WC Identification

I am trying to help someone identify this truck. The owner knows nothing about it, other than he believes it is a military vehicle.

Naturally it is some kind of WC, but there is no data plate or anything else to help figure out if the body really is military issue or if it is a civilian conversion.

Whatever the case, the body seems to be professionally made and from the same time period as the truck. Looks to be a maintenance/service truck.

Not a great pic. But here is one of the interior.

Wc id

Thought I had it but the roof line looks wrong.

I searched "Dodge WC images" and checked a few motor pools but.......

......not havin' any luck. Very unique. Look good with a hemi and a blower out of the hood.

I'll dig deeper later if it hasn't been solved but I'm sure someone will chime in.

It has the 45 Dodge front end http://www.flickr.com/photos/68490320@N04/6355264463/

Are there any builders plates on it?

I have looked online myself and didn't find anything either.

As I said above, the owner said there are no dataplates on it to indicate any builder name, serial number, etc.

That is a post war modification. Alot of it was done over in Europe after the war. There was alot of trucks given to NATO. As time went on and the trucks were rebuilt, some were stripped of thier bodies and special bodies put on. Even the US did this after the war. They took WC54 ambulances, carry alls and I have seen some WC51s were they cut the bodies off and put a bigger ambulance body on the frame. The new ambulance looked like a 4 wheel drive milk truck. This was done post war. If you ever see one of the conversitions, they did CUT the body off. The dash board is still there, but the door frames are cut off.
I have seen about 3 of the post war modifacations done on WCs. Sadly they take a nice truck and make it ugly. The 3, I saw ended up being sold for parts, then scrapped out.
One of the few, Frank USMC RET

Well even if we don't find more information on it, the owner says he is going to restore non-the-less. At least it won't end up getting scrapped.

Can you get the frame stamping number off the driver's side frame rail between the gussett and shock? I have a serial numbers data base that I can run to see what it was originally and when it was made.

snowdad said:

Can you get the frame stamping number off the driver's side frame rail between the gussett and shock? I have a serial numbers data base that I can run to see what it was originally and when it was made.

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I just saved one from the scrapper. As far as I can make out the # is 1749389 What can you tell me about it?

See if it has another digit in front of this number. There should be an 8 making it 81749389. Can you measure the wheelbase from center front axle to center rear axle? Any other information that you can provide? It is either a very late 1944 or a 1945 production run. Do you have any pics to go with it? I will look this number up tomorrow and get back with you.
Phillip

M1010plowboy,
The picture that you posted is what appears to be an M-43 ambulance. It has a solid hood that raises instead of the WC hood that is piano-hinged and the side panels do not have the louvers that the WC series has. The M-43 was an update of the WC-54 ambulance. They were made from early 1950s onward.
Phillip

snowdad said:

See if it has another digit in front of this number. There should be an 8 making it 81749389. Can you measure the wheelbase from center front axle to center rear axle? Any other information that you can provide? It is either a very late 1944 or a 1945 production run. Do you have any pics to go with it? I will look this number up tomorrow and get back with you.
Phillip

Click to expand...

I will do some more scraping to double check those numbers. I will also measure the wheelbase. Pretty sure it is a WC51. It has a M37 cab retrofitted to the WC drive line and frame. I call it baby Frankenstein

Yes, I am pretty sure it is a WC-51, but could be others. Not as likely. Let me know on the other digits.
Phillip

WC identification

Gilles...see what engine is in it...judging by the hood panel cut out on the lower right rear corner, it may be a conversion that someone did to a CDN APT, the same type truck I was driving in the Coe Hill parade, Shore Patrol...Wilf