Geoff

Gunslinger, you bring up some valid points. Motor mount locations on the chassis and block are interesting to think about with regard to clearances. An R3 parallel would be the Granatellis lowered RS1021 in 1025, whereas on the production R3's they shimmed up the body. Another area where I have experience was when I had a '69 Vette, looking through catalogs like Summit for intake manifolds. I had to be alert for the footnote, Will not clear stock Corvette hood. I probably could have gone with a repro L88 hood, though hood replacement is but one solution and must be factored in to the budget. One of my friends made fun of the "salad bowl" the Ford Thunderbolt cars had, especially when another friend was modifying the engine in his Chevelle. The jokester would dole out a good ribbing, "You're going to have to put a salad bowl in your hood, your modifications won't fit otherwise 😆" The Chevelle's mod. list altered and no salad bowl was needed. Ford however, needed that bulge and it's there for good reason.

Blake: 1983 - 1985. Variances already mentioned above. 1983 was essentially like Newman & Altman years but Blake 86'd the "II" nomenclature. Twenty-five [+1] 20th anniversary cars are made in 1983. There was 1 manual transmission prototype 20th ann. car. These are close in appearance to the following two years but are not identical. You may buy a 20th anniversary car in any color, so long as it's black. 1984 & 1985 I like to call "the twins" because they're that similar. 1984 reverse lights are landscape and hug the bumperettes. 1985 reverse lights are portrait and hug the license plate. Blake's cars are the last to use the Studebaker frame. The great paint debacle occurred under Blake which ended his run. No 1986 cars. Kelly & Cafaro: 1987 - 1991 but Kelly bowed out early. These cars adorned 'ground effects' styling cues along the front, rear, and rocker panels. 1987 introduces LSC trim, which has a longer wheelbase, visually differentiated because the rear vent windows are wider. [50] 1988s got 25th (or Silver) anniversary treatment. LSC is still a trim this year. 1990 is the only Avanti sedan produced. Many Avanti people hate it. I think it's cool it got made. 2000 Kelly came back with others. Avantis made on 4th gen. Firebird chassis, and then on the new for 2005 S197 Mustang chassis. That's where Avanti hit the || button in its life cycle. Someone will press |> again; they inevitably do. https://www.theavanti.com/chronology.html

"SBC into 63 avanti, suggestions other than don't" I would only stand on the DON'T pedestal if it was a car of marvelous condition and/or had a chance of being a complete and original car. It is possible to visually fake an early II into a Studebaker. You get more than halfway there upon cutting the front fenders to match Studebaker's profile, and raking the nose. I agree. Studebaker's block is akin to Cadillac's big block so I need a lot of convincing that a Chevrolet small block has any bigger dimension and won't fit. Newman & Altman just wanted their Avanti to be "a gentlemanly cruiser" and removed the nose down rake.

The answer is in that Hot Rod R3 article; Stacey is correct. The fact I find fascinating is 62% of each front passenger's weight attributes to the rear axle.

Supposing somebody was to treat Avanti like SVT treated the '93 & '95 Mustang Cobra R where: sound deadening, air conditioner, radio, and rear seat deletion all took place, opening the glove box on that Avanti would reveal, at one point in time, the car was a 2+2 configuration. It was that weight savings mindset that led me to the Avanti's "cup holders."

Oh hold on a second … 4 cup cutouts on the inside of the glove box? That's got to be it. Unless people were double-fisted drinkers back then?

Ah ha! Thank you both for the clarifications and suggestions. I recollect the fixes to 1025 during the summer of 2012, however they're foggy memories. I remember it having amber bulbs and I think two pieces of plastic in front of the bulb: the clear-ish light diffusing piece and then a transparent piece in front as a protect-all. The later design sounds like it would be easier to implement, and the slightly larger size might not be a bad thing either.

I write this here even though I have a Blake year because I intend to relocate my turn indicators back to the original location. I know there are some differences in how the turn indicators were built and installed along the Avanti timeline. I've heard there may be height differences, I know there were some differences in bulb color and that light diffusing plastic piece. Did some have the transparent outer cover, or did all? I'm not up to speed in this aspect and want to be more-so before I go plunge cut my car. I have (1) P/N 800734, the epoxy/FRP looking turn indicator bucket and either need a second, or I need to make a mold out of this one to make two of my own. Or I need another solution. Would someone please help me to better understand this area?

Avanti doesn't have any vent ducting under the front seats (like today's cars) to blow air to the rear. Believe me, I'm trying to think of a way to implement ones like in my Focus for my build, to do exactly that. But how about on the A/C cars, the center nozzles blowing between the front passengers?

