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I picked up a good used hood battery box for my M38 a while back. There's a slotted hole near the base on the rear side:



I notice that the repro battery boxes have this hole too. Two questions:
1. What's it for?
2. Should it have a grommet or plug in it?

Thanks in advance.

The battery box wasn't a sealed unit. If the jeep went swimming water had to drain from the box somewhere, hence the hole.

The hole on the bottom of the box is for the arctic power plant heater kit. There was a plate that had coolant hose hooked to it to preheat the batteries for arctic weather starting.
John

The hole on the bottom of the box is for the arctic power plant heater kit. There was a plate that had coolant hose hooked to it to preheat the batteries for arctic weather starting.

Aha, that would make sense. Thanks John.

The kit John refers to is TB 9-2855-3 Powerplant Heater Kit. Some of the TB is in my photo album:




Item W lays in the bottom of the front battery box and those two tubes come out that hole. Item V goes in the cowl battery box and those two tube come out the bottom outboard of that box.


The boxes also receive these insulation panels.

When the jeep wasn't driving on top of the ice with the arctic kit, it may have been swimming at the bottom of the river with need for a hole.