Assembling a brand new WWII Jeep from hundreds of individual parts was extremely difficult. It would have been one thing to purchase everything as a huge set, but as the purpose was to demonstrate the enormity of eBay Motors’s WWII Jeep parts selection, I decided to buy almost all the parts one-by-one. This led to a few challenges: 1. There were boxes; lots of boxes. 2. Figuring out how to organize (not lose) things was not easy and 3. This was very obviously not the most cost-effective way of building a WWII Jeep (but again, that wasn’t the point).

If you want a fully restored WWII Jeep, you can generally buy one for around $25,000. As anyone who has restored a car will tell you: If you want to save yourself the headache, just do that instead of restoring a car yourself. It will save you lots of time, and to be honest, it’ll likely be cheaper. In my case, that was especially true because of the way I built my Jeep: I ordered hundreds of parts, individually, meaning I didn’t get the volume-discount that you get anytime you purchase loads of parts all bolted together in the form of a complete vehicle (for example, if I had purchased this one from eBay).

Still, the prices of the individual components were great, so this could have been a lot pricier than it ended up being. At the same time, because I was in a rush, I did have to make some hasty purchases so I probably could have optimized a bit better. Anyway, let’s get into it, starting with the biggest expenses.

Parts That Cost Over $300

Here are the priciest individual purchases, starting with a bit of a luxury item that I didn’t need, but wanted — the brand new engine:

Brand New Engine Block: $6,309.53

The Body: $4,441.88

The Frame: $2,765 (I paid the seller an additional $376.44 — total: $3,141.44)

Complete Engine Overhaul Kit (With Manifolds, Camshaft, Oil Pan)

Combat Wheels:

The Spare Engine: $1,097.50

Reference Vehicle: $1500 (purchased from a local)

Crankshaft: 987.75

Axles/Transmission/Transfer Case: $658.50

Generator: $658.50

Full Wiring Harness: $649.95

Connecting Rods: $592.65

Cylinder Head: $538.31

Specialty Vehicle Registration Costs: $510

Roof Cross Bow Set: $469.11

Fuel Tank: $433.51

Tires: $498.45

Leaf Springs: $476.55

Driveshafts: $442.28

Assorted Hardware Kit: $395.11

Voltage Regulator: $347.08

Starter Motor: $329.25

Rear Seat Frame: $329.24

Distributor: $309.22

The total of all parts that cost over $300 comes to about $30,100. These higher-priced, large items represent the bulk of my expenses.

Parts That Cost Between $100 And $300

Parts between $100 and $300 represented the smallest category of the three arbitrary categories I created for this article. Here are some examples:

Clutch Kit: $243.21

Windshield Glass: $119.90

Muffler: $122.92

Brake Lines: $178.88

Oil Bath Air Cleaner: $214.01

Steering Shaft: $208.54

Steering Gearbox: $113.40:

Lots Of GL4 Gear Oil: $109

In total, parts between $100 and $300 made up only $7,300 of my vehicle’s total cost.

Sub $100 Parts

It’s the sub-$100 parts that make up the biggest volume of purchases, and as such, adding them up also comes out to about $10,100. Here are a few examples of some important sub-$100 parts. I’m not going to list their individual prices because there are just too many parts in this category (Note: The $10,100 figure includes fluids and small pieces of hardware/tools I had to pick up from local stores):

If you add up the cost of the more expensive parts ($30,100) with that of the $100 to $300 parts ($7,300), and add that to the cost of the cheaper parts ($10,100), you end up with a total of about $47,500. If you add in about $1,000 worth of miscellaneous tools and fasteners I had to buy (a conservative estimate), I end up at $48,500. Luckily, I managed to sell the reference Jeep and the spare engine for a total of $6,000, bringing the total for me to build and register this WWII Jeep to approximately:

$42,500

This is about the same price as a restored Slat Grille MB like this one, but it’s more than buying an average, fully restored WWII Jeep, largely because I bought loads of parts individually, shipped many of them individually, and — the biggest cost — I insisted on one major luxury: that brand new engine.

I could have easily just bought a used, running engine or had a motor rebuilt for much less than buying a fresh engine block, a fresh cylinder head, fresh manifolds, a fresh crankshaft, a fresh camshaft, etc.

If you factor in all the ancillaries, that new engine probably ended up costing me $7 grand, but if I’m honest: It was worth it. To me, the spirit of the build called for a brand new WWII Jeep, and a brand new frame and body weren’t enough for me to feel comfortable calling the whole Jeep brand new. Also, I just think a brand new 80 year-old engine design is cool.

So there you have it. If you want to assemble new WWII Jeep from scratch, and you want a fresh, new motor, a rebuilt transmission and transfer case, a new frame, a new body, new wheels, and pretty much new everything except axles and gearbox housings, it’ll cost you a little over $40 grand if you decided to buy most of the parts piecemeal (and if you make a few grand buying and selling a reference Jeep). That’s  probably not the most efficient way of doing things, and you’ll probably spend more than that on labor associated with organizing the parts and actually building the Jeep, but hey, it’s character-building and the end-result is something in which you’ll feel enormous pride.