Gordon_M

Mods feel free to move or delete this as it is a bit of an odd one, but liable to be of interest to some here. No commercial connection to seller.

A local chap in Scotland who imports vehicles has a 4 x 2 GMC for sale;

http://www.rodsnsods.co.uk/forum/vehicles-sale/1939-gmc-coe-chassis-cab-288177#post2452201

It is a 1939-40 GMC 4 x 2 COE telephone truck, Bell Services rather than army, an earlier and slightly heavier version of the wartime K43 and K44 Chevrolet Signal Corps unit.

Goodies include PTO, full COE engine and drivetrain with two speed rear, rims are 9.00 x 20 I think. I don't have the time or money but someone here may, given the rarity of the vehicle.

You need the original oil line, later stuff won't fit.

I think there was a small bore line up to a hose, then after the hose there was a metal line through the bulkhead to the gauge, but the tube at the gauge had a nut and olive on it - different from everything else on the truck.

Vintage Power Wagons, Roberts Mopar maybe, but specify the fitting for the early rectangular gauge.

Leave the jeep at home, just offroad the truck ...:angel:

How is the Napier progressing Mark ? It's been a while

( regards to Tim, too .... )

Hello again Stu, it sounds like the Kingussie sawmill one which has been running about north east Scotland for the last few years.

All the TA owners who have machines, rear armour layout drawings and the like are on Maple Leaf Up. Unfortunately joining at the minute is problematic, but he should be able to go to MLU and read as much as he wants. Most of the survivors are in Canada and Holland,

If he needs to get in touch with any of the owners and can't join to PM them, he can do it via myself or Hanno Spoelstra. I'm sure Hanno is on here somewhere too.

regards

Gordon

If it can be done - not sure - it looks like dismantling the rest of it and dropping the crank out, so that you are only left with the crank with pulley and flywheel in place, would be the best start?

More common in the US. I knew that T202 VC trucks had made it to Australia late in the war, but not T203 VF ones.

Height, width, length, weight, basically ballpark the same as the 1.5 ton Chevrolet G7100 series, even the Budd cargo body is virtually the same.

I have actual dimensions somewhere, but all the survivors I know of are in the US apart from a couple imported to Holland in the last ten years.

Check the torque of the bolts holding the flywheel to the crank .....:angel:

Sounds almost right. I would have expected the range lever to be forward for low range though.

It is possible someone may have assembled the linkage wrongly I suppose.

Getting nicer by the day

( Not sure about the caravan with the green paint though ... ) :-D

ooh, looks promising :cool2:

If it is on one of those intelligent chargers I'd just go for it. It took a couple of weeks to drain a 12 volt battery on my parked car to the point where it wouldn't start, so a couple of days at a show would be no problem.

Mine came with all sorts of wiring and switches and was professionally installed, but frankly I was paying for professional removal and refit of the car interior and proper connection to the fusebox - none of which would be a particular problem on a jeep ...:-D

If you earthed the unit where it was mounted, you would probably have to run one small gauge wire to a constant positive source ( horn feed terminal on column or the like ) and another small wire to the switched side of the ignition. Should be no bother at all on a jeep.

Unit is small enough to go inside the frame horn channel or some location like that.

Other units and suppliers are available but fitting something looks to be a good idea, jeeps have been vanishing a lot recently, and I'm sure it would be a question of getting to a stolen one before it was broken for spares.

While we are talking security. I bought a small set of steel stamps and a holder for stamping various data plates. When I'd finished, I made up my postcode as a stamp and dinged it into a few select locations on various items where it would not be obvious. This stamping could be the thing that saves the day if you suspect someone with, say, a freshly stamped chassis number that they say they have had for years - and then you point out your postcode stamping on it.

EDIT - should have mentioned - these units have an on-board battery that will keep the tracker going for at least 48 hours even if the main battery is disconnected.

I use Carrotech trackers on my cars, no commercial connection apart from being a satisfied customer. You can set them up to e-mail or SMS you if the ignition is switched on, or more significantly, if the vehicle is moved without it being switched on. Positional accuracy is five to ten metres anywhere which is great, and they are small enough to hide inside a chassis rail, although you wouldn't want a lot of metal between them and the sky, so some sort of sealed chamber inside the chassis rail at the end of the vehicle would be ideal. You can fit a GPS ariel but then you have to hide that, and the lead, too.

I do remember they would work down to 6 volt, but check that, and the unit cost was reasonable, plus a yearly sum for use of the SIM chip and tracking system - overall not too bad.

