new jeep M38A1

Hey guys! I had been hunting for a new project/toy for a few months now. I finally found it.
I just purchased my 2nd military vehicle, a locally owned M38A1 (my first MV being my 1967 Kaiser Jeep M35 6x6).

The jeep has been sitting since 2002 (when it was last tagged). The plus side is that out here in the TX panhandle rust is practically non existent so most old vehicles age very well.

After service, it ended up with our local fire department (still has VERY faded MFD Markings). After MFD service it was sold to the current owner, and now to me.

I brought it back to my house friday afternoon. Since then I have removed redneck rollbar, hood, windshield, tires, seats, pressure sprayed off 14,000,000 pounds of mud/crap, de-greased the motor, etc.

The PO stated that the motor turned over freely when the jeep was last parked (back in 2002). As a purely precautionary measure I have been soaking the cylinder bores since saturday morning. This morning I slowly turned over the motor by hand. Now it turns freely and smoothly.

the only downside is that while spraying pb blaster, my straw attachment (that directs the flow from the nozzle) flew off the nozzle/button and into the cylinder head...doh! I would imagine that the first time I crank the motor "for real" (with spark/fuel) the straw thing would just break up and pass through the exhaust....but I'm not too sure about that plan. I really don't want to pull the head if I can avoid it.
What are y'all thoughts on this?

My next step is to send off the carb for a rebuild (even though my motorbike has a carb...I am a diesel motor guy at heart so carbs are a basically foreign concept to me), add oil to the motor. Once the carb returns, Ill add the new set of plugs/wires and try to crank it over "for real"

This afternoon I pulled the drivers seat, fuel tank, battery trays (dead bird surprise hidden below battery tray) and completed a good pressure spraying/cleaning of the entire "interior". I have continued to oil the cylinders and the motor is turning easier and easier as the day goes on.

Monday I am going to Lubbock on a work related trip. I am going to see if I can pick up an oil filter and two group 51 batteries from O'Reillys (lubbock O'Reillys is the area hub so I am hoping they have lots of parts that the "normal" stores don't usually stock...including my filter).

Monday afternoon I am going to try and get the carb pulled. I would like to get it in the mail Tuesday morning and en route to the rebuilder....but time will tell. Work tends to get in the way...A LOT.

I am probably going to hold off on doing any more work to the "interior" at this point (outside of basic cleaning). I have not decided what I want to do with the inside of the Jeep and which direction I want to take this project...might coat interior with bed liner...again...not sure. Also I am going to wait and make sure that the motor will run before taking the interior any further.

Today I filled the motor with oil and installed two new batteries. The jeep turned over under its own power for the first time since 2002. We have compression....now I need fuel and spark!!!

I am waiting for parts to arrive...it sucks having to wait.

I wish USPS had a super mega fast shipping mode...

Well some more parts arrived but no spark plug wires yet...they are still in transit.

Today I was actually off from work. I decided to do some riding on the motorbike vs spending all day working on the jeep. We are short handed at work so we get every 3rd weekend truly "off". Off has the quotes because we are still subject to being called out of something big kicks off (I work for the local sheriff's office).
However I did spend a few hours this evening working on the jeep since the weather is AWESOME.

This evening I knocked out a few things:
-freed up the brake lever from the clutch lever with the help of PB blaster and fresh grease (the pedals were moving together)
-re-installed the fuel tank (after inspection with snake camera & a good rinse)
-re-installed drivers seat frame (no seat yet)
-removed PO license plates
-removed some of the POs wiring (PO had wired up a horn & license plate light which were also removed)
-installed two new batteries with quick disconnects (so I can charge batteries individually...if needed)

Well my spark  plug wires FINALLY arrived...dang UPS!!! I installed my new plugs and wires(plugs not in the block so I can visually check spark. The M38A1 has spark!

Last week (when I had the tank pulled) I rinsed out the old fuel and ran a snake camera/inspection camera down inside of it. The tank is REALLY clean.
I picked up 5gal of fuel after work today and tossed it in the fuel tank with some seafoam. I cranked the motor over a few times and now I have fuel...woohoo!!!
Obviously it took a few cranking treatments for me to push out all the old fuel. Once the old fuel was pushed out of the system, I reconnected everything to the carb.
I haven't tested my carb...yet.

After all this I went into my house for a bite to eat.

I came back outside after enjoying some food and noticed a pretty good sized mark/stain on the ground. I did some looking and apparently I have a pin-hole leak in the fuel tank of the jeep. I pulled the tank and turned it on its side. I have a temporary fix in place but I will complete a "real" fix once the jeep is up and running.

Tomorrow I am going to re-install the fuel tank and then check the carb...assuming work does not get in the way.

ITS ALIVE!!! After 12 years of sitting, the Jeep finally returns to the land of the living!!!

