Willys Overland Knight Registry

    Just as there was an Overland 6 to accompany the better selling Overland 4, so too was the Whippet 6 the big brother of the Whippet 4.  However, there is always a danger that the reputation of a 6 will be dragged down to the comparative "commonness" of a 4 and not realise full sales potential, so the Whippet 98A was moved "up" to a Willys 98B designation for 1930.  Whether this had the effect of dragging "down" the 8 cylinder Willys 8-80 is hard to tell, but certainly Willys Overland were wondering whether to back the sleeve valved Willys Knight or the more conventional poppet valved Willys during the 1930 - 1933 depression years.
    In the end it was the more expensive Knight line that had to go and Willys Overland had to limp through the 1933 to 1936 period with just a single vehicle line.  This wasn't a luxury vehicle, but the humble Willys 77 which was really the Whippet replacement.  As J.N. Willys had left at this time, the reservation of the Willys name for only the finest vehicles seemed to fade as the company clutched at straws to survive the aftermath of the depression.

    In Feb 1936, Federal Judge George P. Hahn granted the order freeing the company from its bankruptcy status and new development could once again take place.  Restyling and synchromesh brought the Willys 77 up to date for 1937 as the Willys Model 37.  1938 brought the Willys Model 38, yet 1939 saw it designated a Model 48.  The Model 39 designation, surprisingly enough, was saved for the Overland name which made a brief comeback for 1939.  This car featured hydraulic brakes, 2 inch longer wheelbase (now 102 inches) and 13 more horsepower (now 61 bhp @ 3600 rpm) and was more expensive than the Willys - another break with logic since consumers might remember the Overland name as being used on the cheaper vehicles.

1941 saw the release of the patriotically named Willys Americar.  Most remembered of all Willys Overland products was of course the famous 4 x 4 Bantam inspired Jeep built during World War 2, when more than 350,000 MA and MB models were produced, with Ford supplying their version also.

The following information extracted from the W.O.K.R. Roster (with permission) can help with identification.    Serial Numbers prefixed with a C indicate Canadian origin.
Note how all the Willys vehicles from the Willys 77 to the Jeep used the same basic 4 cylinder 3 1/8 x 4 3/8 bore and stroke motor originally designed for the Whippet in 1926 and how the HorsePower just kept on creeping up from the original 30 bhp Whippet figure !
 
 

As the W.O.K.R. concentrates on vintage and veteran vehicles it is not really a primary objective to go into detail on post war Willys vehicles, however the following few sentences give a brief overview of the fate of the Willys name.

After the war the 63 bhp engine was used for the Jeep Station Wagon as well as the 12 cwt and 1 ton commercials.  In 1950 it was redesigned as the Hurricane engine with a F head (Overhead inlet with side exhaust valves).  It had a high, for that time, compression ratio of 7.5 to 1 and large 2 inch diameter inlet valves and put out 75 bhp @ 4000 rpm.

In 1953, Willys Overland was purchased by Henry J. Kaiser of Kaiser Frazer Corporation who merged the two companies to form the Kaiser-Jeep Corporation and Kaiser-Willys Sales Corporation.  In 1955 the company decided to abandon the passenger car market and the Willys Aero (which had first appeared in 1952) dies were shipped to South America where Willys do Brasil used them until 1963.
Kaiser-Jeep was then purchased by American Motors Corporation in 1970 and renamed Jeep Corporation and operated as two separate units - the Commercial Products Division in Toledo and the Government Products Division in South Bend.