First MUTT restoration-M151A1

A place to post pics and descriptions of ongoing restoration projects

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rwhimes
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First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rwhimes » March 20th, 2019, 10:22 pm

New to the forum; thought I'd share my project with the community.
After finishing up an M37 last summer, wanted to try a jeep, so dragged this specimen home in August.
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Billed as a '66 Ford M151A1; no discernible hood number, and data plate long gone. Paperwork that accompanied the jeep suggested a "VIN" of 2K5981...not sure whether that jibes with the other data though??
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Made quick work of tearing her apart.
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Body rot in typical locations:
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Power pack came out easier than I expected.
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Took the body to be blasted clean and uncovered more rot than was apparent previously:
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Ended up putting most of an underbody repair kit on it as well as new rear panel, batt box floor, rear fender flares, driver's side fender, & passenger floor panels from Cameron.
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After replacing the suspect panels and shooting it with 24087, it really came back to life:
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More to come...
1966 Ford M151A1
1954 Dodge M37

SturmTyger380
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by SturmTyger380 » March 21st, 2019, 6:56 am

Wow! You jumped right in and are getting it done! It takes me forever to get anything done. The list goes on, (job, kids, wife, chores......)

Keep posting pictures for us and keep up the good work.
45' MB, ??' MBT, 47' CJ2A, 48' CJ2A,
51' M38 #1, 51' M38 #2, 51' M100,
52' M37, ??' M101A1 (1st Gulf War Vet),
53' M38A1, 53' M211, 65' M151A1, 67' M416,
MVPA #31724

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rickf
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rickf » March 21st, 2019, 8:29 am

I am impressed! Looking good. I am going in the opposite direction, I did the M-151 and now I am working on a M-37.
1964 M151A1
1984 M1008
1967 M416
04/1952 M100
12/1952 M100- Departed
AN/TSQ-114A Trailblazer- Gone

lpcoating
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by lpcoating » March 21st, 2019, 4:03 pm

Nice job!

Guy
M151 Body Panels - http://www.m151bodypanels.com/

'68 A1 - Under full resto

Hambone
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by Hambone » March 21st, 2019, 7:14 pm

Welcome to the site, nice looking Mutt, great to see another restoration, what brand paint did you use?

rwhimes
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rwhimes » March 21st, 2019, 8:26 pm

Thanks for the kind words, fellas.

Rickf-after doing the M37, I was amazed at how "dainty" the MUTT parts all seemed to be. A lot easier to handle in my suburban garage than the Dodge parts were.

Hambone-I used Gillespie paint from AJP, but I think I have to give a lot of the credit to the guy who painted the body. The parts he did for me looked almost too pretty for a MUTT. The ones I did at home, with the same paint, don't quite have the same sparkle.
1966 Ford M151A1
1954 Dodge M37

rwhimes
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rwhimes » March 21st, 2019, 11:00 pm

So, thought I'd save myself some headaches and just clean up the steering box externally and not get into the guts of it.
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Of course, it leaked like a sieve when I filled it up with gear oil. When I finally broke down and tore into it, it looked like someone had packed it with grease, which explained why there had been no leaks prior to the rebuild.
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The bottom cup and cone bearing were shot-rusty and pitted...all the little rollers spilled out everywhere! I was able to source both the cone and cup from an auto parts store online. Finally got it all reassembled and set to spec using a digital fish scale, a technique I picked up here on the forum.
Delighted that I haven't seen a drop of gear oil leak after my reluctant rebuild.
1966 Ford M151A1
1954 Dodge M37

rwhimes
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rwhimes » April 17th, 2019, 10:45 pm

Feeling up to a bit of self-abuse, I decided to install the -25 hot water heater kit on the Jeep. There was a unit in the Jeep when I bought it, but during the tear down I realized that all the hoses were shot, all of the electrical parts were missing, and neither of the hot air distribution boxes were in great shape either. So I bit the bullet and bought an NOS kit to have enough bits and pieces to complete the installation.
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I was shocked at how well the kit had weathered the years.
My original blower motor worked ok when I tested it and the heater core tested out fine at the radiator shop, so I stripped and refinished these parts and didn't have to use those from the NOS kit.
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For the assembly, I started by reading all the postings on this site and picked up several pearls.
I ended up just mounting the core to the air intake box and connecting this to the air intake on the cowl for the purposes of locating and drilling the holes in the dash lip and the passenger floorboard. I didn't trust the measurements given in the manual.
After drilling the holes I unmounted the heater and then hooked up the passenger side distribution box, and the pass side defroster hose. I poked both of the water lines through the grommets in the body just a bit to facilitate hooking them up after I bolted the heater in. The first time, I tried pre-installing the hoses and snaking them through the body while installing the heater, but I just didn't have enough clearance (or hands) to make that work.
In the end, she fit right in and the hoses easily fit on.
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The driver's side distribution box and defroster required a bit more contortion of my body, but were still not as awful as I'd imagined.
It's all plumbed in now, just need to do the electrical part of it as the last step.
1966 Ford M151A1
1954 Dodge M37

rwhimes
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rwhimes » February 2nd, 2020, 9:41 pm

Well, guys, I lost some time in the restoration on account of a move to New Orleans. We've gotten settled though and I've knocked out enough of the house projects for the Mrs. that I could escape out to the garage to get working once again.

