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I Built the Only 2026 WWII Jeep

183 points by martey

by fusslo

0 subcomment

That's an insane amount of work. An amazing adventure and a saint of a wife!
I'm wondering if there'll be any follow up:
Thats a lot of metal in the engine oil. Whats the source? is there a fix? or is it just 'breaking in' a new motor?
Did he ever solve the overheating problems?
Did he ever finish the headlights and other small items?
and now what does he do with all the duplicate/spare parts?
I've done a couple extremely high stress road trips, so I fully empathize with him passing out every time he had to pull over. What a fun read; I love these ultra-long-form articles.

by ggm

4 subcomments

The important point is "from as much ebay parts as possible" because I suspect there are still "jeep in a crate" boxes where all you have to do is remove the Cosmolene (this is undoubtedly not all you have to do btw)

by dofm

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"o my god I lob a yeep"
Super article. Something to actually read, great photos. "How I Got Myself In This Predicament" is just the sort of subheading I like to read.

by RugnirViking

1 subcomments

I wish he shared what it cost him overall. I can already see from some of the numbers and some guesswork that it must not be a flattering sum, but I still want to see it!

by Shalomboy

1 subcomments

I love the Autopian, glad they're on the HN front page. David Tracy's Jeep antics have kept me up at night worrying for at least 10 years now.

by bombcar

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This kind of story makes you realize what a true marvel the modern production line is - so many moving parts that have to line up just right each time to be able to produce vehicles as fast as we do.

by thisisauserid

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Just like they eventually added to WWII Jeeps, it needs a huge anti-decapitation pole on the front (maybe a really cool (and huge) hood ornament?).

by dominicrose

1 subcomments

There's a Wheeler Dealers episode where Edd China takes care of a WWII Jeep.

by usrusr

1 subcomments

Is it truly a 2026 car though, if it does not come with an ungodly amount of attention beep nagware that cannot be permanently disabled?

by bushwart

3 subcomments

Wonderful project. But alarm bells went off in my head when I saw the picture of the helper, wearing gloves, holding a part to be drilled while the author held the drill centimeters away from the helper's gloved hands. I hope that was just for illustration purposes.
pic: https://images-stag.jazelc.com/uploads/theautopian-m2en/Scre...

by thomasjb

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I can see the appeal, not having to deal with much rust or bolts breaking (the 2 things which cause the most trouble for me in working on vehicles). 800 miles across the desert is some way to run it in though!

by jaffa2

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a decent long form article with pictures, a story, well written, and something of interest. I will read this fully later as it will require some time. Good work!

by MontagFTB

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This article was tremendous. My dad and I rebuilt an old GPW as my car in high school. His brother bought it as his car for high school a generation earlier. This article and the video are a love letter to that old car- a quirky, heavy, underpowered, beautiful legend.

by hvs

3 subcomments

One of my great regrets in life is not knowing anything about how to rebuild an engine (and various other car parts). It's not exactly a cheap hobby, so it's probably for the best, but I have the feeling I would love working on cars (my wife probably not so much).

by elzbardico

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Incredible project.
And how much I love that this is an article instead of an youtube video.

by jbailes

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Wow. This is super neat. After having gotten my hands dirty on a 30+ year old car, I can definitely see why it would be desirable to have a relatively new frame to start from vs. a WWII Jeep.

by steve-atx-7600

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Good skills to have for mad-maxing it thru the desert after the ai apocalypse :)

by stronglikedan

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"the only" is hardly ever correct. you built the only one that you know of

by baerbelblue

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[flagged]

by babakzy

0 subcomment

Cool, maybe worth it!