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mikes 1957 CJ5 restoration

mike stg

mike stg

Member
Joined
Sep 12, 2014
Hi all,
I am very new to your forum, so thanks for having me. I have had some form of offroad vehicle all of my life, from quads to rock crawlers. I really enjoy building stuff. Here is an example of my last crawler... It started out as a Suzuki Samurai:
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Here is an example of my last build..... 1947 Chevy body over an S10 drive train:
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And if your interested.... here is a link to the Chevy build: http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/showthread.php?t=526387

Here is my latest project:
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As the title indicates, it is a 1957 CJ5. It is surprisingly complete and uncut. The Samurai was all custom, the Chevy was all modern equipment modified. Since the CJ5 is so complete, I am going to go for an 'as close as possible' restore to original. I have had the CJ5 for about 3 months now and have completely stripped it down to frame, sand blasted it, cleaned and painted most of the drive train. I will post more pics very soon.

thanks,
mike
 
thanks guys. I love the '47, but it almost killed me. I went at it way to hard and fast an it wore me out. I worked on it an average of 10 hours every week for a year and a half and most of it was cleaning and body work.... and I hate cleaning and body work. :) After I was done, I took a year off and swore I would never do that again. Then along came the CJ5 and I caught the bug again. The CJ5 will be a totally different build with way less body work, so I will enjoy it.

Here are some before pics:
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I like the full roll cage, extra tool box, rear tire rack and the tow hitch on the front, but all of the diamond plate must go.... and any carnage it might be hiding.

The engine is all stock and it fired right up after replacing the battery and a few adjustments.

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Now for the tear down...
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Offf to get sand blasted
 
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The original frames are very flexy which causes the body mounts to tear away. I decided to box the frame. before:

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after:

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all painted:

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weeks and weeks of cleaning and painting suspension parts and i have most of it looking new again. Add in all new seals, bearings, rubber, brake system, fuel system and steering components and it should be as good as new. :)



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Now for the fun part... assembly :)

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It came with 15 x 6 stock wheels, but a few of them looked bad around the lug nuts. So after searching for stock wheels and stock tires and finding nothing but outragous prices, I decided to go with aftermarket wheels. I stayed as close to original as possible with 15 x 8 black steel wheels and 29" x 9" radials.

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Looks good, I want to take mine down to the frame someday. What became of the diamond plate corner guards? For sale?
 
Ya, I will sell off all of the diamond plate stuff, gas can holders (god, I can't believe what gas can holder are selling for!) and all of the internal guts of the transmission (my transmission case was literally split in half so I just purchased a complete new one). I have not decided if I will hang onto the original rims or not (not sure if they are 'original' anyway)

here is a pic of the old transmission case so you don't think I was exaggerating :)

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Has anyone ever seen a case split in two like this before? I was very surprised... all of the guts inside look very good still.
 
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I thought the body was is pristine condition when I bought it, but upon closer inspection, it will need a little work. This is a pic of the damage under the diamond plate corners.

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Not too bad. Here is a pic of the drivers side door opening:

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This will take a little more time to repair, but compared to the '47 chevy build, this will be a walk in the park. :)

I was VERY pleased.... the diamond plate on the dash was not covering up a grossly butchered dash.... just a few small holes to fill.
 
How are the floorpans and the tunnels under them? Usually they need attention....

Project looks to be making progress fast! keep the pics coming.
 
Some previous owner Ryno lined the tub, so it looks really good. They missed the inside of the tool box, so that will need some attention and all of the body mounts will need to be repaired. Fenders, Hood, tailgate and grill are in perfect condition. All in all it is in very good shape.
 
All I can say is WOW, what a pain in the arse!! Everything I read said this was hard, but WOW!!! I broke two lesser pullers and my mechanic struggled with the axle hubs for days. I ended up removing the axles first so I could clean and paint the rear axle housing. Now that I finally bought a huge puller, I could not hold the axles tight enough in my vice for the puller to work. :( Finally, after beating on the vice to tighten it up and beating on the puller, I got the hubs apart.... I think I ruined my vice though.

does this make any sense to you guys........ the long axle only had one large shim plate behind the backing plate but the short axle had about 5. Is this normal? What do these shim plates do anyway? help align the brake shoes to the drum?


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Thats a nice puller. Those hubs are a PITA. The first time i did it, it was unpleasant. The best place to do it is on the vehicle. You use a hammer to beat the part that goes on the nut around. You leave the nut on 3 threads or so, because when the hub lets lose it can become a projectile and injure whatever it hits. When you get pressure on the hub from the puller you hit the threaded portion to give it a shock. That sometimes is enough to break it free.
 
I took a week off to spend some time with visiting family... had a great time :)

Back at it this week (going on 4 months total): I got most of the engine components mounted back on. I discovered that the generator does not have the proper sized pulley, don't know how that got there. I also ran into some minor snags trying to replace the fuel lines and oil hoses. A Previous owner changed them to rubber with odd fittings. I will have to order the correct elbows. I also had some struggles with the clutch linkage.... no matter how I installed the cross bar, it just does not look correct.

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Nice work so far. I do appreciate how much work is involved… been working on a body off frame restoration of my 1947 CJ2A since last Summer. I made a few detours from original along the way, but I am getting close.
 
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