50 CJ3A "Nuthin' Fancy"

[squidtone]

She got her Jeep.
She came home for the holidays, and I took a nice drive in her new Willys! She hadn't even tried 4WD yet, so I had some fun showing her how to shift with some tricks on how to coax it in (slight roll,  wheels straight ahead, etc).
It's a Cadillac compared to my TJ Jeep. So nice. It's the gas V6, and it's pretty peppy, more HP, but not as torquey at idle as the 4.0. It's easy to stall unlike the ol' straight 6 Jeep engines.
Manual trans shifts nice, but I didn't drive it enough to figure out if the last two speeds are overdrive. (it's a 6 speed)
Anyway, I like it. It's huge, but I like it.

[squidtone]

Hi folks,
I've started on another chapter for this Jeep.

In the beginning of this thread you might have noticed my Jeep came with a half hard cab. Lots of Jeeps in the northeast were plow Jeeps, and it seems many were fitted with aftermarket hard tops. The one I found on this Jeep is a Koenig Iron Works #355 "Supertop". Compared to the Koenig "Jiffy" tops, it's got larger windows all around and full roll up door glass. Honestly, the Supertop is a little bit ugly, and/or clunky as the bigger side glass requires bigger doors with quirky little cutouts in the corners. (I'm debating changing this odd cutout.) But I've always liked the half cab look on Jeeps (going back to my Scrambler days) so I've begun "restoring" the top to install onto my Jeep. I think it might make for a fun addition in the winter months. I'll post my progress as I go.
The pictures are from November 2006 when I dragged this Jeep home.

[oldtime]

I went out of my way in 1983 to find a Koenig deluxe half cab.
I absolutely loved the visibility and solid feel of that cab.
Doors are easily removable for summer use.
This same Jeep has currently been fully rebuilt yet again with many additional upgrades but not sure yet if the .cab will be re-installed.

[squidtone]

Oldtime, Thanks so much for  that picture! The top looks great! I think I'd like to duplicate that door notch that you had...it just looks better with an angular shape. There are NOT many pictures of the Koenig supertops out there on internet land.
I love the roof rack rig.

[oldtime]

You are observant. Yes I reshaped the bottom corners of the doors.
I think one of the doors was rusted down there and I like the modified shape better.
IMHO The rebuild version of this Jeep is way cooler than it was before.
I’d take a pic of the jeeps current state but it’s raining today.
The cab has not been re-installed because I sold it.
But I may be getting that same cab back and will I definately will put it back on if I do get it.
It will be perfect for the “garage”, “gas station”, “service Jeep” look.

In the meantime I bought a NOS Kelly deluxe half cab but realized I have many great memories with that deluxe Koenig.

[oldtime]

Can I get a cab fitment dimension from you ?
Middle of Jeep back.
Exactly how far from rear of cab to rear edge of bed ?

[squidtone]

Yes. I'll try to get this dimension tomorrow. The top is now blown apart for repairs, but I was going to test fit the sides, rear panel and top piece tomorrow I hope. I have the Koenig installation directions from ewillys for this top so I'm going to do something crazy and install the top per the instructions.

[squidtone]

I've got a few shots of what this top looks like now and the repairs I'm doing. Koenig design was pretty simple using mostly flat sheet metal with simple folds. Lap joints were most common. I've started with the "sides". They are quite simple and well made. The folds are crisp and the metal is flat with no distortions. But all the bottoms have "L" braces and gussets and it's all rusted. I cut all the rust out and pieced in new sections. I duplicated the construction as close as I could. I don't have a spot welder so I did plug welds.

[squidtone]

The doors are hung on "jambs". These jambs are in two pieces: an upper jamb that attaches to the windshield, then lower jambs that connect to the upper jamb and also the tub. The two get screwed together when the top is installed. It can fit a '3A or a '3B as the jambs can adjust in height during installation.

The lower jambs are complex because they have to fill in the angled shape the tub makes in the middle of the tub toward the front. The lower jambs came with permanently welded piano hinges. (The doors are bolted to the non-welded side of each hinge.) I cut my hinges off the jambs because they were rusted and almost unmovable. I purchased some stainless steel piano hinges from McMaster Carr to replace the originals. But first I've started repairs to the jambs themselves. First shot is the finished repairs followed by a shot of the rusted section. Note all the pieces welded together.

