You are a good man - makes good sense...except my OCD... 😂

Don - I have a few NOS babbit connecting rods.  There are no potholes on the surface - they are perfectly smooth.  That being said, I would definitely plastigauge a couple of them and see how much wear you have.  If they are still within tolerance, you probably will be fine with them...even with imperfections.

Misery loves company Scott!😂. Rest assured that I am going to spend some time this weekend, trying to identify the high and low speed winding so I can fix that beast and get it running again.  I am going to have to put myself on the clock.....

We may need to fly you up for a guest spot Dana! 

Jay Turnbull Alright, Doc....sounds like the prescription is "as much as I can handle"....I can handle that!  🤩

Always keeping me on my toes Scott - appreciate that!  I checked the last ORD 9....calls for cad plated nuts.  The TM 10-1206 (first edition slat grill) shows "rust proof nuts" - not brass.  The 1943 dated GPW parts also shows cad plated nuts.  Appears that brass nuts were not ever called for on the WW2 jeep!  That being said, they are still a great idea! Studebaker went first class!😜Big Mat did indeed put the hurt on the brush hog blade and won.  As far as I know, no humans, bolts or mowers were injured in the process!  A win for all!!Hope you are well and getting warmer my friend!

I am not sure Howard.  I am of the understanding that the manifold is different on the Weasel, but that part could very well be the same.  The Studebaker part number for that cover is different than the ones I have found.....not sure.If you think about it, grab a picture of the post war cover - hopefully it would work!

Cheers!

Let me see if I got this straight Jay....are you saying this "contagion" is a bad thing?🤣.   "Dreaded"?😂

Whatever happened to the "guy with the most toys wins?"You did hit a chord with the comment about the multiplier effect....whatever project sense I have gets pretty quickly thrown out the window if someone blurts "not that bad"....😜

I am trying to schedule a call with a shrink to see if he can shed any light on this contagion...treatment options....hmmmmm😁

Dana Smith.......I don't kiss and tell😍

It was kinda odd that the disassembly and cleaning "fixed" the problem.  There was junk in the water pump, but I can't see it stopping all flow.  We blew it out, scrapped a little junk off of the inside and reassembled.   What was not shown is that on the second start, the engine started getting warm...like close to 200 and then just as quickly settled down to 185 and stayed there - pretty reasonable temp.I am not sure that the thermostat wasn't sticking.  When we took the water pump off, we also pulled the thermostat and put the heat gun on it.  It took quite a bit of heat to get it to move, then it started working.  Maybe it is sticky/defective and takes more to open.The water pump was indeed the one that was on the engine when we removed it from the Weasel.  It doesn't leak, and after taking it apart, it was very clean inside.  I have a couple of rebuild kits, but at this point, I am probably going to pull the one off of the running Weasel engine since I rebuilt it last year.