Jeeps in Olive Drab
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After losing the first Jeep contract to Willys, Ford was immediately courted to build Jeeps to the Willys design. Called the GPW (W equals Willys pattern), Ford built a total of 278,000 from January 6, 1942 to July 31, 1945. The early-1942 models had Ford in script on the rear panel, and these are the most collectable. Though the Ford-built parts from GPWs were functionally interchangeable with MBs, many differences remained between Ford and Willys Jeeps. These included the chassis, which had a U-shaped front crossmember instead of a tubular unit, many body detail differences, and a Ford script F on nearly every small part. In January of 1944, a composite body was adopted by both Ford and Willys that contained features of both designs. View Related Article
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