[squidtone]

Oldtime,
I installed the top loosely. I measure 26 inches from the rear face of the rear panel to the rear edge of the bed (tailgate down to take this measurement). While I did happen to measure exactly 26 inches, keep in mind that I think there is some rather large tolerance built into the design on how the koenig top is installed, so I'd say for other installations it might vary plus/minus 3/8" or so?

The Koenig instructions say the forward edge of the sides should be 30.5 inches from the face of the dash, but in my case I can't get them closer than 31 inches; the rear of the side panels would hit the seat backs else. So, I installed it as best I could, plopped the top on, and it all sort of fits. I will have to do some tweaking here and there and I wouldn't be surprised if that 26" measurement changes a bit.

Picture of the side, rear panel and top loosely fitted, picture of back view, then picture of measurement (end of measure tape against rear panel)

[oldtime]

Thanks Dave, now that you mention it 26” sounds about dead on as best I can recall.
Yeah windshield tilt and such as that could make slight differences.

I now have a winch boom mounted in my bed right near the back wall and hoping it will clear the back wall of the Koenig half cab.
I’ll go out and measure it now.
Looks like I’d have to put about a 2” deep x 3” high x 3” wide notch in the middle of the Koenig rear wall to clear the boom.
So now I know for sure a slight mod to the cab rear wall will be needed.

Looks like you have a few repairs that you will need to address on your cab.

[squidtone]

I'm finishing up the rust repair for the doors. These also utilized basic sheet metal construction with flat sheet parts folded into all the necessary shapes. It's actually quite impressive how they came up with the origami type design for these doors. There are subtle angles throughout in order to deal with the Jeep body necking down toward the windshield.

The door panel is a flat sheet with flanged pieces welded around the perimeter with a completed assembly that is about 1 5/8" thick. I had to replace about half the flange pieces at the bottom of each door. There are flanged standoffs as well to space out the masonite "door cards". So I fabbed all the replacement parts using my vise and wood pieces to pound in folds in the patches. I sure wish I had a sheet metal brake. Before welding I painted all the joints with masterseries primer. It's the silver stuff.

[squidtone]

The bottom edge of the window opening had an upside down "J" piece to stiffen that section of sheet metal as well as prevent slicing your hands or arm when sticking your arm out the window. These were rotted (see first picture). I drilled the spot welds holding them on and then pondered on how to make new ones with a nice smooth "J" profile. I gave up on that idea and simply used 0.5 x 0.5" square tubing. I sliced the tube so that it can slip over the door edge. The slice is biased to a side so it doesn't hang into the window slot opening. Holes drilled into the "flap" on the inside of the door will be plug welded to the door panel. Then ends of the tube were folded to a curved shape and welded up as a nice detail. The holes in the door panel (drilled out when removing the old "J" piece) will be welded closed.
I think it looks pretty good.

In the last picture you can see I've drawn out the new corner shape I want to cut like oldtime did in his Jeep pictured above.

I think it's hilarious that this corner is the ONLY design flair in the whole top assembly. The whole thing from top to bottom was designed and constructed in a utilitarian style, except for the strange curved lower door corner. It's the one and only part that the Koenig designers whipped out their french curve!

[squidtone]

I'm still at it on the Koenig top "resto". This is taking quite a bit of work; the top was in pretty poor condition. I started in on the top section itself for repairs. I was surprised to find some heavy pitting to the point of getting tons of pinholes between a flange over the door opening. i had to cut the flange off and weld a whole line of the side of the top to fill in all the holes and pits. There are 4 flanges: two over the doors and two over the corner panels. All the rust is repaired and it's all welded back together awaiting final bodywork (which will happen when all the rust repairs are done).
The first picture is of the top sitting on the rear edge. Note the rust under the removed flange. Holes and pits.
The next shot shows the holes and pits after sandblasting...
The final shot shows the ground down welds with a coating of primer and awaiting the reinstallation of the right angle flange. The flange at the bottom of the image is there to mount a "headliner" of masonite (which was missing on this top.)

[squidtone]

Next was the rear panel. This is a flat sheet with right angle flanges welded to the sides. The top and bottom flanges are folded into the main sheet. The bottom was rusted away (hard to tell in the picture).
There was plenty of rust between the sheet and the side flanges too so I drilled out all the spot welds and blasted and cleaned it all up and plug welded them back on. I folded up some scrap to make a new bottom fold and stitch welded that on.