I don't know if there is any interest to this but thought I might show what I am currently working on. I bought an Australian No.4 Army Trailer, though they were used by all our armed forces. Originally bought to just use the tub as a bed for my Grand Willys project, but it would need too many modifications in resizing to be practical for that. So going to do a partial restoration on it to make it structurally sound so it can be sold off. I don't want to put too much time and money into it and not recoup my investment.
Though similar in dimension to the Willys trailer used in the USA, these Australian ones had different stampings on the ends, guards, and other details. Notice the Willys or Bantam trailer behind it to compare.
It looked really good in the eBay ad shown in the first picture, but what I got was not what I expected. They also took the springs, axle, wheels and tyres by the time I picked it up a few days after the auction had ended! They swapped back the original ones that the trailer was supposed to have thinking they were doing a favour from a restoration point of view. Guess if a restorer wants a period correct one, it might add value to it. I took it home just flipped over on my dads 6x4 trailer.
Stripped the wheels, axle, suspension and the whole A frame off before even un-strapping it. Must have taken half the weight off doing that. The axle is particularly heavy being full floating.
The A frame was in really great nick and just unbolts. Has the original drop down support leg and pintle hook which are quite valuable.
Here is my tag. 2WH means 2 wheels. 8 CWT is 8 Counter Weight, ( 8x112 = 896 lbs), just over 400 kg. Made in 1945. FMC shows it was made by the Ford Manufacturing Company in Geelong. They were also made by GMH in Adelaide. More information of them here.
http://jeepdraw.com/TRAILER-AUSSIE.html
Found these original army specs for my trailer online on the G503 site. My exact trailer was actually pictured on there too as an example. Couldn't believe it when the serial numbers matched!
Thought I would start the trailer repairs on fixing this impact spot.
Looks like most of the damage is centred around the one area.
Welded on a piece from my slide hammer kit.
It is a pretty big one and just started sliding the weight towards me to pull the bend out.
Came up pretty well. Went right around all the sides and was able to straighten the rest with just careful massaging with a lead filled rubber mallet.