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Posted by Eric B. [99.100.188.129] on Friday, July 13, 2012 at 12:23:44 :
In Reply to: Re: power giant fire truck in Baltimore... posted by S. Bear [72.219.255.38] on Friday, July 13, 2012 at 12:04:27 :
Don Bunn used the term Power Giant in one of his early Dodge Truck books to indicate the 1957-60 Dodge truck era (that same book called 1961-71 the Sweptline era even though that is a term that just refers to the bed in the factory literature and Chrysler started using it in 1959 in factory ads). All 2wd and 4wd trucks were Power Giants.
As far as I know he based that naming convention on the fact that a lot of the literature of that era refers to Power Giant.
Hobbyists for the most part have adopted that naming convention, including myself.
Dodge was not that discriminating as the owners manuals and other literature talk about Power Giant until at least 1962.
Later in the 60s Dodge used big block engines from International in the Low Cab Forwards and those engines were called Power Giants. Those later 60s trucks are were the Power Giant tags in the style I have on my website came from.
In Australia there were different Power Giant tags used and they were used in earlier years. From what I understand the tag meant the truck had a V8. Careful reading of the factory US literature makes me wonder if it was always a engine reference. To this day I am not sure, but I am leaning that way.
I hope that both muddies the waters and clears up the original question. If anyone has a definitive answer for what Chrysler meant by Power Giant in the 1957 to 1962ish era I would be interested to hear it.
Eric