51 HJ body/ frame seperated

[Henry's HenryJs]

I removed the body and found more damage to the frame. It took a hit front and back. I am going to try and straighten the frame at home, if not I may use the frame from the 53. Henry

[retired wrench]

  I dont know what kind of equipment you have but i takes some pretty good pressure to move this stuff. Do you have frame specs? If that front horn is off the sheet metal might not shim out. On the rear the metal is buckled and should be cut out and a patch put in. If you have another frame you could probably change the parts over in the time you will put in on this. Your choice.

[Henry's HenryJs]

The more I look at the frame I am now sure that I will use the 53 frame and switch the front suspension from the 51(which is like new) onto the 53 frame. I will probably narrow and tub the 53 as the floor is pretty non existing so the bad spot just before the rear kickup will be where I tie it in. Henry.

[retired wrench]

  Sounds like a plan.

[HJ-ETEX]

HJ Frames:
One thing I found out was that fine gravel tends to collect in the boxed section of the frame. In one HJ, I extracted a gallon bucket of gravel out of the frame but I figured that was not even 1/2 of the gravel. I just didn't have any way to get to the rest.

[Fid]

That's interesting Tom. The number 2 front cross member fills with dirt too. I remember when I was converting my '52 Vagabond to a six cylinder, I was looking for the holes in the cross member to mount the other style engine mount supports and I couldn't find them. It was because they were caked full of mud! I removed about a half a bucket of caked in dirt from that cross member.  Found the same in my other J!


There's a large round hole at each end of that crossmember. You can shove a large screwdriver in one side and push the crusty dirt out the other.
Or you could probably stick a hose in and wash it out if you have enough pressure because as I said, it was caked on so hard it looked like part of the metal where those holes were.