Jeep CJ3A from "les Etablissements Wilford", Belgium - CJ3A37684 - 1953

[xavier_peeters]

Hi,

Here is the beginning of my CJ3A restauration. The jeep is a CJ3A from 1953. Serial number is 37684 (without any prefixes) and engine number is 3J130583.

The engines comes from the belgian army and is therefore not the original one.

I'm willing to make a complete body off restauration and want the jeep as original as possible. So there's a lot to do.

I'll need help!!!!!

Thanks in advance

Xavier

[1955CJ-5]

It looks great...you've done a lot already...

Keep the pictures coming....looks like there isn't much rust..

Randy

[OnlyOneDR]

That is really neat to see an export version of a CJ-3A.  Good luck!  I am assuming these vehicles are very uncommon to find in western Europe but yours looks mostly complete so I guess you should not have too many issues locating replacement parts.

[xavier_peeters]

Well, it's super easy to find replacement parts for MB and GPWs. CJ3A are a bit more difficult. We had a lot of those jeep in Belgium, but sadly people are turning them into WW2 jeeps instead of keeping their original look.

Below pictures of my father in his CJ3A during military service in the 60ties.

[Rus Curtis]

Very unique serial number data plate! 

Great pictures!!

[xavier_peeters]

Hi everybody,

here is an update of the work I'm doing on my 1953 CJ3A.

I completly dismounted the jeep.

All the small pieces and the small mechanical parts were cleaned and prepared to be painted.
I'm cleaning the small pieces using electrochemistry! It's slow, but it's cleaning by itself. To get a perfect finish, I sandblast the nearly cleaned up pieces. It reduces the sandblasting time, wich is good for my back...

So everywhere in the house I'm stocking boxes of renewed parts.

Parallely, I made new belgian data plates for the jeep. This jeep was sent in kit in Belgium, and was build here by "Les Etablissements Wilford". I want to keep this belgian history.

(...)

[xavier_peeters]

(...)

As I am not equiped for that, I let my engine to a specialist for a complete overhaul. The transfer case and gearbox were also renewed.

(...)

[xavier_peeters]

(...)

2 weeks ago, body and frame were sent for sandblasting and painting.


The renewed body parts are now coming back to my house. I'm still missing the frame and body. The frame is a little bit bented and the rear floor and toolbox of the body have to be changed.

(...)
 

[xavier_peeters]

(...)

For the colours,  I choose the original grey wich we found below the dataplate. It's nearly RAL 7022, but I do not know how it was called in the Willys colour pattern? Maybe Chesapeake Grey. The wheel are gonna be in a slightly dark red, candy apple red.

I still have to renew the front and back axle and then I can start to rebuild the all thing. And for that I will use the original documentation of the "Etablissements Wilford", translated in french!

I want this jeep as original as possible. It's gonna cost me a lot of €uro  but like we say here: "quand on aime, on ne compte pas!"

Thanks for reading

Xavier, from Waterloo, Belgium

[squidtone]

Xavier
Looks GREAT, keep up the good work. Assembling clean Willys parts is fun!
It's nice to see it's not going to be transformed into a WWII Jeep.