JB and his first restoration project...

For the last several years JB has been wanting an army jeep for his car.  When I was at the  Shenandoah Valley Antique Show last weekend I stumbled across one....well, kind of... I found this adorable pedal car army jeep probably not 20 years old.  The body is metal but the tires are plastic.  As a joke I sent a picture to JB of the jeep in a text message.  I told him he had never really specified the type of army jeep he wanted.  Within a few hours he was calling me and he had me work a deal with the sellers. 

No matter how well you know JB you still don't know how his mind is turning.  I thought that he was going to clean it up and sell it.  Once I got home and he got to see it first hand you could just see the wheels turning.  He started spitting out he'd like to make the head lights works, a fresh paint job, and her wanted it to represent a M*A*S*H jeep because he's such a big fan. 

On Friday night after he got home from a ball game his restoration project began.  While I was in bed he was up taking everything apart.  When I awoke the next morning I found the car in pieces.  He and his girlfriend spent most of Saturday evening working on his project.

He first managed to wire single Christmas tree lights in each headlight.  He then added a toggle switch and battery for power.  He had to work the toggle switch into the dashboard and a build a holder for the battery under the car. 

Once he successful got the headlights to work now was the paint job. He careful taped over the decals and rubber trim on the car because he wanted to salvage these to use them. Everything else including bottom and inside of the car received several coats on a satin finish army green paint. The grill and front bumper of the car recieved a fresh coat of black paint. Once everything was done JB free hand painted a red cross on the hood of the car for the M*A*S*H effect.



After allowing all of that to dry over night he spent most of this morning putting everything back together.  Within a few hours he had Courtney in it giving it a test run.  I will have to say that I am very proud of his first restoration project.  JB is the type of person that has always taken things apart with no idea of how to get it back together.  By completeing this project I will say he has really shown me that he has grown up and maybe he has a great talent that we are just discovering.