Three newbie questions for the M38A1 1953

[majflash]

Hello! My dad and I realized our dream and recently purchased an Army Jeep! It's a 1953 M28A1 in fairly good condition. Still needs a little tlc but we are thrilled with it. I have a couple of possibly stupid questions for a new old MV owner.

1st question is regarding the canvas top. We have it on currently for some airing out but when we opened it there were 4 metal dowels wrapped in the canvas (pictured). Our assumption is that they are meant to give stiffness to the sides of the canvas. Does this sound correct?


The second question is regarding the particular oil we should be using. Is synthetic recommended? What weight would you recommend. We are in Northwest Ohio and it will likely only be driven during the warmer Summer months.

The third question is Why on Earth did we wait so long to realize this dream! super fun!

 

[NDT]

Welcome! That is one nice M38A1! Someone did a lot of restoration on it. You want 10W30 petroleum oil in your engine. The canvas top does have rods that go from the front bow to the windshield, but they have a 90 degree turn at both ends.

 

[SturmTyger380]

There should be holes on the side of the front bows just above where the canvas is. Then on the windshield inside at the same level should be a tab with a hole in it poking to the rear. There should be two metal rods with 90 degree turns on them like NDT said. You put one end of the metal rod on the bow and the other one in the tab at the windshield. There should be little holes in the J parts of the rods to put cotter keys to keep them in place.

Nice looking M38A1!

 

[DeetFreek]

That's a great looking A1! Welcome aboard.

 

[majflash]

Thank you all for the information! Im sure we will have more questions to follow. There are some motor issues that we are tackling.

 

[majflash]

Im thinking that the original rods for the canvas were gone so the guy made these as a makeshift solution. We didnt feel the need for them as there were no issues when we drove it down the road so for now I guess we will omit them. We probably wont have the canvas up too much anyway. thanks again!

 

[dmetalmiki]

welcome to the site, hobby, and friendships with events to come.
We ran our M38A1 without those rods for years,
Oil?..We ALWAYS use Rotella Straight 30 or 40 in all the jeeps, Any year.
My WW11. jeep and the Packard run with Straight 50.

 

[exhogflyer]

No need for synthetic oil, and 10w-30 is too **** thin. use straight 30 or maybe 40 in summer.

 

[Saberr]

Synthetic will mess up all the seals, and may leak like a siv then.