Also, take a look at pages 259 to 266 in All American Wonder Vol 2. Good
picture of a Ford-stencilled crate with markings, plus other pictures of
assembly and written instructions for un-crating.
Antoine
(Ex Willys 1943 + MBT Trailer owner - sigh!)
----- Original Message -----
From: "JOHN SEIDTS" <john@astory.com>
To: "Military Vehicles Mailing List" <mil-veh@mil-veh.org>
Sent: Sunday, October 29, 2000 7:18 AM
Subject: Re: [MV] Crated Jeeps- IT'S NOT A MYTH
> First, I want to direct your attention to this photo on the G503 website
>
> http://www.g503.com/pharchive.html?step=2&xid=3
>
> This is a photo of crated jeeps, and if you go through the rest of the
> archives, they show jeeps in other stages of assembly.
>
> You were right in saying that the government did not crate jeeps for
> shipment overseas. This was probably done by a contractor to Willys or
> Ford. The probability of finding one of these in intact condition is very
> slim, as the vehicles were probably all used up by overseas units.
However,
> I am sure one exists some where.... Mike Scholer, of restoration note,
> built a jeep in a crate. He sold it to a collector in Japan.
>
> As for other items, shipping in crates was absolutely necessary for
> conservation of space. I have a copy of the original Department of
Commerce
> guidelines for packaging for overseas shipment in WWII, and there are
> explicit instructions on how to package everything from pot-bellied stoves
> to bulldozers. These instructions were written for manufacturers to
comply
> with shipping space limitations, and properly mark their crates with
> information vital to hoisting and balancing a ship load- pounds per cubic
> feet, center of gravity, hard points, etc.
>
> Larger trucks than jeeps were shipped in other ways. WC51's and WC62's
were
> stacked on top of each other, and were probably shipped this way. Also,
> later in the war (after 1943), when there was not so much of a problem
with
> shipping losses, the regulations were probably relaxed, and jeeps did go
> overseas un-crated.
>
> But they were built, and there probably exists somewhere one never
> un-crated. It will either pop out of the woodwork one of these days, or
go
> to the smelter, or get buried as building foundation (that's how two 1918
> Indians were recently found).
>
>
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Nov 01 2000 - 21:37:50 PST