I was able to pull the straw using one of those magic claw things.

today I installed the new plugs + wires. I decided to pull the carb and give it a good cleaning.
The carb was full of old nasty fuel. Also the accelerator pump spring keeper had become detached from the shaft (I replaced the keeper on the shaft).
On reassembly I filled the bowl with seafoam. After re-installation the jeep was soooo close to catching (it sure was trying).
I gave the Jeep a small shot of start fluid and she kicked off. The Jeep ran fairly well....it blew out a bunch of crap/mice nest/oil out of the exhaust.

(most) everything is looking good on the jeep.

I have three main issues that I am going to tackle next. I might find that they are the same issue once I tear into the motor.
1. motor burning oil after approx 45sec of running (heavy blue smoke out exhaust).
2. possible sticky valve (I did the "old timer" test by holding a piece of paper up to the exhaust pipe. the jeep attempts to suck in the paper every so often).
3. tick around valve cover.

I am reading the manual to what it says concerning these issues.

Off the top of my head:
I am going to start with adjusting the intake valves (since it is super easy/quick) and a compression check. The compression check will determine my next course of action.

This is a project jeep so I may pull the head just for the heck of it (and so I will have the experience of pulling the head off a vehicle).

I will update as more info becomes available.

This morning I ordered a compression tester for $21 off ebay. It should be here in a few days and I can test compression.

After work today I checked the oil and started the jeep. Still had large amounts of blue smoke and a light tic near the valve cover (I used the screwdriver to the ear method to located the tic).

I got a wild hair about me and decided to use up some seafoam I had sitting around. I seafoamed-ed the upper end of the engine and added some to the motor oil in hopes that it would clean out any crap the Jeep had accumulated after sitting for 12 years...also because I was bored and wanted to occupy some time (idle hands are the devils plaything...right?). I should note that I already had seafoam in the fuel/carb to clean out the carb.

I let the seafoam sit in the upper end of the motor for about 45min. After cranking I had the usual stinky white smoke that is seafoam (along with my blue smoke). I let the jeep run for approx 30-45min. I mixed up the throttle between idle/mid rpm/high rpms. As the running time increased I noticed that the the jeep smoked less white smoke. Eventually the white smoke stopped all together (assuming because upper-end seafoam was gone/used). Eventually the blue smoke stopped as well.... which was a pleasant surprise. During todays running of the motor, the blue smoke progressed from smoking all the time to smoking only during throttle acceleration to no blue smoke at all.

***correlation does NOT imply causation***
I can't say for sure if the seafoam helped my blue smoke issue or not. I might have just burned off all the residual oil/crap I had used to coat the cylinders before cranking. WHO KNOWS?!?!?!?
All I can say for sure is that I enjoyed making a huge stinky white smoke cloud (who doesn't???) and I will might be sending the City of Lakeview an invoice for mosquito control (yes, this half sentence is sarcasm for those few ppl who have no funny bone)
***correlation does NOT imply causation***

This weekend I am going to drain & fill fluids in the drivetrain (x-mission, x-fer case, and front/rear differentials). I also need to purchase said fluids (tomorrow) once I decide what fluids to purchase...based on my searching, I can see that there are many many schools of thought on this subject.

Eventually I am going to start on the brakes but I am having to soak the drivers/front drum in PB blaster while tapping on it from various directions... I can't get those three darn screws to release from the drum (so I can pull the hub/drum). I may tackle the rear end brakes (since those are free) if work/time/weather allows but we shall see what the weekend has in store.

Pretty cool. Thanks for posting man.

CRUX wrote:

Pretty cool. Thanks for posting man.

no prob! there is more to come too!

Well today I decided that I wanted to drive my Jeep before several events occured.
1. before Winter/Snow decides to roll in
2. before I get too far along in the project where I can't drive it for several months (ie tub removal, etc).

I still have not had a chance to work on the brakes. So this drive was done with no brakes..but I was in a field and wasn't worried about having to swerve to miss anything.

I slapped the wheels/tires back on the Jeep and putted around in the field next to my house. IT WAS AWESOME!!! It's nice when hard work pays off. I ran around in 2hi, 4hi, and 4lo. Everything performed flawlessly.

I did not re-install the windshield for my drive but I did install the hood...because the chicks dig it!

I know the rules: PICS OR IT DIDNT HAPPEN!!!! (pics below)

Today I drove the jeep a little. Once again I just piddled around in the field next to my house...it was still SUPER FUN!!! Unfortunately the rain decided to roll in and killed my fun.

Tomorrow I am considering pulling the grill, fenders, and body tub. I would like to start working on the chassis/frame with my needle scaler. After cleaning the frame and checking or rust I would like to eventually hit it with a coat of chassis saver/por15/whatever...but that is still a ways away.

