here. When I got it I realized that the pictures didn’t reveal how much work would actually go into it.
I began going to reenactments after I got the jeep (It wasn’t restored yet so I couldn’t bring it) and saw that the majority of reenactors who had jeeps did a work as you go kind of thing, Which caused them to not look very good. This made me decide that I would do a complete frame up restoration of mine.
It took me a year to get the jeep torn down, The frame sandblasted, I Rebuilt the engine, Transmission, transfercase, and did some bodywork to the Hood, Fenders, and grill. The body ended up being replaced as I don’t have the tools to do that. It was then rebuilt, Painted the correct OD green for the time and theater of war. I ended up making the stencils by hand and painted them onto the body.
I was able to bring it to the first Reenactment in October 2011. It was an airshow in Midland TX (I live in Houston). It was there that I was asked by a fellow reenactor to help restore his GPW. He had all of the parts he needed already purchased so it was a pretty fast restore (took around 4 months) with his help. I am now working on a 43 MB for a friend.
As promised yesterday, here are images of Claus’ Brother’s CJ-2A. Really great work!!
Claus writes, “I also promised you my brother’s nut and bolt restoration of his late 1947 CJ2a. Both of us are very fond of these vehicles – a passion that developed from a simple photograph of a CJ2a that my grandfather had on his farm in the early 1950’s (Photo attached). As we grew older our quest started and we both started searching to only find the right vehicle some 12 years later.
Parts are always a problem as they are not readily available in South Africa. The majority of parts are refurbished originals – although 60 years old, these are usually still more durable than any reproduction parts you can buy these days. When we didn’t have the right parts, we were always very happy to order from Walck’s in the US.
I am not going to give a description of the restoration – I believe the pictures speak for themselves. Perhaps it must just be mentioned that he is a bit of a perfectionist. As you look at the chassis note the nickel plated parts ….“bling” … they were purposely not painted. All elements that could get damaged by brake fluid or a wrench have been plated. The only other thing that is not quite standard is the positioning of the spare wheel. He liked the view of a complete wheel arch and the thought of a wheel’s weight on the body was a bit daunting to him, hence he opted for a M38 style spare wheel mount. He has gone through great efforts to save the body – again body parts are not available and having to ship these to Africa would have cost a fortune. So this is the best he could do with the limited access to parts.”
Below is the front housing assemply:
Here’s the rear assembly:
Here’s the chassis assembled:
Here’s a closeup of the front assembled:
See many more pics here by clicking the link below ….
Claus contacted me a little while back telling me he was from South Africa and asking if I’d be interested in seeing and sharing some pics of a CJ-2A he rebuilt. Absolutely, I responded. So, yesterday I received pics and a story of both his jeep and his brother’s jeep, which you can see here. Thanks for sharing Claus!
Claus writes, “Its winter in the southern hemisphere and unfortunately this means wet weather for us folks in the Western Cape Area of South Africa. Sunny days are few in this time of year and I/we don’t plan many trips. It must be said that the nicest days are however also during the winter months – not too hot and no wind. All very positive aspects if you are day tripping with the old vehicles.
So now for the jeeps – There are not many flat fenders left in this part of the world – quite a few numbers of CJ2a were imported during the 1946-1949 for the purpose of farming. South Africa was also one of very few countries that ordered CJ2a’s in 1948 as Military vehicles. At that time the Union Defense Force (UDF) ordered 289 units, and these came in fact all standard from the factory in olive drap. Not many survived as they had to work hard on the farms or in service. Some that did continue to “exist” where built up as challenge vehicles and so the numbers decreased drastically. To date limited numbers are on the road – we don’t really have a vintage “jeep” club in the country so it is hard to tell how many are actually “alive”. It has however emerged that many people start to convert back to the original spec CJ’s which is nice.
I consider myself very lucky and after about 12 years of intensive searching, both here in South Africa as well as my home country Namibia, found a beautiful 1948 CJ2a in very good condition on a nearby farm. The Jeep stood for about 20 years on bricks in the owners shed so it has worked only for about 2/3 of its life and those must have been gentle years, because everything was still in very good condition. To top it all it had a complete PTO and monarch governor installed. The pto is currently off so I can restore it. I was also very fortunate to pick up a set of early WARN freewheel hubs (seen on the later pictures) So that in short is the story of my CJ2a. Attached are photos for reference.
