I feel like when most of us think about early (as in ’60s and ’70s) shortened-truck-like SUVs, we tend to think of vehicles like the Ford Bronco or the International Scout or the Chevy Blazer, and, oh yeah, the Dodge Ramcharger. What we almost never bring up, though, is the Plymouth one! Yes, Plymouth did have a Bronco-like SUV from 1974 to 1981, and, sure, it was basically just a re-badged Ramcharger, but it existed, dammit. Just like Samuel Pepys and enchiladas, this thing was once part of the world, and it was called the Trail Duster.
Does anyone remember this? I mean, maybe there’s not all that much to remember, since the Trail Duster really only differed from the Ramcharger in name and some trim details. But still, as Plymouth’s only SUV ever, it’s worth at least a couple of neurons in your brain, right? Sure it is.
I can’t recall the last time I actually saw one of these out in the wild; it has to be at least 30 years or so. Oy. That’s sobering. Let’s lighten the mood with a 1978 dealer promo video for the Trail Duster, complete with music that’s just a tiny bit too loud:
There’s a lot of fascinating stuff here, and you sort of get the sense they were reaching for details to be excited by. Like, sure, this is convenient, but making a big deal about the fusebox location feels a little weird to me:
I can’t think of another car that has a fusebox as easily accessible as this one, sure (right on the dash when you open the glovebox door) but that also just makes me wonder how often these things were popping fuses? Like, how often do you really need to get to your fusebox?
They also make a point of showing the Electronic Ignition System box in the brochure, which I recognized because the same unit failed at least twice in my old 1977 Dodge Tioga RV, which used the same setup. Maybe by showing fuses and that module they’re subtly preparing the owners for dealing with these dodgy electronics?
Speaking of electrical stuff, the training film lists the upgrades for the Light-Duty Trailer Towing Package. What the hell is the HD (heavy duty) flasher? Do they mean the blinkers/hazard lights? Did they have heavy-duty hazard lights on these things? What does that mean? A more intense shade of amber at the front, a more intense red at the rear? They blink harder? With a louder click?
(Commenters have pointed out something I should have realized: this is referring to the flasher relay, which would need to support extra incandescent bulbs on the trailer, and hence would need to be uprated!)
These things were kind of handsome in their way, too. I feel like when I did see them they tended to have the metal rear cap, but I do like the canvas top option you see there. I can’t recall ever seeing that in the wild, but look at what you could do with it:
The sides could roll up! That’s pretty fun, it feels very safari-like! Maybe if the US had a higher population density of giraffes and lions and wildebeests this would have been more popular.
The Trail Duster had some strangely austere basic trim levels. Like, look at this: the base level had only one seat? Who the hell was ordering that? Hermits who moved a lot of ladders, maybe? I can’t recall another non-commercial vehicle that had an optional passenger seat.
One thing the Trail Duster had that was ahead of its time was a cooler in the center console, which, according to this picture, seems like it would also have been great at keeping your binoculars nice and cool.
Also, a this is a good reminder of just how chromatically deprived the modern automotive world is. Look at that! Fourteen different colors, all dramatically different and vivid! It’s fantastic! Just to see the miserable state we currently are mired in, these are the colors you can get a modern Mopar SUV, the Dodge Durango, in:
Jeezis. Look at that. A dark red, a dark blue, and six grayscale colors, four of which I can barely tell the difference between.
Also, I bet you have to really look for the fusebox on a new Durango, and probably can’t yank fuses out while cruising down the highway at 70 mph, seatbelt-less, yell-flirting at someone on your CB.
The 1978 Plymouth Trail Duster is what happens when Chrysler tries to build an SUV and ends up making a spring loaded waterbed on wheels. That woodgrain interior trim looks like it came from a period basement rec room, and the panel gaps are wide enough to register as sunroofs.
Trail dusters are neat when you see them I think they are all tucked away or rotting somewhere besides a few days a year. You rarely see ramchargers anymore outside of maybe Carlisle now too. Mopar was of a head of its time a bit being a more luxury truck / suv model under a different name and brand. GM had GMC and different packages like Scottsdale.
My paternal aunt (who was best described as hell on wheels) exclusively drove Mopar products, and she had a bright red Trailduster. It is one of the vehicles that sticks out on my mind from a very early age (probably early ‘80s). I recently found it in the background of a family photo, which made me inexplicably happy.
I’ve never seen one of these in person. I haven’t even seen a Ramcharger in person in decades
The safari top option is one of the main reasons I own a Scout. Used to be, I would hoist the top off in April and hang it from the rafters in the garage, then put it back on in October or so. Now I just run it with the soft top on and the sides rolled up all the time.
One thing Scouts and early Broncos have over this is frameless windows; seeing the Trail Duster without a top and those goofy doors makes me laugh.
There was one of these at a local service station in NY that sat there for years. Never saw it move, never saw it connected to a plow. A few years ago it vanished. Hopefully not to the great crusher in the sky
When I was running my R53 MINI in Colorado, I looked really hard at one of these as a winter beater. They weren’t that expensive at the time. I ended up with a 1990 Mazda B2600i 4×4. It was just a bit too big.
Years ago I replaced my flasher relay with a heavy duty one because that’s all the parts store had in stock. It was hilarious, very slow and loud. CLICK-mississippi-CLICK-mississippi-CLICK. I lived with it for about a week. Those glass fuses did blow out more often than modern ones. I love that fuse panel.
So, between ’74 and ’76, if you wanted to buy a Plymouth, you could get a Duster, a Gold Duster, A Duster 360, A Feather Duster, A Space Duster, A Silver Duster, or a Trail Duster.
