’57 CJ5 “Swamp Thing”

rebuilt speedometer…

now that “Swamp Thing” is back on the roads, it’s time to put her to use around the farm. Today was hay day and we drove the old 5 up to Loudoun Milling to get some hay…

go figure, you can fit 10 square bails in a CJ5…

the funny thing is if we actually had a few more ratchet straps we could fit 5 more bails: 3 more across the top and 2 stacked off the tailgate. gotta get those ratchet straps…

Fixing Swamp Thing…

part of the neverending saga of trying to get this old CJ back on the roads again began today when we started to take apart the jeep (for the fourth time in the last two months) again. this time it’s to install the brand-new shiney T90 transmission that came in the mail a few days back.

so today we put the old ’57 up on jackstands out infront of the barn since it was fairly nice outside and the light was better than inside the barn.

first off, the original t90 that was in this cj seized up and upon closer inspection i realized that the oil in the case hasn’t been changed in at least a half century.

so we drained the old tranny and started pulling apart the jeep.

making room for this…

within about an hour and a half we had the old transmission and transfer case out of the jeep and were cleaning up the parts to make way for the new tranny. the hardest part has been cleaning off the fifty years worth of mud and small rocks that have been caked onto the transfer case, crossmember, and just about every other part of this cj’s undercarriage.

the next step is to separate the dana 18 from the old tranny, clean it off, and connect it to the new t90. unfortunatly we didn’t have the right socket size for the nut that holds the output shaft of the tranny to the d18 together so we had to stop work and wait until tomorrow to finish this project (not to mention it was getting too dark to see).

Swamp Thing back on the roads.
well after much frustration, the transmission went in the jeep and worked fine. nate and i took it out on a test
drive and and all worked as expected. now i just have to tighten down all the bolts so she doesn’t rattle herself to death.

thanks to nate and paul for helping me get her back on the roads.