I worked with a lot of Dodge trucks over the years. I have real life experiences.

The 72 new design was updated in 73, and much of the stuff from the 72 and the 73 did not interchange. This always showed up when you started looking for replacement parts. The 72 model year is often listed alone, and then the other siting start at 1973.

Things were pretty decent in the time from 73 up to about mid way through 76. Chrysler was facing hard financial times by mid 76. What ever parts were on hand were used to send the trucks out the doors. That story didn't really change until the 94 new truck design.

Dodge always told you specific trucks had specific parts, That was probably the goal, and I'm sure for the most part was true, but the hard truth was, it was not always true. From about 1980 on, I was buying, selling, scrapping, and building Mopar cars and trucks. I learned very early, you had to look at each specific truck to actually see what Dodge shipped it with, or what someone swapped into it. That was the real life experience.

Now, here we are all these years later and some guys are telling the world that every Dodge 150, 250, or 350 came with specific parts because some book said so. That was not true back then, and it sure doesn't apply now that all these years have passed, and guys have installed what ever they could get their hands on to keep the trucks on the road.

The book guys can keep living in fantasy land, I'll keep living in the real world. The parts under your 1973-1993 Dodge truck may be anything Dodge had on hand at the time it was built, or what ever parts some previous owner installed to keep it functioning.

When you get past the D 350s and into big trucks, things really got twisted, and motor home chassis is a whole new world.

When it comes to Chrysler, the historic events and production timing have a tremendous impact on each other. Chrysler has always been a company with a wide swing of financial position, between very well off to going broke, or somewhere in between. Those financial pictures of times also had a huge impact on production. To discount the financial position Chrysler was in at any given time would be a serious error.