M37 Bracket Identification

[MasterYota]

I think these brackets are for the fording exhaust, but I've never seen a set like these before, so I might be wrong...







The upper bracket looks stock judging by how its riveted to the artic top, and the bottom bracket is bolted to the box. There are no fording controls in the cab, or valves on the original engine, so I'm beginning to suspect that perhaps the box (or lower bracket) and top are from a different truck altogether...?

Any thoughts would be great help!

Ray

[MasterYota]

Must be the ultra rare, black-ops brackets...

Nobody know's what these are for?

[Longhunter7]

Brackets?

Could these brackets be used for holding down a radio shelter?

[Jess]

Brackets

Hi Ray, I looked at my old photos but couldn't make out any details but wonder if this might be for an antenna mast mounting. A couple of my trucks have the same bolt pattern on the hardtop but without the bracket, but not all four of the fleet have them.

Jess

[Gordon Maney]

I have not seen them before.

[Gordon Maney]

I asked Dave Butler to look at this and here is his reply:

Not for sure, but think they are probably tie downs for the aluminum radio box that fits inside the M37 box, Saw one not long ago in Arizona.

[MasterYota]

Thanks for the reply's gentlemen!

Gordon, could you inquire to Dave if they would have used these brackets on both side's of the truck to hold the aluminum box in? My brackets are only on one side (passenger side), with no holes or provisions on the other side.

Jess, I've seen a few pictures of the antenna mast setup, but like yours, they were too blurry to make out any detail. Also, all the pictures I've seen have always had the mast mounted on the drivers side - seems prudent as the radio antenna was alread on that side. Seems anti-efficient fo the military to run extra wiring to mount the larger antenna mast on the other side of the truck, unless the two signals interfered with each other, or the truck antenna bracket was in the way...
I may be wrong however, as some of the pics I've looked at may have been reversed when loaded onto the PC.

If these are the brackets for an antenna mast, or the aluminum radio box, are there any other tell-tale brackets that would be on the bed to indicate one or the other?

Thanks for the help guys!

[Gordon Maney]

Thanks for the reply's gentlemen!

Gordon, could you inquire to Dave if they would have used these brackets on both side's of the truck to hold the aluminum box in? My brackets are only on one side (passenger side), with no holes or provisions on the other side.

Jess, I've seen a few pictures of the antenna mast setup, but like yours, they were too blurry to make out any detail. Also, all the pictures I've seen have always had the mast mounted on the drivers side - seems prudent as the radio antenna was alread on that side. Seems anti-efficient fo the military to run extra wiring to mount the larger antenna mast on the other side of the truck, unless the two signals interfered with each other, or the truck antenna bracket was in the way...
I may be wrong however, as some of the pics I've looked at may have been reversed when loaded onto the PC.

If these are the brackets for an antenna mast, or the aluminum radio box, are there any other tell-tale brackets that would be on the bed to indicate one or the other?

Thanks for the help guys!

Will do.

[Matthew Ziegler]

brackets

is there any sign that the truck was a radio truck 100 amp charging system? i'm pretty sure the fording stack bolts to the stake pocket just in front of the passenger rear wheel well.

[MasterYota]

is there any sign that the truck was a radio truck 100 amp charging system? i'm pretty sure the fording stack bolts to the stake pocket just in front of the passenger rear wheel well.

Not that I'm aware of. To be honest, I didn't look that closely at the Generator or charging system as I wasn't planning on keeping it, or using it. Most of it is in my shed, anyone care to remind me what the difference's were between the two charging systems are, and what would indicate them one way or the other? I don't have any data plates indicating it was ever radio equiped, and all the knockouts are still installed on the box where the antenna mount and wiring would go...

Hence my confusion...
Only these two brackets are what's different from the other M37's I've owned over the years. That, and I've never seen these brackets in any pictures.

[Paul Cook]

Mounting to a hard top?

I was in several units that had signal monitoring rigs in bed mounted Signal Shelters. In one unit, we had both M37 series and M715 series trucks.

