[screamingchief]

Well,as I stated above,I believe the big opening '73 glass nose front end option was tied in some way to both the custom trim level package,as well as being tied directly to the sprint option,not just to the sprint option,and it seemes pretty obvious the standard trim levels got the mail slot front end.

I have seen '73 four door venturas in the wrecking yards in the past here while hunting parts for my '73 & '74 2 door venturas,and at least two of those 4 door cars came with the glass '73 "big opening" fiberglass nose and grilles,and those grilles were not blacked out as is supposed to be the case with the sprint packages,these grilles were plain argent,I am 100% sure those 4 door cars were wearing the original sheetmetal and front ends.

So based on the fact that you could not get the sprint package on a 4 door,consider that you certainly could get the custom trim level on a 4 door,and that would fully explain this whole situation.

So it makes perfect sense to me that for some odd reason the glass front end could also be had on a few non-sprint optioned cars,say for instance when the custom trim level was selected for certain '73 venturas,this also would fully explain the 2 door cars that are mentioned as available "sans sprint stripes/designation" but with all the other sprint hardware,because if you look at a lot of that literature,most all the hardware that came on the sprints,also came on the custom trim level venturas too.

This may also explain the custom trim level cars with the four slot front end and stripes,yet were not full on sprints either,seems to me it was a toss-up what front end some of those cars came with.

The custom trim cars also got a seperate body designation too,according to my PHS docs the third digit in the sequence is Z vs. Y for the standard trim level cars.

"standard" 2 door hatch backs = 2XY17
"standard" 2 door coupe = 2XY27

"custom" 2 door hatch backs = 2XZ17
"custom 2 door coupe = 2XZ27

"standard" 4 door coupe = 2XY69
"custom" 4 door coupe = 2XZ69

My '73 ventura was a standard trim level hatch back (2XY17),it had the mail slot front grilles.

HTH.