Photo1: My Jeep when purchased
Photo2: My Jeep during a short day trip on a nice summer day in the Swartland district. (It just fits so perfectly into the landscape – water reservoir and windmill)
Photo3: My Jeep with new 10 piece canvas top ordered from New Life Canvas in USA
Matt’s provided us with a couple of projects completed by Edmund Angelus Automotive. If you are near Roanoke, Virginia and are looking for someone to handle your rebuilds, you might consider them as they have rebuilt a couple of beauties. Thanks for sharing Matt! You can contact Matt at 540-354-4321.
Matt writes: “Welcome to Edmund Angelus Automotive. Located at the foot of Bent Mountain in Roanoke Virginia. I do restorations and all kinds of custom work,heck I will paint a refridgerator if pays my rate of $38.00hr. The yellow jeep is a restoration w/a body kit installed. The Green CJ-3a is the second for the same customer, it also is a off-frame restoration with the original and complete make over with nearly 900hrs, the christmas jeep as it is called by the customers two little twin boys. These are taking an average of 18 to 20 weeks to do. I am currently doing B.J.#102, It is ’46 Willys Boyer Fire Jeep w/out the fire equipment. It found its way to me in literaly pieces and in lots of boxes. Now in week 19 I am acctually able to get in it fire it up and take it around the patch.”
The next time you are in Perth, Australia, make sure you stop by and see Ben Carlin’s SEEP named Half Safe. Ben Carlin and his wife navigated their SEEP around the world back in the 1950s. I found two website’s that chronicle the adventure: David Brooks shows pictures along with the story and Leisure Wheels has a large article with a single pic. Below is the beginning of the story and below that are a few pictures. Ben Carlin also wrote two books about his adventure “Half Safe” and later ““The Other Half of Half-Safe”.
FROM DAVID BROOKS WEBSITE: “Ben Carlin (1912 – 1981) was born and attended school in Western Australia. While awaiting demobilisation after service in India in World War II, Ben noticed a US amphibious jeep among other war debris, and remarked “You know, Mac, with a bit of titivation you could go around the world in one of these things”. For some never-explained reason, Ben was not certified insane on the spot, and eventually fulfilled his dream ….”
Patrick recently purchased this flattie. It’s now road ready and a great deal of fun.
He writes, I have always had a passion for old military jeeps, even as a young kid. Can’t explain other than I think they are just cool. When I was 16, I lived in Iowa and purchased my first vehicle (I’m almost 50 now): a 1947 willys cj2a, that the previous owner had done some updating to with a 327 chevy Engine/headers/big tires. I bought it for a $1500 and thought it was THE coolest thing ever. Ever. I promptly spent the rest of my wealth (about $500) painting it. Bad ass brown.
I got about 500 miles of the hottest, ragin-est, death-defying days of my life racing and 4-wheeling that thing (invincible at 16, right?) before the natural laws of having to pay for and fix the things that gave out (plus I’m non mechanical) set in and I couldn’t afford to do that. And had to pay for it by selling it for $500 in non working order. That was 1980.
I’ve owned various newer jeeps (last was an 89 wrangler), and cars since then, but I always knew someday that I’d go back to my first love and fix one of these bad boys up hot rod style.
Last year was that year. In August, I stumbled onto eWillys from a random google search. It set off the bell in my head that it was possible to find and own one of these jeeps again, so after about a month of searching every day on your site, one struck my fancy and I set out to buy it.
The previous owners are a family of professional desert racing enthusiasts who had a family friend (also professional racer) that built this Jeep from the ground up as a labor of love in the late 90’s/early 2000 with the intention of using the best pieces/parts for desert 4-wheelin/rock climbing.
The friend had to sell, and sold to the family who basically have every toy under the sun (it was being stored in an airport hangar),
never used, and they finally decided to sell just to make room for something else They decided to sell as a whole because they wanted to pass it on to someone who would love it as much as their friend had before he had to sell.
For whatever reason, I was in the right place at the right time and purchased this vehicle on the spot for cash.
Because it was setup for off-roading, I’ve spent the better part of 7 months and $$$ to get the thing street worthy and safe enough to drive on the freeway. Now it stops like a normal car (Hydroboost!).
