1) go to your local library.
2) locate the cardfile/directory
3) look up Loch Ness Monster, Yeti, Sasquatch, Big Foot, UFO's, etc. It's likely to be filed with them.
4) It's a myth. Legend. I've never seen one. I don't KNOW anybody who's ever seen one. I've never talked to anybody who could reliably confirm the existence of such a thing.
5) If you do hear of one, it's always "I know a guy who KNOWS a guy, who knows a GUY..." it's all

but let us know if you find one, we're always up for something new and exciting!

 

theres really no such thing.....all the recent jeeps are cut up and destroyed....all the older ones are gonna cost more cuz they are rare if they are in good condition

 

I heard a while ago that France had a stock pile that they were getting rid of. I don't know what ever happaned to that but you're better off searching Ebay looking for an old M38 or GPW if those are what you're after.

 

Let me point you to THIS

To me the French Army got rid of it's last Jeep last year...
but I might be wrong...

However their is still a lot of those on the market...

 

In the mid 50's there were regular ads in Popular Mechanics and similar magazines. They had a picture of a military flatfender and a headline that said "Surplus Jeeps for $50". They weren't selling Jeeps; they were selling pamphlets telling you how to buy surplus from the military.

When I was a kid, there were stories of WW II Jeeps, still in crates and cosmoline, that could be had for next to nothing, but as Bluesman says, they were always about a "brother of a friend of a friend who's neighbor's uncle . . . "

I'm sure somebody, somewhere really did but a new-in-the-crate surplus Jeep for $50, or more likely, a bunch of them for $50 each, but it probably was in 1947.

 

Put on your diving gear...

I watched a show on TLC or something a while back that showed some post war footage of jeeps being pushed off the back of a big ship. surplus jeep being tossed overboard. I think I cried that nite.

 

In 1965-66 I worked with a guy that bought one of those "crated WWII Jeeps." It was complete, and dissasembled. I know for sure it was crated because I helped uncrate it. Everything was in cosmoline and grease. Lotsa work, but worth the effort.

I tried to get one the same way he did, but wasn't successful. I got the typical govt run-around.

A few years ago another friend was able to buy some Mity-Mites from the military - he knew someone that knew how to do it. Their policy was to sell them for scrap, so they'd make cuts in places that would make it very difficult to put back together. They torched several places in the suspension and the frame
We just rewelded the cut places, and used a few "other" parts for the suspension, like the rubber bushings. Essentially we made 2 out of the parts from 3.
He was battling with the Calif DMV to license them when he took ill and died. His widow sold them, have no idea if the new owner ever got them licensed.

 

A few years ago someone offered a one million dollor reward to anyone that could find one of the crate jeeps. No one has claimed it yet. I saw one on TV in a museum but I think it was a reproduction. The show said the only crate jeeps were in sunken ships at the bottom of sea. Hmmmm...any deep sea divers here???

 

I've seen a steel drum full of oily gyroscopes

.

 

The military was selling MUTTS (M-151s...the jeeps with the horizontal grill slats made by ford with that funky independent suspension) for a while real cheap...however they were cut in half. The MUTTS were deemed too dangerous (except for the last run of M-151A1s which still pretty unsafe) for the civilian population (and they thought some green 18yr old army private would be SAFER than the general public when given a vehicle he didn't have to pay for?!?) and basically sold for scrap. You can still find a few M-151A1s for sale, but prices are almost as bad as M38/M38A1s since there is some "ego" involved in owning one.

 

I work at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland. APG has been one of the militarys premier vehicle testing areas since the original Jeep was tested here way back when. On a daily basis I see all manner of past, present, and future, miitary vehicles. I have never seen a military jeep other than the ones that had been cut into four pieces and sold for scrap. After personally seeing the pieces I have a hard time believing that anyone would ever go through the work to put one back together. I have doubts that it could even be done withoput some major fabrication of parts destroyed in the quartering process.

 

One nice thing about a French Jeep is they would have only been used in reverse.

 

1. Yep, Crates did exist!
[*] Now those are FENDERS!
[*] Just not the way we think!
2. This is how they were shipped by Rail, July of 1944 to be loaded in Liberty ships,
3. The next to the last picture was receival at an English Ordnance Facility, 1944.
4. The troops could re-assemble the Jeep in 3 minutes flat...

 

i usually post on the mid-wheelbase board but i saw this and had to read it. i am 17 years old and ever since i was a little kid i have loved jeeps. i always wanted one cuz my grandfather who was an engineer for the army back in the korean war drove the Willy jeeps. he purchased a m38 from the military before my mother was born. it is sitting in his gatage with all the original equipment, top and all. it still ahs the issue nubers on te hood of the jeep. he hasent driven it in like 25 year or somthing. the last year it was registered was in 1979. i will probaly end up getting it. i plann on getting it restored this summer and driving it. he lives in south carolina. i live in wasington state. well thought you guys might want to know that and also i was wondering how much woud this jeep be worth fully restored with all OE, it doesn't have much rust.

 

Leve that's it!

It came just like that, brings back memories. Not sure if they are fond or not, but memories.

As I remember, it had a basic set of tools with it, enough to get it together. Instructions said it took about 4 hours for 3 men to get it assembled - I think.
During assemble you rolled it on it's side to do some of it - instructions said the roll it with 6? guys or another vehicle.

Even the stock devil digger tires had stickey preservative on them, and it worked, the tires were usable.

Two of us got it running in one long night. About 5 AM we were terrorizing the neighborhood with it - no license.

My earier post said Mighty Mites we restored - wrong, Mutts! Big, heavy, ugly things.
They were quartered, looked really bad, but it really wasn't that bad. We built two from three - reason was some parts or sections, like a chunk of the frame, was missing on each. Each one was cut similar, but different enough most of the time we could take something off the partster to use on the good ones. One looked to be almost new, looked like it had very few miles on it before getting cut up.

Lots of welding but they were coming out OK.
I wouldn't try it again, not on a Mutt, but a WWII Jeep for sure!

I'd bet the military still has some crated Jeeps somewhere in storage they forgot about. They lose things all the time. But, unfortunatly we'll never see them, they'll be given to another country.

How do you tell it's a French Jeep?
The bugs are on the tailgate.
Underarm hair on the guy's wife.

 

Just an FYI......

the modern picture that leve just posted...the crated jeep on display, with the banner for the vehicle preservation association in the background is not an original. that perticular one was re-created from specs and pictures.......its not an original thats been left in the crate. they had a blurb about it in an old JP mag a few years back.