Wrenching on the Tub

This post should get me to where I actually am in the rebuild project, so all of my "back blogging" will be complete, and the posts will likely come much more infrequently.  I have been working a lot of overtime at the fire department, working part-time as a bartender/server at The Fifth Quarter, and playing in my band, Jack's High, so wrenching time has dwindled over the last week.  However, I have a few guys coming over this weekend to help me lift off the tub.  But I am getting ahead of myself.

From the factory, early Willys CJ5s had a mechanical fuel pump, whereas modern vehicles have an electric pump.  The benefits of the mechanical pump are that if the engine cuts out for whatever reason, the fuel flow immediately stops, whereas an electric pump may keep running, overfilling the carb float and potentially causing an engine bay fire.  The earliest models had a two-stage pump, in which the top stage pumped fuel, and the bottom stage creates a vacuum in the system to drive vacuum-powered accessories, most notably the wiper on the driver's side.  The vacuum-driven wipers can be problematic, as they have a leather flap inside which tends to deteriorate over time if it's not kept lubricated properly.

The old two-stage fuel pump

Also, the extra resistance of running a two-stage pump for something that admittedly doesn't run that often (a wiper), made me decide to switch to a later-model one-stage pump and convert the wiper to electric.  There were several factors involved in my decision to swap out the pump for a single-stage.  The original pump would likely need a rebuild, which cost nearly the amount of a new pump between parts and bench time. Originality was not a concern, either.  It felt like a no-brainer to convert to a single-stage.

The pump runs by means of a lever which is driven by a concentric on the cam. While it does "rob" a small amount of horsepower, and you don't have a lot to spare with only 74hp from the factory, I thought that the benefits outweighed the disadvantages.

The open hole, showing the cam

The new fuel pump, installed

That was my brief break from wrenching on the tub, and it was back to business.  Among the things I did next were:

• Removal of steering wheel and gear
• Removal of brake pedal and clutch pedal
• Disconnected speedometer drive cable
• Disconnected and labeled chassis wiring
• Removal of body mount bolts
• Removal of starter switch and disconnected high/low beam switch
• Removal of under-seat fuel tank and seats
• Disconnected throttle linkage (pedal and hand throttle) and choke cable linkage
• Removal of floor plates

Steering wheel removed (that was a bear)

 

Floor plates removed

After all of those things were accomplished, I tilted the body left to right and front to back on the frame to ensure that I was completely disconnected from the frame.  I then removed the windshield and tailgate to save on weight when lifting the body off.  When that was done, I decided to remove the roll bar.  A few of the bolts snapped off, but that's not a concern at this point, as I am likely to replace the roll bar with a full cage somewhere down the road.

 

Now you see it...

...and now you don't!

So, back to the current state, as mentioned above.  I am having a couple of friends over to help me lift the tub off the Willys and put it on a utility trailer I have so that I will have complete access for the mechanical parts of my rebuild project.  I'll keep posting as things progress!