Later, I was the Unit Maintenance Officer and also Property Book Officer for a SIGSEC unit that had M884 CUCV with bed mounted signal shelters. The Truck, Cargo, 1 1/4 ton, 4x4 M-884 is not visually distinct from the M880 cargo truck except for the S250 shelter kit installed in the cargo box. The shelter is secured with tie down straps. The only other significant difference is the installed 24 volt, 100-Amp Generator Kit. The M884 vehicle has auxiliary rear springs installed. Because the M880 series had different standard battery/generator systems, the M884 had dual voltage systems 12v and 24v and the beds were “factory modified” to incorporate tie down points. (They are the hardest to work on.)

I also bought a M37 that was a former RATT rig truck (4375 miles when I drove it into my driveway). It had the 100 amp kit.

Because the cabs had non-rigid mounts, the shelters were tied down to the rigidly mounted bed only. Securing a shelter to a hard top on the cab would have damaged the top. The installation kits usually had provisions to strengthen the bed tie down points. In the M37 and M715 trucks, the shelters were mounted in the cargo versions with the only modification being the 100 amp kit which included cables for connecting the shelters to the truck electrical system.

Operating power in all cases was a separate 5k generator.

I have a complete fording kit with instructions. The brackets shown are not part of it.

[Kaiser2boy]

Are the brackets on both side of the cab or just the right side?
I drove an M37 radio truck in the 60s while on a paid vacation with uncle Sam. It had antenna mounts but they were no where as massive as the things on your truck. just looking at them they look very heavy duty but not connected to anything heavy duty. The shell on the cab is just sheet metal and it looks like the lower one is on sheet metal also. To me it just does not seem right to bolt on a 1/2 thick steel plate to sheet metal.
That said the top one does look formed to fit.
Strange .
I wonder if your truck is a Canadian truck, God only knows what they may have done.

[MasterYota]

The truck is a Canadian unit, so I'm not surprised that it might be slightly different than the ones found more commonly south of the border. The brackets are also only on the right (passenger) side. In an effort to disassemble the lower bracket for some better pictures, I tried to remove the large nut on the bottom. Natually it moved several rotations, then boundup an broke the stud off. Typical. However, under the nut was a very large copper washer. Now, I'm now radio expert, but that type of hardware is usually found alongside radio equipment. Both the brackets have removeable bolts (the ones with the wing nuts on 'em) so whatever was mounted there wasn't designed to be permanent.

I'm starting to lean towards a radio antenna mast. Purely a guess on my part, but I'm thinking they are not that heavy, so the sheet metal mounts would support it, and the large copper connection on the bottom could be used for a ground stake, or a ground directly to the truck. The rubber doughnuts would also allow the mast to move a little in the wind, without putting undue stress on the sheetmetal mounts. The logic seems sound, but the mystery still remains....

[Kaiser2boy]

I dont know if you intend to keep the truck or not but if you are you may want to just remove those brackets.

Reason, if you leave them on everyone will ask " what the heck are those things?". Not having an answer you may come up looking uninformed about your truck. This will put the purity of your truck in question.
It would be much simpler to just not have them.
Then again some one may come up and say Wow you have one of the only two M37s ever built with the special Doohicky mount.......snicker..

[MasterYota]

I dont know if you intend to keep the truck or not but if you are you may want to just remove those brackets.

Reason, if you leave them on everyone will ask " what the heck are those things?". Not having an answer you may come up looking uninformed about your truck. This will put the purity of your truck in question.
It would be much simpler to just not have them.
Then again some one may come up and say Wow you have one of the only two M37s ever built with the special Doohicky mount.......snicker..

You may have a point, the lower bracket would be a simply enough task to remove, just unbolt it. The top's bracket is a little different, but I do have another hardtop that I could swap into its place, so that it can remain as it is for now.

As for the trucks purity, there isn't much of that left once the 7.0L big block, Np435, dual Tcases, D60 front, and C14 rear are factored into the mix...