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Old 18-11-09, 17:52
rob love rob love is offline
carrier mech
 
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Shilo MB, the armpit of Canada
Posts: 7,591
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I bought a batch of 30 of them, so I could likely shed some light on the subject. There were 935 Nutts purchased by DND, and the bulk of them (about 900) still remained on the books. Despite the safety concerns with the Mutts, the fact that they were newer than the M38A1 fleet they seemed to survive pretty well. When the time came to get rid of the fleet, our reasons for destruction seemed to be a direct copy of the US. They claimed DOT's decision not to have them on the road as well as the fact that they did not meet EPA standards. I thought EPA was an American thing.

At the base I was at, we had one towed, complete with batteries and all, to the local crusher to see how well it would go. No problem, and the DND likely got it's $30 for salvage. However, nationally, a decision was made to sell the Mutts as salvage, with the bodies going to the crusher and their destruction witnessed by DND pers.

I bought my 30 for $110 each if I recall, and had to move them from Shilo to wherever I was going to do the work. The contract I had allowed me to remove anything that could be taken with hand tools, but no torches were to be used. Not sure the reasoning behind this. It may have been the intention of Ottawa that the vehicles did not leave the base, but Shilo insisted they leave. However, as I was moving the last couple, a very drunk veh tech MWO pulled me over on the highway stating that he had just been to a meeting in Ottawa and that none of the muts were supposed to leave the base. I politely told him that if the DND wanted to pay for their return they could. 30 is an easy number to say, but not an easy number to move. Anyway, that was the last I heard of that.

So I had 30 jeeps out in a field, almost all had full tanks of fuel, all had their batteries, lots of brand new spare tires, some even had their tool kits and locks on them. A couple even had their IKEES, but of course, no radios.

On completion of the stripping, the 30 bodies were picked up by a local tractor/trailer operator, and taken to mandak metals for scrap. The CADC guys went down to witness them being cubed and that was the end of that.

There were some larger lots of 250 or so, depending on the location. A few were sent to various museums, both regimental and the war museum. A few managed to escape uncut through trades by collectors, but these were on the QT. A few years later, when the parts were disposed of, there was the release of some new in the box bodies, which contributed to the resurrection of a few. I know many of the Alberta ones were torched clean through the middle and then later reassembled. The saskatchewan ones were torch cut into 5 pieces, there are still a few minor pieces at the guys place that cut them. There were also some bodies which had been scrapped due to accident damage sufficient enough to warrant PCC. Most of those had been cannibalized, but when the cut ups appeared, were perfect for rebuild.

I built up one MUTT that way. I had a body which only sufferred fender damage on one side. It was an easy rebuild, and as an early release, was rust free and in better shape, other than the fender, than any of the 30 I bought.

There are a few around, but since the majority of them got the axe, they are likely the rarest jeep in Canada.
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