After drooling over Jeep’s retro concepts last week, our Find of the Week for this week is a vintage Jeep you can put in your driveway. This 1951 Willys Jeep Truck 4x4 would look at home on the trail or on the farm. It’ll look a bit out of place down at the mall, but who cares?
The Willys Jeep Truck was made from 1946 through 1964, and a little over 200,000 were built. They were based on the Willys Jeep Wagon, which was in turn based on the CJ-2. The bodies were designed so that they could be stamped by factories more used to making appliances. This was because car body production was in high demand. Changes over the years were mostly engine and grille changes. The 1946 model started with the WW2 55-hp 2.2L Go Devil four-cylinder. A number of increases to larger displacement engines ended with a 3.8L Tornado inline-six producing 140 hp. The 4x4 version of these trucks came with a one ton payload rating, so the originals were better than a horse, but not great if you were in a hurry.
This particular truck left the factory with the Go Devil engine, but that has been replaced at some point with a 4.3L inline-six-cylinder engine from a 1962 Chevrolet. It is backed by a three-speed manual Borg Warner transmission (with a non-synchronized first gear) and a two-speed transfer case. It’s a 1951 model, which means it has the revised ‘vee’ grille introduced in 1950.
The owner states that this truck has some rust on the cab rain gutter, but it looks to be in good condition. There’s also a winch on the front bumper and a toolbox in the bed. It's currently for sale in Kelowna, so you're all ready for a trip to the mountains. Pick it up and go.
