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Nelson

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Posts posted by Nelson

  1. 22 hours ago, bob caser said:

    It would delight me to have a R3 powered car in the showroom. I have seen in person every Bonneville car over the years, Sherwood Egbert's personal car and       # 1025 when Vince Granatelli owned it. But I have never seen your R3 Lark. A car that I consider to being very significant, and I thank you for saving it.

     

    Thanks for the comment, Bob. I just wish I could see those cars you saw back in the day. Good photos of those Bonneville cars, especially under hood shots and inside trunk shots of the two R3 convertibles. I own both of those cars and have one pretty much finished. If it wasn’t for having those two as samples plus the HR road test Lark it would be anyones guess on how things were supposed to go together and how they should be fitted. One big surprise was they didn’t run an air cleaner at Bonneville and evidently were sold that way. One of the convertibles has never been restored under the hood and witness marks made by the hose from the air intake to the blower are pronounced as wear on the inner fender. When this one gets restored I will do nothing to the paint work or misjudgments made during the original build. To me that is what is so cool about original cars……they are still able to tell their story.

  2. 10 hours ago, mfg said:

    Yes, an R3 equipped Stude Avanti could have a spacer under the left, or perhaps both, front coil springs!

    11 hours ago, mfg said:

    Hmmm! The definitions of those two words kind of overlap… 

    I’ll go with either/or!

    True. I was thinking precision adjustment for shim but it is a spacer in the the raw sense of the word.

  3. I imagine the guessing is over but Bob Caser is the closest.

    It’s hard to substantiate as there have been SO MANY interviews with Caroll Shelby but way back in the later part of the last century, Shelby was interviewed concerning the original or the initial  prototype of the AC Cobra. He talked about how they were putting something together which would evolve into the Cobra. He mentioned that the rear end was taken from a Studebaker and fit into the AC chassis. Being that I was and still am, an avid Stude guy his statement has been imprinted in my mind. An even closer match to his statement at that time is “the rear end came out of a six cylinder Studebaker”. Im sure Caroll Shelby, like Andy Granatelli, liked the lime light and enjoyed his time on stage. If he used a model 27 Dana it sure wouldn’t have lasted through one hard shift but if it was dimensionally what he needed at the time he, at least, would have a roller.

     

  4. Somewhere I have a photo of one of the GT Hawks getting fueled at Bonneville. It shows Andy leaning in the passenger door shoutin suggestions to the driver. It’s a shot from the rear and the guy fueling the car is just removing the nozzle from the filler with fuel still coming out the hose and an immense amount of fuel gushing out from vents under both rear quarters. It is a very cool action photo depicting the real intensity of those Bonneville runs.

  5. I think the the short mounts always referred to as R3 mounts are actually six cylinder mounts. The factory R3 mounts are the same as any V8 Stude. Im pretty sure they are needed when the high output blower drive is installed. Also it seems some Avantis with standard engines but R3 blower boxes actually clear the hood surface.

  6. To clarify beyond Dwight’s great explanation, the R3 and R4 engine breathers when installed on a California or New York delivered R3 or R4 equipped Studebaker would have the early style 6 cylinder caps with all the vent holes silver soldered shut on both valve covers.

    So, are we still missing one more part used on both 6 cyl and R3 R4 engine?

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