Another fender tag - export only?
First of all, this thread is how old?
Sorry, it popped up on my watchlist of currently-active threads and I didn't look at the date of the post I was replying to.
Second, you mention the number 21 years, and this occured in a car which was less than 10 years after it was manufactured.
So then why did you say
Fast forward about 20 years, the car is sold to US citizen.? Anyhow, alright, if it was 10 years that's not it, then. But that's only one of two easy explanations I offered.
regardless, my made-for-Canada-market 79 came with a different floor pan which allowed passenger side electric seat, not avaliable in US as an option. The reason was because it did not have catalytic converters.
That's not unreasonable. Note that not all late-'70s US-spec Chrysler cars had catalytic converters. Some did, some didn't. It is probable that power seats weren't offered in the US because it was easier and less messy than offering power seats with a bunch of asterisks (not available in high-altitude areas, available with this engine and this engine but not that engine or that one, not available in California, etc).
Furthermore, Canada had leaded fuel available longer than the US
Not relevant—both countries had leaded gasoline at every station in '79 when that car was new. And the end of leaded gasoline availability wasn't all that different between the two countries. It was banned for road-vehicle use in California in 1992, in Canada in 1993, and in the other 49 US states on 1 January 1996.
which infers to me that Canada was a few years behind the US in emission restrictions
Implies. Canada's emissions regulations were indeed a few years behind the US regs until 1988 when they were commonized, but that's just the date that US-emission new cars became
universal in Canada; they were widely sold in Canada prior to 1988. It was pretty granular, too; Chrysler's Canadian-market line contained a mix of cleaner US-emissions and dirtier Canadian-emissions cars right on up through '87. The first few years of K-cars in Canada took leaded gas, but the '74 Slant-6 cars had a full complement of US emissions and safety equipment—including the OSAC and EGR valves and the seatbelt/ignition interlock system even though the cars would've met the looser Canadian regs without them.
As for the cross pollenation of cars back and forth across the border, I'm going from the firsthand account of my best friend of 30+ years, who had absolutely no reason to lie
I don't think he was lying, I think he was either misinformed or not remembering correctly.