True Spirit

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Hey Mike do you happen to have the measurments for the stripes from your True Spirit I got one earlier this year and can't find anything about the stripes other than pictures......."


Hi True Spirit. I took the liberty of starting a new thread to answer your question.

The True Spirit stripes are the same as the ones used on the Warlock, just without the center flourish. You could/should probably used a set of those and trim out the unneeded parts.

As I did mine in a non-standard color, I had a local sign shop make them from rubbings of the originals before I sanded the truck down. I did the same with the "True Spirit" Decals that go on the front fenders.

Mine was a very early True Spirit so it didn't have the tailgate decal.

By the way welcome to the forum, post some pictures of your truck.


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Thanks I will get some pictures up later today

For some reason i cant get the pictures up so i will just tell you about it, before we got it some one had made the truck into a mudding truck so the cab was completely rusted. We used our 88 cab, chassie, and drivetrain and made it into a 77 its on the road now but not done we are still doing body work.

Do you happen to have pictures of the decal "True Spirit " on the front fenders?

As a new member your pictures may be caught in the queue awaiting moderator approval. Once you've got some more posts to your name the delay/approval process goes away.

Welcome to the forum, BTW.

Probably i just joined last night thanks.

http://www.clubhotrod.com/photopost/...0/IMG_1641.JPG

Its a work in progress but its coming along.

I will get pictures of the tailgate tomorrow.

Looks like a good start!!!

“……Do you happen to have pictures of the decal "True Spirit " on the front fenders?.......”


It just so happens I do.

http://i450.photobucket.com/albums/q...psjuzy0eaa.jpg

Mine was an early one so it had this type of decal on the tailgate.

http://i450.photobucket.com/albums/q...pss7109tkg.jpg


Unlike the later ones that had a True Spirit decal (sorry I don’t know when the changeover was).

http://i450.photobucket.com/albums/q...psuw8rphcq.jpg

http://i450.photobucket.com/albums/q...pspiwkyxi9.jpg


If you’ve done some research you probably have already come across this information, but just in case you haven’t here’s a bit of history on the trucks.


In 1976 Dodge began the release of factory custom vehicles advertised as their Adult Toy Series. Initially the series consisted of custom vans but was soon expanded to include factory customized pickup trucks culminating with the Li’l Red Express Truck in 1978-9.

In early 1976 Dodge shipped a limited number of the first custom trucks called Warlock and True Spirit to dealers in Los Angeles and San Francisco to test market reaction. All were Custom D100 Short-Bed Step-Sides, pin-striped and with various options. Warlocks were more popular and in June 1976 were added to the toy series and released for nation wide sales. True Spirits continued as a California only package thru 1979.

During that time frame there were a bunch of regional/dealer installed appearance packages besides the True Spirit; Palomino, Viking, North Eastern, Midnight Special, Orange Blossom Special, Westerner, Californian, Texan….just to name a few. The down side is, as these were generally dealer installed appearance packages it is almost impossible to verify the truck originally had the package installed unless you happen to have the original sales invoice.

Just a word of caution…… any of the dealer installed packages are neat and generally do generate interest when you take them out. Being neat, and even arguably rare, however does not mean you will be able to retire or put the kids thru college when you sell it . It is VERY easy to bury yourself building one of these old Dodges. With the exception of the Lil Red Express trucks, they just do not command a very high price when you decide to unload them.

Just my own opinion….. even though it was not originally part of the True Spirit package, those bird bath hoods like you have just scream to have the indents painted and engine call out numbers applied. :D

http://i450.photobucket.com/albums/q...tom/Hood2B.jpg
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Thanks the changeover was in 77 on my tailgate it says True Spirit but that is the only decal left on the truck.

Do you still have your True Spirit?

http://www.clubhotrod.com/photopost/..._Edited_1_.jpg

I almost have the body work on the front of the truck done , then after that all we need to work on is the back fenders.

Sounds like progress. What color are you going use? Also what drive train are you running?

I sold mine a couple of years back to an overseas buyer.

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The paint will almost be like the original green but a little bit darker metallic and the golden stripes.(forest green pearl to be exact) We are running the original dodge 318 with the 727 trans for right now, wanting to get a 360.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by True Spirit

The paint will almost be like the original green but a little bit darker metallic and the golden stripes.(forest green pearl to be exact) We are running the original dodge 318 with the 727 trans for right now, wanting to get a 360.

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A 360 is easily stroked to a 408.

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I've found out that it is hard to find dodge small block headers if I do they are really expensive .

I hate it when you think you are done filling in dents and then you find more . I think its an unending cycle.

I bought a 1974 dodge truck from a friend of my dads. The body was shot but the engine has been rebulit lately. We don't know if the 360 has been bored over any though,

I ordered some headers for the truck today from summit racing.Should I put some header mufflers on it or just strait tubes.

You will definitely want mufflers of some type (and preferably tail pipes). If you are running the saddle tank instead of the behind the seat tank pipe routing can be a challenge for dual exhaust......usually requiring the drivers side pipe to be crossed over to the passenger side. Here's the post on how I did mine.

http://www.clubhotrod.com/shop-talk/...project-4.html


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Did you use headers on your true spirit?

I didn’t use headers on my True Spirit, but I did do the exhaust on a customers 78 that I assembled years ago. It was a 360 4 speed truck with headers.

http://i450.photobucket.com/albums/q...om/78Dodge.jpg

I ran the exhaust pretty much the same as mine, except we used flowmasters on it, which fit really well by turning them vertically instead of running them flat.


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Ok thanks! P.S. That is a very pretty truck.

There has been a change with the True Spirit instead of the 360 we were going to use we are going to use a 413 big block that we found in an RV with only 84,000 miles.

There is no substitute for cubic horsepower. Good luck with the 413.

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