Renagade Yellow Paint Question?

Unrelated question, do you happen to know how many 1974 Jeep Renagades in yellow 304v8 3 speed, Dana 20 with PS Jeeps were made? My thought is many people in that era could not afford the Renagade vs the lower priced models, hoping you know?

 

This page Jeep Production Dates, Models, & Numbers says the total CJ-5 production for 1974 was 43,087. That's not very many, considering Ford produced nearly a million light trucks annually in that era. In my experience, the Renegade was popular - I saw quite a few in the day. If one in ten CJ-5s were Renegades, that's 430 total. There were two special Renegade colors that year, and yours is the more popular I would guess. You could order the Renegade package with any of maybe a dozen appropriate colors, so say between 1/4 and 1/6 were Renegade Yellow. Maybe 75-100 as a WAG?

 

Very cool, thank you, I wonder how many are left

 

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After reading your response again, are you just guessing that it was 1 out of 10 were renagades? Anyway to know for sure?

 

Yes, just guessing. WAG = wild ... guess

I worked for the second-largest Jeep dealer in the USA in 1974, and that's my guess of the fraction sold that were Renegades.

Don't know how you would do better. Jeep had those records and they are probably destroyed by now.

 

I was also working at a jeep dealer part time and on Saturdays back in 73,74,and 75. They sold maybe 10 or so new CJs per month. If my memory serves me correct when they placed orders for stock usually 1 renegade was ordered and 9 regular cj5's of various configurations and colors at random. I can only recall ever having one or maybe 2 renegades on the lot in the renegade yellow in 3 years. Most of them were green or orange and plum was very popular as well. Therefore I would be inclined to think if you have a yellow one it would be fairly rare. BTW the yellow was my renegade color of choice so keep the color, it's the coolest.

 

Wouldn't 1 in 10 of 43,087 be 4,301?

 

Very cool, the color and Jeep will be saved, so now I have a guy who was directly involved in the mfg and a guy who was directly involved with the sale of these Jeeps I 1974 and you both say this is a rare one, I love this site, very informative and helpful to say the least!

 

Yeah, I'm off by an order. Thinking about it more, I'd guess 1 in 10 is a bit high. Probably 1 in 10 is right for vehicles off the lot, but many Jeeps were sold for fleet use that did not go on the lot. I know that the dealership where I worked sold quite a few Jeeps to the beach cities for lifeguard patrol (a dozen a year? They came back as horribly rusty trades in 2 or 3 years), and they made other fleet sales. Maybe 1 in 20? That would be about 2000 total. In '74 Jeep offered only Renegade Plum and Renegade Yellow ... unlike previous years when they had more colors like "Riverside Orange" and "Mint Green." You could still get orange as a fleet color ("Omaha Orange") and there was no restriction on combining the Renegade package with any of the regular or fleet colors. I recall several years ago a member here owned a black '74 Renegade, original paint. A few hundred is a better WAG ... though it is still a WAG.

 

As far as paint goes, it depends on who is doing the work. Are you having a shop do it or are you? The reason I ask is because some products are more "forgiving" than others.

I also agree that the OEM stock color would be the way to go.

Just keep in mind even a cheap rustoleum paint job could look great if the prep work is done correctly. Just as an expensive paint can look like crap if the prep is done incorrectly.

 

99 percent of paint work is prep. and I will differ as to paint, you get what you pay for cheap paint is just that... cheap.