1970 PLYMOUTH Duster 340- Dave Horton

When I took my first ride in a Duster i noticed the family resemblance of the interior and front nose to the Valiant. The Rally gauge package and Tuff steering wheel in the Duster 340 I rode in was enough of an upgrade to make it seem like a distinctive new model. It wasn't obvious that the Duster was really a Valiant in disguise, just with a new back end added on. What a sporty, cool looking car. I had a Hot Wheels Duster that was a flip off bodied hot pink dragster car. I really liked the shape of that car.

The owner of the Duster only kept it a short while. It was a 340 and the gas mileage wasn't up to Valiant standards. I suspect it would've stayed for longer if it had been a slant six car. The owner wasn't a performance person; he just liked the idea of good styling on the old faithful Valiant. Some ugly import thing ended up in the driveway a few years later.   

Dave Horton's Duster 340 reminds me a bit of that old Duster 340 all those years ago. Dave's ALLEY FIND is rotted away to the point where I imagine that the Duster I used to ride in has probably degenerated to by now.

This Duster is thought to be the car owned by a friend of Dave's from way back when up in 100 Mile House, BC. Dave recognized certain body dings and dents when he found the remains of the carcass. The car is also pretty distinctive for the small Northern town he found it in because it had a 3 speed manual. If someone springs for the Duster 340, you would expect a 4 speed, so it's an oddity that way. Somewhere around this time, the insurance companies were surcharging for 4 speeds, so it may have been a stealth maneuver on the part of the original owner.

The Duster hasn't been on the road for quite awhile. Aftermarket parts usually give you a good tip off as to the era that the car was last used in. This Duster sports a Cragar S/S mag wheel that is pretty well rusted out and a 70 series profile tire. We can deduce that the car has been sitting for quite awhile, since these mags were in vogue in late 1970s early 80s. By the 90s the aftermarket guys were buying repro factory mags often with widened rims and even enlarged diameters. By this time most of the custom rims ousted the formerly standard size 14 or 15 inchers with 16 to 18 inchers and tires with profiles in the low 40s. Good performance tires in 14 and 15 inch diameters were gone by the late 1990s.

The car doesn't have an engine right now as you can see from the way it sits high up front

it

This parts car isn't registered anymore, which means it is safe to run the VIN number for the guys who love to decode cars.

This Duster was built in Canada sometime in December, 1969. The VIN tells us that the car is a Valiant (V), a 'special price' (S) which obviously refers to the Duster option, and a two door sports hardtop (29). The car came with a 340 4 barrel (H) and is a 1970 model (0). The car was built in the Windsor, Ontario factory (R) and is unit number 186,422.

Here is the special gauge package taken from the Barracuda when the Duster was ordered as a Duster 340 model.

Who knows how many times around the clock it went before stopping at 28,388 miles?

Here you can see the original pedals set up for the 3 speed. Not a lot of wear here, considering that the clutch pedal probably saw a lot of heavy foot applications!

I liked the fastback look of these cars the very first time I saw one. For very cheap, the Chrysler guys were able to create a pretty exciting car out of a basic Valiant.

The factory wheels on this car always looked too skinny and small for the rear wheel openings, but with this temporary wheel on the car (just to allow it to be easily moved) that rear fender looks very disproportionate.