In 1970, the auto industry as a whole had a bad year. Plymouth was able to boost its self in to 3rd place (a place it had not held since the fifties) in the auto market with its Duster and Barracuda sales. The Duster was introduced in 1970. It was a reasonably priced car with good gas milage and pleanty of room. In 1970 there were just two models of dusters. There was the duster, which offerd more space than its competitors for cargo and passengers and the famous Duster 340. Which put the Duster well ahead of its competitors in the performance field as well!

The Duster 340 was the low priced super car of 1970. the duster 340 was equipped with the light weight hi-winding 340 cubic-incher. Performance equipped included the heavy duty suspension , shocks, and anti-sway bar 5.5 rallye road wheels and big fron disc brakes. inside was a special instrament panel and for identification out side was a flat blak grille with tape stripes along the sides and stripes between the tail lights interrupted by an angry cloud of dust. The interior wa said to be able to accomidate five adults. with 5 different seating arrangements,. which ranged from the standard vynal bench seat to the all vynal bucket seats. The duster 340's insturment pannel had circular dials featureing a 150 mph speedometer and full gauges, a tachometer was optional. the basic duster shared the standard valiant instrument pannel.

The engine avalibility for the duster was a 198 cid 1-barrel slant six, rated @125 horses, With optional engines being the 225 cid 1-barrel slant six,rated @145 horses, and the 318 cid 2-barrel V-8 rated @230 horses. the engine for the 340 duster was the 340 cid, which offerd a 4-barrel V-8 Rated @ 275 horses. Trannys that were offerd were, 3-speed colum mounted shift, 3-speed console mounted shift, four speed console mounted shift, and the awesome 3 speed torque flite automatic, with colum or console mounted shift.

18 colors were offerd for the dusters at the beginning of the year, including the "MOD" colors such as lemon twist, Tor-red, Vitamin c, lime light, and in violet metallic, mid-year additions were sassy green and moulin rouge, vynal roof were avalible in black, green, or white. Interiors were offered in blue,green,black,tan,or red all-vinyl bench seats and in all-black or in white trimmed with blue, red or black all-vinyl bucket seats.

Duster production was 192,375 units. In addition there were 24,817 Duster 340's built prices (as of sept. 23, 1969) were $2,172 for standar slant six, $2,283 for the V-8 and $2,547 for the 340.


Check out this pic of the little Dust devil!
Look at this some what good scan of part of the options!