Your best bet is to buy a slightly rundown 1984 or 1985 and build it how you want. For your stated power goals I would look to 1980s L98 or 1990s LT1. They have the same motor mount locations as those Avanti's 305, so are more plug & play friendly than jumping into the post-1997 LS/LT engines. And hey! 45 more cubic inches while you're at it. The L98 would need a little help to hit or exceed 300 horsepower, though it is attainable. If I am recalling correctly from my Corvette forum days, it takes an intake manifold & cam change.

I didn't rely on starting fluid very much. Believe it or not when my friend showed me the magic of ether, it was not really a cold start. She'd only been sitting 2 1/2 hours at most. It was a royal PITA come Monday morning if I didn't take'er out Saturday and/or Sunday. No choke. Turn the key until fuel pressure registered. Abandon cranking. Pump the gas pedal at least a dozen times. Crank again while holding WOT. She didn't always stay running, so repeat from "abandon cranking" as necessary. If I got the engine to hold up through reversing out of the garage, I'd be departing the housing development early in the morning, doing neutral revs trying to get some heat into the effing thing. Luckily I wasn't driving it in snow, that would've been a no-go since Paxton had the Dana packed/shimmed tighter. As it was, rainy days were sometimes heart-stopping. 12/12/95, I was on my way home and the power was out at some traffic signals. I got to the front of my line at a major intersection and it got to be my turn. I plopped the shift lever into 1 and eased into the throttle. That started out okay but the rear tires ran over the watered down crosswalk stripe and the rear wanted to take the lead. I got things squared away and back in line but then came the second crosswalk stripe. I just kinda danced the car across the whole intersection, like the teenage A-hole I'm sure I was perceived to have been. Although completely unintended, that was just the day, the car, and the conditions.

I drove 1025 daily from 6/95 - 10/97. Its snorkel was oriented downward (roughly 180° from the photos above). I remember that because it was very easy to spray starting fluid into the snorkel. I complained once to a friend about 25's starting procedure and he said, "Hold up, try this. Where's your intake?" You could see the pleated paper element from low in front of the bumper. A couple of nozzle squeezes from the Pyroil can and she promptly started. I had zero problems through wet El Niño years in the SF area. On freeways I followed cars throwing great rooster tails of water, and my only complaint was, the windshield wipers were woefully inadequate. There's a trick to have that snorkel face downward. You roll the unit 180° and then mount the plate to the other facing [outside vs. inside] of the radiator frame [not right side vs. left], or some such manipulation.

I inadvertently found your answer in a generic 'Net search. LSeat says they are Recaro. https://www.lseat.com/products/1980-avanti-ii-recaro-custom-real-leather-seat-covers-front.html And am I recalling correctly, the Studebaker Avanti front seats are out of an Alfa Romeo, yes?

Yes if your car had one, 25 did not have a grille. I think I replaced air filters twice in the span I drove it. In other instances I'd just remove the filters and blow them out with a blow nozzle on an air hose. I had auto shop my junior & senior HS years, so I [and whomever helped me] got credit for working on the car, that made it super convenient. Auto shop side note: My shop classmates loved the 5 breather caps, they make oil changes go quick. We always added 5 qts. of oil simultaneously.

I recall performing 3EE battery maintenance on 1025 quite a bit when I was driving her in the '90s. We would charge the battery, and open the caps to add distilled water and electrolytes some times. From 1995-1997 I don't believe we ever changed batteries, just maintenance and charging. We did replace that battery once we started repairing my '97 crash, in 2012. The battery tray's strength is something else isn't it? I wonder if borrowing a page from C5 'Vette's floor, and making a balsa sandwich between fiberglass (FRP/MFG) would be a worthwhile investment? It's a stronger solution, and not much heavier. It's not original so show cars wouldn't want that. For everybody else, that could be a winning solution.

Definitely a possibility. Photographers will shoot "B roll" just for backup purposes, though sometimes those are what hit print. I was granted a media pass once to shoot an ALMS race at Laguna Seca. It was at the 6-hour season ending race in '05. Amazing access, fun times. Some of my "I don't think this'll make it" shots were what got published.

That sounds like an interesting solution, make an air box seal against the hood when closed, and suck air from the boundary layer. Insert a NACA duct in the hood so air gets directed into the air box. An alternative might be to make that air box seal against a hole in the inner fender. Almost anything is better than what R2 ultimately got; that poor thing is just sucking radiated heat from the exhaust manifold. Smokey Yunick might have made something work there though; he sure delved into the hot vapor engine.