The one disadvantage is that they did drain down the vehicle batteries. I got mine set to check in with base at a lower frequency which cut down the drain, but it was still significant. I'd think on a jeep you'd need to have them wired to the vehicle, of course, but something like a solar charger in place to provide a constant small charge to make up for the tracker drain. I don't think a separate battery would work unless you were really sneaky about it - and it was huge.

Ask for Russell and tell him Gordon sent you :cool2:

Possible but not really safe, too much chance of error if it wasn't standard to start with.

The journal sizes should be written down somewhere but no idea where.

No idea of the sizes - ask Steve at Dallas Autos. Big end failure is typical as it is just the furthest away from the oil supply. You will NOT see a big end failure on the dash gauge as the flow down the crank is so restricted. Only main bearing failure will show on the gauge.

You need to clean and flush every oil passageway in the block. It might help to pull and clean or replace the water distribution tube too as blockage there will increase the heat around that cylinder ( furthest from water pump ) and contribute to the failure.

If you had the resources I'd have advised getting another engine, checking it over, swapping it in, then rebuilding the original as a spare, but I know not every has those facilities.

Canadian Chevrolet, probably a vanilla C60 cargo

It is worth reading that link above to find the bits that shouldn't be gray, tho'

Just to tidy up, Dodge truck engines up to 1939/40 were metallic silver.

Read this;

http://ww2dodge.com/node/138

Buy paint from Dallas Autos near Reading

As I remember the paint used on little gray Fergy tractor engines was about right.

I've been to the castle and seen the apartment. I knew a jeep went with it, but I'm unsure how much he used it, if ever.

Not saying he didn't, just don't know.

I can see three shots of a hard cab T212 D8A Scout Canadian Dodge pickup, which puts it in the deserts of North Africa 1941 - 2 at a guess. The lowest shot and second bottom left look like Guy Quad, which would match that

I am after some help in identifying a trailer I bought a while ago, but first a bit about me: I'm not hugely into military vehicles but have had a variety of 'Series' Landrovers over the years, the first was a 1958 2L diesel LWB that seven of us toured around what then was Yugoslavia (Rather slowly!). Then when we moved to the Welsh hills we had a 1956 SWB petrol which was our daily transport for ages. Next was an ex-military 1974ish Safari petrol which came from somewhere up in Scotland on the coast, a great landrover but it's chassis literally fell apart with rust... Steel,Ally and salt water don't mix well! The last was a 1980ish SWB diesel which was surprisingly fast and economical, but it did try to rattle your teeth out at tickover.

I'm also into ham radio and have had a variety of ex-mil radios, some of which worked, some didn't. But all interesting to experiment with.

As for the trailer, I bought it to lug firewood etc. and am pretty sure it's ex-military. A few photos are attached, anybody got an idea of what it is? There is there remains of a label that I think says 'SAR 19', it is transverse sprung,5 stud 14" wheels and seems to carry about half a ton ok.

It's such a useful trailer that rather than just use it until it falls apart, I thought it might make a nice restoration project, I like to keep things original so any info would be welcome.

Regards to all... Chris

Ifor Williams P6 or P7 I think. Used by everybody, including the military I'm sure.

I've seen that often before but never considered how they did it.

It is obviously a coarse material backing, but no sign of glue attachment ( it would be difficult to get it that neat with glue - however good )

If I had to guess I'd say the letters and signs had pins on the back and were tapped through the material into a softwood backing - that would give you a neat finish.

Robert does an excellent job of plates - he did all the plates for my T-36 in brass and they are great.

At first glance there is only one thing wrong with those plates - the stamping is too good, which will not be a problem for most people. Original Dodge plates had some of the information machine stamped, such as the truck description, weights, etc, but the date of delivery and chassis number were hand or block stamped and not done very neatly. In addition to that most of the lettering was small but chassis number and delivery date were slightly larger.

The plates are just fine - fit and forget. Serial plate needs to be riveted on, rest of the plates screwed.

Don't have a photo here, but when I was a new start in engineering all those years ago, I bought a square section thread file with eight different profiles so that I could restore NF and NC threads on my 1.5 ton Chevrolet. Still use it.

Taking a step back and having a look - there's nothing wrong with that, and nothing tricky either as it is an ordinary castellated nut locked with a split pin. It is just going to be a case of applying enough force.

Given that you have a pile of these to do, I'd be hiring a small air or electric powered hydraulic pack with a torque multiplier and a socket that fitted as neatly as you can get. Probably not worth the hire cost for a single nut, but if you have dozens of them ...

Best source for that gear is a company that makes and breaks pipe equipment flanges for petrochemical or offshore, like Hydratight or Destec.

http://www.destec.co.uk/on-site/bolt-tensioning

This would involve some expenditure but you'd save it back in time, effort, blood, and probably buying replacement nuts if you have a pile of them to do.