How To: Restoration of Ford M8 armoured car US Ordnance number 7373

[Big D]

Hi all,

I’ve been chipping away on various little jobs on the M8 in between work and life.

I’ve been slowly making up the hydraulic lines. It is quite a time consuming process when you don’t have any original lines to work from. I found after I made the first two lines, that it was easier to get a length of Number 8 wire and shape that to what I wanted and use that as a template. I ended up using steel bundy tube and I’ve found that even 5/16” line is quite hard to bend. The copper alloy tube I'd seen was just too expensive and I’ll need a better tube bender than what I’ve got to finish the 3/8” and ½” lines.

My intention is still to get a commercial brake line specialist to do the flaring on the ends of the lines. I want to be pretty darned confident that I’ll fit these lines and they won’t leak, and while I can do the flaring myself, I think it is a wise move to get them done right, especially with steel lines.

I’ve seen a couple of versions of the layout of the hydraulic lines to the throttle master cylinder. I’ve noticed that most (I figure the original layout) have the line from the outlet on the master cylinder coming out horizontally and then being bent upwards vertically (see the pictures I borrowed off the net). From what I’ve seen this can be a problem as the co-driver can damage the connection by just putting their foot on it. I plan to fit a 90 degree connector to the outlet so the line can go vertically upwards and behind the reservoir, which should hopefully prevent those problems. I'd be interested to hear what other M8/M20 owners have found with this.

Has anyone reconditioned the primer pump? Mine is missing the washer/seal in the end of the pump and I am looking for the correct replacement. A local seal supplier said they can make me one out of a rubber product which will handle the fuel but I’m thinking there must be something commercially available now that will do the job. Is this a cup type washer or something similar? What is the purpose of the two nuts?

I noticed there are several variants of the rubber bushing for the shock absorbers. I was told that the one in the centre of Photo 10 (the bottom photo) was what ‘everyone is using’, but they are certainly too thick in their present state. The one on the left is the correct one but I only have a few of these. Has anyone got a source for these?

What about the spacer for the top mounting bolt on the shock absorbers? Does anyone have any of these?