Cleanest showroom on earth.
I seem to remember a light green Trail Duster used by the local school district maintenance crew to haul around lawn mowers and to plow the school parking lots in the winter.
There was a Chrysler-Plymouth (and formerly DeSoto) dealer in town, so that tracks.
I’m constantly reminded of the Dodge Ramcharger because there are couple in my neighborhood. I had to jar a few neurons to come up with the Trail Duster. This also reminded me of the OG Plymouth Voyager, which was a rebadged Dodge Sportsman passenger van
I have rather a lot of nostalgia for the Mopars of that era. They closed up shop and moved about 8 or 10 years ago but my mechanic at the time had a Trail Duster nicely modified for desert off-road usage. I haven’t seen even one other that I can remember for a very long time, although I’ll see the occasional Ramcharger. I’m not surprised the K5 / 2-door Tahoe / OJ-era Bronco / Ramcharger fell out of favor given that people seem to have given up on 2-door vehicles in general like single-cab pickups and “personal luxury” coupes.
As for fuse boxes my XJ40 Jaguar XJ6 has the Trail Duster beat. There are three(!) very accessible fuse boxes in the passenger compartment, one in each footwell on the door post and another in the ashtray area. All can be opened in a matter of five seconds or less with a flat-bladed screwdriver. I am very familiar because I had to replace the passenger side footwell unit when a fuse melted instead of simply blowing and damaged the box.
Very Jaguar like.
Nice warpage on the far right faux-wood gauge surround. And the upside-down (by conventional standards) sport steering wheel is interesting. Along with the pull-tab Pepsi in the gloriously glossy center armrest/cooler. But COLORS! Wonderful COLORS!
I totally forgot about these, but as a kid, I also probably assumed that the ones I did see from any distance were Ramchargers.
I’m with you on the colors. I might actually buy a new car if any of the manufacturers that aren’t M-B, BMW, or Audi had custom colors as a normal option. I would wait however long it took to get one in something other than white, grayscale/silver colors, or the occasional metallic beige. Even dark blues are not that common now. *SIGH*
As to that fuse box – back in high school I had a 75 Dodge D-100, slant six, three on the tree. I wanted a tach, so I added on one. The fuse box started smoking. I removed said tach quickly!
My parents had a 1975 Plymouth Voyager Van. It was mustard yellow with brown trim, and had a huge one piece rear door. As a kid I loved that it was a Plymouth not a Dodge, which confused my friends. It was a near twin of this curbside classic van – but with standard hubcaps:
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/ebay-find-1977-plymouth-voyager-the-ultimate-shaggin-wagon/
Thought for a minute the van in Bad News Bears Breaking Training was a Plymouth after seeing the linked one. Turns out it was Ford. Sometimes hard to tell the different brands from that era apart.
Is there a modern car available with more than 10 paint color options, or anything as diverse as yellow, red, orange, green, and blue all available for the same model?
Even sports cars like the Toyobarus only offer them as limited models (and still don’t quite have the guts to make a purple purple or a green with some pop) or boring new colors on the Miata that are more appropriate on a CUV someone enjoys losing in parking lots.
Porsche offers a bunch of good standard colors.
They’re HIGHLY coveted amongst old mopar heads. A rust-prone era of American trucks, a short model run, low sales, and likelihood of being destroyed in the woods by rural teenagers in the 90’s have made these trucks rare as hen’s teeth.
I remember them as I mentioned in a comment on here recently I rather have a Ram Charger or Trail Duster over a Bronco of similar vintage
I’ve seen a RamCharger, but never the Trail Duster.
Thanks for the clarification. I was assuming the heavy-duty flashers only came with the “Dom DeLuise in a Trench Coat” package.
“Does anyone remember this?”
Yeah – One of the guys in my Dad’s squadron had one.
It was Sunstone and White Two-tone with the white hardtop.
I don’t ever recall seeing any of these or the Dodge versions with the soft top or open roof.
If you’re going to differentiate between Dodge and Plymouth, then you should mention that Chevy had the Blazer, and GMC had the Jimmy!
The “choices” of colors on modern cars is pathetic, what upsets me more is when a salesman try to convince me that this is what people want, and my desire for more colors is just one person opinion … yes, i’m the only person in the world who wants yellow!
You have to remember – You’re not the factory’s customer.
The dealer is.
And the dealer has to sell the thing twice – Once to the leasee, then again 2-4 years later to the actual buyer.
Leasees generally don’t really care what color their long-term rental is – they’re giving it back in 39 months anyway.
And “pre-owned” buyers don’t get a choice anyway.
It’s even worse inside, where it’s been over twenty years since interiors came in anything but “dirty dishwater,” “unfrosted Pop Tart,” and black.
This reminds me that I really want a soft top for my 4Runner. But $1300 from softopper is a bit too steep when I suspect the vehicle’s worth about $3k.
Sigh.
How bad is the rust? And can you roll with just a bikini top over the front two seats? I say go for it, but I’m also known to make questionable purchasing decisions.
A lot of what I read says that once the top is off it never goes back on that well. That prevents me from just going with a bikini top, as it would render the vehicle useless in the winter.
Also, 1st-gen 4Runner have the cab over the front seats. Only the rear of the top comes off. Like the later K5s.
Yeah, they said the same about Scouts too—taking the roof off requires cutting the seals around the doors. I’d imagine it’s harder with the 4Runner cab top because you’ve got the seal spanning the roof.