'48 steering bellcranks

[oldscot3]

I bought a donor jeep for parts today, a quick look at the frame tag seems to indicate it's a '48 like my driver jeep. I did notice however, the steering bellcrank arcs up and back down on the arm that connects the drag link. The crank on my driver jeep is fairly straight and bends up to the drag link. The catalog shows both, but quite a price difference, what's the deal?

[LarrBeard]

The catalog shows both, but quite a price difference, what's the deal?

On the original CJ-2A's (through early '48) the bell crank has a 3/4" bell crank pin. It appears that there was a mid-model year break-in change some time in 1948 that carried through a lot of the later model years that changed the bell crank pin to a different size (7/8" and 1-1/8") pin.

The CJ-2A with small crank pin was probably built early in the model year, the other one later on.

This goes back to the First And Second Rules of Jeep:

1. What you see is what you have. Trust nothing written or told you until you verify it for yourself.

2. Never say "Willys would have never ........... ". In this case " ..... have changed the design of the steering system in mid-model year". Yep, they did.

Hopefully you won't need the exotic, early one!

[pelago]

just to add fuel to fire i have a xtra steering box and bell crank available, box rebuilt and ready to go

[oldscot3]

good to know... my driver cj2 steers pretty good, I did however, notice the bell crank jumps up and down a bit when I move the steering wheel left & right quickly. I have a rebuild kit ready to go in but haven't put it in yet. Hopefully, my bell crank will be good but if it's egged out what do you have your crank priced at? If I need one, it would be the one with the straighter arm and the end turned upwards.