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Decided to just clean the outside of these and drain and refill the gear oil.
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Hit a little electrical next:
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Old Suspension:
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New Suspension:
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I'll just show the picture of the finished product and leave out the days of heartache and scraped knuckles spent rebuilding these.
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This project gave me an excuse to go buy a shop press...a tool I now can't figure out how I ever lived without. Even with the press, it was still kind of an ordeal to get the old seals and races out and new ones in.
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I suffered a lot putting the front suspension back together. In the picture above, you can see that the angle of the whole arm is off-kilter. Must have spent an hour cursing this until I had an epiphany and realized that we had the lower control arm on wrong side (outside) of the attachment point. If you just pop it around to the other side everything looks a lot better!
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Question for the MUTT guru...the prior owner said that the hood number was 2K5981. Would that make sense on an A1 of this era...I think a '66?
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1966 Ford M151A1
1954 Dodge M37

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muttguru
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by muttguru » February 4th, 2020, 6:18 am

Hello Rw,

that's one lovely restoration. Congratulations. :D

The BUDD Number (24363) would tie in very nicely with that hood number of 2K 5981. That would define it as follows:-

- ex-US ARMY,
- Ford Motor Company model M151A1,
- delivered as part of Contract DA20-113-AMC-02787-(T)-(MYP)
- delivered approx. May 1966.

The engine however is a much later AMG-built engine from the 1977 M151A2 Contract (don't lose any sleep about that !).

Ken
Kind regards....
Ken

Always wanted - Details and pictures of M416 Trailer data plates & M151 data plates & body-tags for my research. Thanks!

Contact address - - muttguru@aol.com

Note for 2023..... Ken..."Less Stress - More Exercise!"

rwhimes
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rwhimes » February 4th, 2020, 11:44 pm

When the move to NOLA materialized, the engine hadn't yet been rebuilt or installed into the jeep. I decided for ease of transport, I ought to go ahead and get that done. So I had a machine shop go through the engine and I then committed a few solid weekends to getting it all put back together and installed. Decided to go with black for the engine and accessories for a little contrast to the rest of the jeep.
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1966 Ford M151A1
1954 Dodge M37

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rickf
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rickf » February 5th, 2020, 10:01 am

Did you have that engine rotating assembly balanced at the machine shop? And for future reference, when lifting the engine you want the rear chain pulling straight up on that rear lifting eye. If pulled on an angle they will break off frequently. Ask me how I know! I usually add a secondary ratchet strap from the hoist down under the back of the transmission to take the rear weight off of it. That is some really nice work there.
1964 M151A1
1984 M1008
1967 M416
04/1952 M100
12/1952 M100- Departed
AN/TSQ-114A Trailblazer- Gone

rwhimes
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rwhimes » February 5th, 2020, 11:08 pm

Thanks for the heads-up. I felt pretty timid hoisting it up the first time, but got to feeling pretty comfortable with it as I went. Guess I lucked out this time!
1966 Ford M151A1
1954 Dodge M37

rwhimes
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by rwhimes » February 9th, 2020, 11:34 pm

I have been working on assembling the grille and wasn't sure what I was going to do about the rubber strips which direct air into the radiator. I wasn't able to find these offered for sale through the usual outlets, so had to get creative.
I ended up finding rubber strip material, 2" wide and 1/16" thick, on Amazon.
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Best I can tell, this material was probably originally stapled to an "L"-shaped length of steel, which was subsequently spot welded onto the grille. Since this wasn't practical for a restoration, what I ended up doing was using wire to attach each strip to the bracket. The wire very easily pierced the rubber and I just wound the loose ends tight with pliers.

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The end result:
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1966 Ford M151A1
1954 Dodge M37

lpcoating
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Re: First MUTT restoration-M151A1

Unread post by lpcoating » February 10th, 2020, 8:13 am

Looks good. Very nice work!

Guy
M151 Body Panels - http://www.m151bodypanels.com/

'68 A1 - Under full resto

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