Dave, or if anybody knows how to get hold of Dave? I haven't heard an update about what he decided to do with his stock interior? I would be interested in 4170's seats. 4174 would benefit greatly, having an interior which was neglected for a couple decades. I've been on Recaro's Instagram sporadically asking if they'd reproduce their earlier KRX model, please and thank you.

This is an interesting topic and you bring up placement. Related and affirming what you said, in my build I want to [buy/borrow] some Longacre scales, and my battery placement will be the last item I fit. I'll set the scales and sit in the car, having a friend move the battery around until the cross-weight reading is as good as it gets. It might only be 38 pounds. Considering that's a 76 pound swing (38 pounds in spot A vs. 38 pounds not in spot B), that's no sneezing matter. I love cornering forces, the Granatellis were hunting longitudinal grip. Both require mass to be set specifically.

Due Cento [DC] would've eclipsed 200 with its existing setup. DC only needed to make a return when the salt was not wet. As it was, DC was doing a rolling burnout of 190-or-so MPH. I've read in an article the tachometer registered DC was well over 200 MPH (peak speed); she just couldn't maintain traction for the required two-way average.

I'm tearing down my 1985 to start fresh with a blank canvas. The only module I've found is an aluminum box mounted beneath the glove box. The wired connection (and an empty connector) are on the outboard side, facing the door. Attached are a couple of pictures.

Oly-hay it-shay George! I'm not building my '85 to be factory stock but if I was, I would definitely be bugging you for more detailed pictures this next year: "Where does this go?" "How is that oriented?" "Please help! I've disassembled my car and I can't recall how this fits." Yours is a fantastic looking Blake, and I'm liking them more and more in white. My build will pay tribute to the Mid-Ohio car and I dig that car's white over black livery, except I think I'm going to choose white over Old Glory Blue on the exterior and a mix of white and Old Glory Red for the interior.

I could maybe dissuade these fears with an experience I had driving 1025. I remember it vividly. I was living in the SF east bay area. It was 12/12/95 and that was a particularly bad El Niño year. I was a junior in high school and 1025 was my daily …… when it wasn't down for repairs that is [engine fan embedded in the radiator, 4 of 5 lugs sheered off RF, a clogged fuel filter, and more I know I'm forgetting] That day started bad, a storm cell came in the night before and by 0700 high winds had blown some tree branches into power lines, and area creeks and rivers were rising. They weren't overflowing yet, that started happening around lunchtime and only got worse as the day progressed. I got to school for a 0740 start and immediately heard the principal with a megaphone saying, "The quad is flooded. We don't have power. School is closed. Go home!" My drive home at 0745 was during torrential rain and sustained high winds. Cars were leaving beautifully long rooster tails on the freeway and I was behind them for a handful of miles with no ill effects. I suppose it's true to say, I was behind several different cars, all the way home and didn't have an issue at any point in time. Not that rainy day, nor any other rainy day. Hydrolock was never a reason I couldn't drive ten-twenty-five. The boxed opening for the air filters is tilted down, I'd say 30° to 40° up from straight down. If I was to theoretically drive so close to a trailer, the kind with a whole row of tires across the rear, that the Avanti's radiator inlet was all but making contact with the rear of said trailer, and if we were driving in fairly deep water, I could hypothesize spray from those tires would bathe the air filters with water. Along a related tangent however, how much water is needed to hydrolock a 289/299/304 Studebaker V8? Was I WOT when the trailer's splash came up? Was the throttle closed? Paper Frams (that's what 1025 had) getting wet is one piece of the equation. From the filter box water would go through ducting, into and out of a Paxton supercharger, through hard piping and into the R3 pressure box where the Carter is up next. Has the splash quantity streamlined out, so as to be a thinner stream over a longer period of time? I don't see it remaining concentrated like a floating puddle after passing through the Paxton.

True. My "AV" nomenclature would more relate to car companies' internal designations [BMW: E30, E36, E46, E90. GM: A-body, F-body, Y-body. Mustang: fox body, SN-95. Audi: B4, B5, et al.] that level of breakdown. A 1995 BMW M3 is an E36 BMW M division tuned, 3 series. However, that's all at a level of breakdown not everyone has to delve into, or know. I just use the AV# coding personally. Again, it's at a level of breakdown not everyone has to delve into, whether it catches into the vernacular or not. I find it cool the 2002 Avanti door tags even have a mention of Studebaker at all.

Could it have possibly been in the space between inner and outer fender? Ed you're correct, 1025's air filter housing was in front of the radiator, below the bumper's height.