The particulars:
REGISTERED AS 1957 CJ5, COLOR IS CHAMPAGNE BEIGE 1996 TOYOTA CAMRY With 2-tone brown highlights. Funny, I don’t know why it’s registered as 1957.
FRAME IS 1978 JEEP CJ5
POWER STEERING AND STEERING COLUMN ARE CHEVROLET
4 WHEEL DISC BRAKES – FRONTS ARE AMERICAN MOTORS 1978
REAR BRAKES ARE 4 WHEEL PARTS WHOLESALE AFTERMARKET
HYDRATECH HYDROBOOST BRAKING SYSTEM ( http://www.hydratechbraking.com ) 2011
CUSTOM BRAKE PEDAL ASSEMBLY 2011
PARKING BRAKE IS MICRO LOCK TO THE REAR BRAKES (LEVER TYPE)
FRONT WINCH IS MILE MARKER HYDRAULIC TYPE RUNS OFF POWER STEERING (DISCONNECTED)
ENGINE:
351 FORD WINDSOR SMALL BLOCK OUT OF 1969 FORD MUSTANG. APPROX 400 HP
EDELBROCK CARB (4 BARREL) W/SPACER 2012
OIL PAN HAS 2 DRAIN PLUGS
CAPACITY IS 6 QTS, PLUS FILTER
CAMSHAFT IS HYDRAULIC (NOT MILD) OUT OF 302 C.I. SMALL BLOCK FORD
POWER STEERING PUMP IS G.M. NOT FORD
CUSTOM FUEL CELL
DRIVE TRAIN IS DANA 44S FRONT AND REAR WITH 4.27 TO 1 GEARING
FRONT HUBS ARE SUPERWINCH 30 SPLINE
REAR DRIVE SHAFT IS CV WITH OPEN KNUCKLE BY TRI COUNTRY GEAR
FRONT DRIVE SHAFT IS CUSTOM AFTERMARKET BY REEL IN UPLAND CA
RANCHO RS5000 Series Shocks AND STABILIZER SHOCK (5) 2011
NEW FRONT SHOCK TOWERS AND REINFORCED FRONT FENDERS 2011
The engine is a horse, but required a bit of transformation from an initial fuel injected system (variable H.P.up to 500 H.P. but didn’t idle at low rpm’s so well with the big cam and hard on transmission) to a traditional carb system. Some $$$ went into this process (pumps/distributor/wiring/tuning etc.).
2 different shops have worked on it and contributed to the point that it is now, which is, happily, fully operational and most awesome.
I have had it out of the shop for 2 weeks now and have already been able to enjoy this thing immeasurably. I envision having it the rest of my life.
NOTE: Nate needs NOS Amp and Temp Gauge for his new CJ-3A (or ones in good shape. If you have them, you can email him at bolducn20 [at] aol.com).
You might remember Nate’s last two rebuilds. Well, he managed to find a stock, solid CJ-3A in the Northeast. Kudos to him for that find. It looks great.
(See all three of his jeeps in the bottom picture)
Nate writes, “Anyways, the one I picked up a month or so ago is truly a rare jeep for the northeast and one that I have been searching for. The body has very little rot, all the original wiring is intact and every thing works, lights, brake light, horn, and vacuum wiper. It runs great also. I had to do a little tinkering with it to get it running good, just as good as my ’53. It also has decent breaks now too. It was missing some parts that I located like a passenger hand wiper, battery hold down, matching ’49 license plates, one seat pan and a spare tire/carrier. I added the dualmatics.
Only things I need for it are two original gauges and it is back to 100% original. The ones I need are an amp and temp gauge. If anyone has both, please let me know.
We think it came from Tennesee. On the tailgate, very faintly it says “DAVIS HOLLOW SECURITY PATROL”. We researched that and there is a seasonal campground in Tennessee by that name. There were other places too, all down south. Someone at one time painted the entire thing, and I mean everything (even the grease) with the red primer. The original color was Luzon red which can be seen in many places. Makes me want to remove the primer to bring out the original paint. Even the frame is still black in a few places!”
James emailed me recently about his recently completed Recovery CJ-6. The CJ6 is set up to be used as a ATV/UTV/Jeep Recovery vehicle in the mountains of Red River and Taos, New Mexico.