I have been doing some pretty serious thinking about how far I want to take my Jeep in terms of my "rebuild". I put rebuild in quotes because I am not going to do anything like a "super authentic only used once per year mega meticulous" rebuild. However I did buy this Jeep to learn/enjoy and have the full intention of tearing this thing apart....just because (also it is mostly super easy because there are not much to these old Willys Jeeps).

At first I had been thinking that I would put everything on hold (outside of fixing the brakes) and wait until winter ended. Even though I am in Texas, I am in the panhandle and we get some pretty serious snow/ice up here. I do not really want to freeze my arse off working in my carport all winter. The downside to this plan is that I would not be making any progress on the Jeep whatsoever.....I didn't really like this idea.

I have been trying to think of plan that would allow me to complete at least SOME work on the Jeep throughout the winter....without loosing any body parts to gangrene.

Today I got the idea that my body tub MIGHT fit into my shop-room/enclosed garage. The room/shop is about 9ft wide and approximately 30ft long. I currently use it as a place to park/work on the motorbike. I also have tools, compressor, kayaks hanging on the walls, etc. I was not worried about the tub fitting interior of the room.... I was worried about the entrance (landlord installed a sliding glass door). So I measured the jeep and even with the sliding glass door...I will be able to fit the body into the room but just BARELY!!! (I will obviously have to have the tub on its side). This would allow me to complete some body work (rust removal, possibly apply bed liner to the floors/wheel wells/bed, some paint, and apply an undercoating). If I decide to follow this plan I would be MUCH further ahead of the game after winter clears out.

I still have not decided on a "game plan"....yet. Both plans have their pros/cons.
What I really need is to built a super awesome heated/cooled shop for my toys...all it takes is money!!!

Well I have been spending the last few days working on my data plates.
I read A LOT of articles online. Some guys use electrolysis, some guys painted/sanded, etc.

This is how I did it:

1. clean everything with sponge/wd40
2. remove plates from master plate (after realizing I should have done this first) and clean both sides of plates.
3. soaked willys plate (painted) in brake fluid. soak other plates in vinegar.  At this point the willys plate requires no more work. It is complete.  (etched aluminum vs brass).

4. give the plates a good scrubbing of brasso.
5. paint using a semi-gloss black. sand using emory board to show the raised stampings/numbers/etc.
6. coat everything with a nice clear coat.
7. celebrate and post pics on FB!

I actually painted/sanded twice. the first attempt did not turn out as well as I had hoped. The 2nd attempt is not perfect but I am happy with how they turned out.


fresh off the Jeep:


after cleaning:


after vinegar soak:


result after first paint/sanding (no clear coat. this attempt was the failure):



2nd attempt was much better. This picture was taken while clear coat was drying:

After work today, I removed both fenders, grill, and radiator.
the "coolant" in the radiator was greenish- brown...ugh. I am hoping this was caused by extended sitting in the field vs contamination from somewhere inside the motor.

Wow, those turned out nice!

I have to put progress on hold for a couple of days. I am attending a wedding this weekend so I will be out of pocket from weds-sunday. I have also been working 10hr shifts (sat-tuesday) so I can still get in my 40hrs at the office....so that leaves almost no time to work on the Jeep.
I did however remove both fenders, hood, grill, and radiator.

Once I get back on monday, I will complete a compression test and then continue with the teardown. I am hoping to have the body off here pretty quickly.

Unfortunately no updates on my progress. I have three issues that I am working against here.

1. Sunset here is 540pm which totally sucks!!!. I get off at 6p. It sucks working at night in the freezing weather.

2. Usually during the winter months, it is below freezing by the time I get home. I am working under my carport. I do not have a fancy heated/cooled shop or anything fancy.

3. My Sheriff's Office is sending me to an EMT course. The course is also taking up a lot of my spare time.

This weekend we are forecasted for a high of 54. I am actually off of work too. I am planning on doing some more work to the Jeep over the weekend. I would like to get the tub pulled.

Looking forward to the updates

Ordered a new water pump and driver cushion today.
The temp got up to 36* degrees today... a little too chilly to work on the jeep. I haven't forgotten about the old girl though.

finally got around to installing the water pump. It was a BEAUTIFUL day.

The old pump was gross as was the cooling system. Once I get everything back together I am going to have to flush the cooling system several times (based on the way everything looks).

I installed the new pump and the pulley sets about 1/4in too far forward ARGH!!! (apparently it is a fairly common issue) I am going to see if a local machine shop can press the pulley further down on the shaft....we shall see.

I think I got it all figured out. Crisis averted.
I am waiting on parts. They shipped out today (like a week after I placed my order)

both rad hoses, bypass house are in the mail.
Once they arrive I will finally be able to finish out my water pump swap.

What's the status?

still rocking along.got the new water pump installed. New hoses/clamps/etc.

I have been flushing out the cooling system.Every time it gets a little cleaner and I see a little less crap.