vw powered m274A1

New here to the site hoping to find a little information on these cool little vehicles. My grandfather has one from 1964 which i have no clue how or when he got them. I know he got them in non-running condition and that is how they have sat.

I took a good look at them and wrote down most of the information which i found important on the tag on the side. Looks as though once the engine is running that it should be drivable but the thing i noticed is its powered by a 4 cyl vw engine. Compared the the original engine am i going to be breaking parts of the axles which are expensive?

Welcome to the site.

Are you sure it is a VW engine? The early mules were horizontal opposed 4 cyl.

The early Mules are boxer type, air cooled 4 cylinders. Later on, the military started using the horizontally opposed (boxer), air cooled 2 cylinder engines.

Let's see some pictures! That will help us out.

If you have one of the early four cylinder models, it is definitely a collector's item. Most of them were later rebuilt with the two cylinder engine.

yeah, someone definitely converted this to a horizontally opposed air cooled v dub engine. I am just curious if anyone else has seen this conversion been done?

I would have some pictures but it is located about 3 hours away from me. next time i make it up there i will snap some.

I think this thread has earned this:

I have not seen this conversion, but talked to a man who did one. It required locking out the 4 steer and modifing the engine cover and deck to accomidate the fan shroud. It also required governing the engine down to a reasonable rpm. It was used successfully in the Colorado mountains to haul an elk and 5 other hunters up from a deep drainage in just one trip.

hmm, so you are saying the previous one you have heard about does not have the 4 wheel steer working? Looked like to me that the previous owner fabbed up some sort of bell housing adapter to make this work as well as the top deck was cut to make room for the extra room of the enigne. I guess i have to figure out whether its a 6v engine or 12v engine and work from there.

The gentleman stated there was not enough clearence for the rear wheels to steer with the V W engine. When I asked him about the fan shrouding he said they did have to make up a different engine cover that was humped up for the shroud. I believe he also stated there had to be some modification to the deck.

If this is the 'homeland insecurity' mule, then it is definitely a VW engine and far from stock.