Subscribed, nice job. My pile. Traded my way into this. Going to use the use the back of a 47 Ford cab to fix mine. Somebody on here clued me in that the rear of the Willys door matches the curve of the Ford door jamb, yep really close. Using beater sedan doors that I am collecting for the belt line. Happy New Year, John
Awsome build! Always loved those Willys pickups! You better check that cam shaft in the engine. Marine applications have a different power band and will perform poorly in an automotive application. Don't want to see ya get that thing together and have to take it apart again!!
Thanks. The cam is an old Erson 465 grind. Should work fine for now. Will probably go bigger later, but right now I just want to hear it run through open headers in the Willys! Man Kev, I'm jealous of you being able to mockup your chassis out in the sunshine! It's freezing ass cold here, you can see the propane heater burning in some of my pictures!
I've seen a couple late 40's to early 50's Ford pickups used to build Willys gasser pickup clones. They both used Ford cabs, with Willys glass tilt frontends, and custom built, or cut down boxes. At first glance they were not recognisable as Fords, and one of them was customized enough to not be noticeable even with a good long look.
Began the process of skinning the roof with the sheetmetal that I salvaged from the rusted pickup cab. I wanted to remove the driprail but keep the stock curve at the edge of the roof. The pickup roof was rusted out at the drip rail flange so I had to fold over the lip from the sedan above the door and lay the edge of the pickup roof over the top. Not quite finished, but here's the progress. The pickup roof section. The back window is rusted out, so I will be using a narrowed and sectioned window from a '50 Chev pickup. It has basically the same shape as the Willys.
That is actually a real Willys pickup cab back and roof. That was about all I could salvage from the '40 cab that I bought.
Not much new right now, just lots of little welds on the roof. I did buy a set of used headers off of that auction sight and had to see what they looked like.
The headers look like a good fit, don't know how close they will be to the fender once they are on but look good anyhow. Making good progress on it overall too, come spring when you roll it out of the garage it should look pretty damn righteous .
Started on the fugly rusted out back window this weekend. Cut the rear window out oF a '50 Chev cab. Making it a bunch smaller, the pattern for the new window is in the opening. Here's the replacement window mocked up. I've still got a bunch of trimming, grinding and welding to do.
My understanding is the '37-'39 were 100", 1940 - 102" & 1941/42- 104". But yes the pickup, sedan and coupe were all the same for specific year.
So between my regular job and volunteer work, I haven't had much time to work on the Willys. I have been getting a Dana 60 ready to go in my O/T '71 Road Runner so that I can put the 4.10 posi 8 3/4 that is in it in the Willys. I did manage to get the back window tacked in TWICE! Lesson learned- don't get in a hurry and measure twice or you may end up with a crooked window. It was only an 1/8 of an inch, but I knew it would drive me nuts if I didn't fix it.
I have also been doing some late night internet shopping and scored some good deals. Some more engine parts. The valley cover came from Jr. Thompson. A set of Aldan Eagle double adjustable coil-overs for the rear. And a set of Dutchman race axles with green bearings for the 8 3/4 rearend. I hope to get the rearend swap done in the Road Runner this weekend so that I can get the rearend set in the Willys. Then it's back to welding sheetmetal.
So the springs on my Craigslist front axle weren't up to weight of the hemi so I ordered a new pair from Speedway bolted them in. You can see in the picture that they are actually starting to bend backwards just after the front eye. New springs in place- much better!
The Jalopy Journal