It’s a 1973 CJ-6 with a stock 304 3-speed and a D20 with Terra Low. It has a 4’lift 35’s. The bed winch is a Ramsey 10,000 pounder. On the bumper is a Smitty Built 10,000# winch mounted on the ARB bumper.
Jeff has been a reader for a couple years. Recently he shared some images of his jeeps along with his story.
“In 1970 I bought a 1943 GPW and had a lot of fun rebuilding. After a few years I sold it and bought a 53 3b. Living in Denver and having the Jeeps I couldn’t wait for snow just to try out the 4 wheel drive. I sold the 53 CJ-3B in 1992 and I always regretted selling it. I bought the green 46 in 2004. but I really wanted another 3b so I bought one out of Wyoming that was disassembled in a field.
That is the turquoise 3b in the picture. Of course I had to buy a trailer to haul the 3b back to Denver. I saw a add in craigslist for an original 57 3b so when I went to look, it wasn’t 100% original but close, so I bought it as well. The blue 2a I sent you picture of I got after a friend told me he knew a guy with an old jeep. So, thats how I ended up with that one. I wanted disc brakes and gear reduction starter and electronic ignition. These parts added to the fun building the blue 46, It starts easy and stops great!”
Larry has begun doing research on his M-38 that he has begun to restore. However, the only numbers he has so far are his hood numbers. Based on my research, I couldn’t find any pattern between hood numbers as a tool for determining an exact VIN number. So, we thought we’d post what he has in case anyone has other ideas.
Larry writes, “I realize that hood numbers were put on in random lots but it is possible that they were put on sequentially. I am narrowed down to 32 serial numbers producd for 6-52 and they begin with MC71350 -MC71382 and I know four of those numbers are assigned to M38s on another website data base My hood number is 20945312. I want to find anyone with a 6-52 M38 with numbers above or below this hood number. If they will contact me by email so I can get their hood numbers and serial numbers by seeing which way the serial numbers go as compared to the hood numbers I may be able to figure out my number. yeah its a long shot and there are those that said it cant be done that way.
Now I dont know much about the way things were done by the Willys factory but I did get assigned to a military paint shop and we were tasked to take all the vehicles we had just received straight from the factory and repaint them camo with all the numbers done in subdued black. We all had to keep records of the vehicle, the serial number, unit number as assigned, etc. While doing this I noted that the serial numbers went up consecutively and the registraion numbers assigned all went down.
So, if there are any owners of Army M38s with DOD of 6-52 and hood numbers above and below and close to the hood number 20945312, please send an email to loop_m@hotmail.com and please put M38 REQUESTEDINFO in the subject line.”
Craig’s CJ-3B has been a regular visitor at Sam’s Flatfender Willys shop in Arvada, Colorado, where Craig has allowed Sam to experiment and update his jeep in a variety of ways.
Sam’s not some shade-tree jeep mechanic; instead, he brings 45 years of experience owning, running and working in hotrod shops in California. One of the early projects he worked on was the famous Munster Mobile. Sam tried retiring, but that didn’t work for him, so when he moved to Colorado years ago he started buying jeeps for himself and rebuilding others.
It doesn’t take long when talking with Sam until you realize that he has a lot of ideas, and they all seem to be good ones. So, I am not too surprised that folks in the Colorado area keep him plenty busy restoring, updating and servicing their old jeeps. If you want to contact Sam and talk with him about your jeep, you can email him at flatfenderwillys@comcast.net or call him at 720-841-0614. His shop rates are very reasonable.
In the image below the arrow points to a rubber line. Replacing that was a priority for Sam.
Front floor removed and replaced . Dark Brown is new floor and black is removable two piece front and rear panels for access to transmission. NOTE: the arrow points to the new STEEL fuel line.
A shot of the complete Mutt. When it came time to paint it, Sam was ready, but Craig wasn’t. He said he wanted it to look like a Mutt, so he is keeping the mismatched colors like they are for now.
Wade shared these two photos with me yesterday. He writes, “We were walking a site in Mission Hills of San Diego and saw this jeep at the end of a cul-du-sac in an older house’s driveway. Also is a shot of my nephew and their jeep. Thought it was just a good jeep shot.”
Here is his nephew and their nice looking flattie.
