By John Gunnell,
Dave Logan is the sales training manager for OMIX-ADA (www.omix-ada.com), the world’s largest maker of Jeep restoration parts, but he is also the curator for the Suwanee, Georgia, company’s Jeep museum. According to Logan, OMIX-ADA’s Jeep collection reflects the passion of Henk Van Dongen, who owns OMIX-ADA and serves as its Director of Marketing.
“Henk is originally from the Netherlands and I don’t know why he has this passion for Jeeps, but he drives a Jeep every day with the windows out,” said Logan. “I know that in the past, he worked for Quadra-Tech and Four Wheel Drive Hardware, but you’d have to ask him where his passion for Jeeps originally came from.”
Logan said that OMIX-ADA has been making Jeep parts for over 20 years and started the Jeep collection between five and seven years ago. “We have 31 Jeeps in our collection,” he noted. “We have three prototypes made prior to World War II, so we have a Willys MA, a Bantam VRC40 and a Ford GP. We also have a GPA, which is the amphibious version of the Ford Jeep. In addition, we have an MB, a GPW, an M38, an M38-A1 and an M17. Those are all military vehicles and the others are civilian Jeeps.”
Each year, OMIX-ADA brings several Jeeps from its corporate collection to the SEMA Show in Las Vegas. “We don’t bring the same Jeeps twice, so we’re constantly adding more and more vehicles to the museum collection,” Logan explained. “I just got another one last week, right before we left for SEMA.”
According to Logan, the company’s motivation for the museum is to “protect the legacy of the Jeep” and honour its history. “There are these really cool vehicles out there and not everybody appreciates them or knows about them,” Logan pointed out. “We want to preserve the history and, as a manufacturer, we have the means to do that. So, we are collecting Jeeps and holding onto them—preserving them and protecting them—and so forth. We have the museum dedicated to them and we have a shop area that we use to maintain them.”
Logan said that whenever an opportunity comes along to pick up some Jeep that’s “rare or cool,” OMIX-ADA would take advantage of it. “We have a Willys CJ2A Farm Jeep and a Jeep J10 pickup truck with only 2,440 miles on it,” Logan emphasized. “You’ll never find one with that low of a mileage reading.”
According to Logan, OMIX-ADA doesn’t want anyone to go out and buy such a low-mileage Jeep and chop it up, jack it up and put big tires on it. “That would ruin its originality, so we’re trying to do our part to protect original vehicles.” In this case, the J10 also belonged to the president of NASCAR. “It wasn’t advertised for sale anywhere,” Logan stressed. “I think that Henk went through a broker or someone like that to find out about it.”
Logan has found most of the 31 special interest Jeeps that reside in the collection today. “I’m the curator of the museum, so I find them in a variety of ways. I have a network of people and contacts who I know, so I’ll call them and tell them what I’m looking for. And then, all I do is be patient and wait and someone will find the exact thing I’m looking for. I’ve bought Jeeps off of eBay and I’ve bought directly from people who have original, nearly untouched Jeeps.”
Logan has a couple of Jeeps on his “bucket list.” He is looking for a Gladiator pickup. “We found a few of them that are good and we’re waiting for Henk to make up his mind if that’s what he wants or not,” said Logan. “And, believe it or not, we’re looking for a 1995 Jeep XJ, because that was the last year of production and we want a six-cylinder with low miles that’s very, very original.“
Protecting the original Jeeps is the curator’s goal. “We have a number of models that are like the little red FC-150 fire truck that we brought to SEMA this year,” Logan explained. “It’s all original and has its original paint. It has patina. The lacquer paint is all flaking off, but it’s original and we don’t want to ruin it.”
According to Logan, a goal of the museum is to have one of everything. “It’s not that we want to make everything a museum piece, but because our technical department will go and look at the vehicles to determine what was original,” he noted. “Then, if we have reproduction restoration parts coming out, we want to be able to look at a really original Jeep and know if we designed the part correctly or not. So, we use them a lot for that purpose; test fitting. We don’t take them apart or anything, but we look to make sure the parts are correct.”
Logan said the collection is not corporate. It’s a private collection, but it is open to the public by appointment. “We have to be there to open the door, turn off the alarms and explain what the visitors are seeing,” he pointed out. “We don’t have anybody dedicated to do that. Typically, if I’m in town, that’s my job, but we need to know in advance if somebody is coming. Then, we’ll be happy to open it up, but of course we don’t have a gift shop or regularly opened doors.”
