SBCA96
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Posts posted by SBCA96
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Here is my reply to your post in the 63-64 area:
Depends what you mean by "plain", I would NOT put a basic Studebaker
engine into an Avanti, simply because it will look "wrong". An R1 would
be an OK way to go, but if you HAVE a way to make it "correct" it will
always be worth more either "original" or with more accessories. So I
would put the R2 engine in if you can.
Tom
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Depends what you mean by "plain", I would NOT put a basic Studebaker
engine into an Avanti, simply because it will look "wrong". An R1 would
be an OK way to go, but if you HAVE a way to make it "correct" it will
always be worth more either "original" or with more accessories. So I
would put the R2 engine in if you can.
Tom
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Your pics were nice before too. The latest ones are sharper and the black comes through a nice jet black. That low pic of the front looks like calendar material. Okay, so it needs a little photoshop magic on the front bumper license plate area . . . Awesome pic though.
Thanks! Yah .. its weird how well it photographs .. whats funny is EVERY time a friend of mine sees the car
he asks me "when you gonna get it painted?!?!". Everytime I tell him .. its good enough for now, I wont be
painting it until after the engine, trans, suspension ... etc .. are ALL done .. you dont paint a car, and then
pull the engine!! The paint is all cloudy now from being in the sun. The laquer only stays nice for about a
week and then it starts going dull. From the right angle, I can make it look better then it does, but I like
this camera even more since it somehow gives the car a great paintjob! (but it doesnt rechrome bumpers)
Tom
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Did you buy more pixels?
You got it! I finally broke down and replaced my ancient digital camera. I got a Canon
Digital Rebel XT 8 megpixel camera. The above shots are actually reduced to 25% of
the original, so I dont get complaints on the page loading.
Good guess on the mirrors ... but I got those a few years ago .. they need some work.
Tom
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All that bright work should look good with behind those rims.
You betcha! It will also set it apart from other Avantis, making it clear
that these brakes are different.
Tom
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In case you missed it ....
Here is a picture I took of my Avanti during my last Gtech runs. Its
with my new Canon Digital Rebel XT camera. I reduced it for 1024x768.
Preview :
Right click save as :
http://hometown.aol.com/sbca96/images/Gtec...esting_day2.jpg
I have reduceable pictures of each on this thread, but only the last
set from day 2, the first set is with the old cam :
http://www.aoai.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=452
If any are interested, I will take more after I wax it, the laquer is
getting "cloudy" again .. thank goodness for a cloudy day!
Tom
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Went out to play again today, 8 more runs on a different stretch of road. I
guess one of two things happened, either that first stretch of recently oiled
road was not the best choice (duh), or my pads wore in. Either way todays
results were MUCH better then last week. I wasnt at all concerned with my
0-60, so I only took off fast enough to trigger the Gtech. My best 60-0 this
time out was a MUCH more respectable 148.1 feet. Thats what I figured it
would do, and its about ballpark when compared to those two 65 Mustang
fastback road race cars that Popular Hot Rodding tested :
13 Baer brakes front / 12 baer brakes rear - 155 feet from 60
brakes not listed though planned Cobra upgrade - 144 feet from 60
So 148.1 feet was the best, the worst today was just over 160 feet & that
was with one rear wheel locking for a split second. This time it was the
passenger side wheel, must be catching something in the road. Here are
a few pics from the outing today :
Getting ready, some shots of the brakes :
Passenger front :
Drivers front :
Drivers rear :
Passenger rear :
Waiting for the Gtech :
The audience :
The road :
The Car :
So can anyone guess yet, what I bought last week??
Tom
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The rotors came friday night, a welcome surprise. I havent checked the
hub clearance with the set of unmodified hubs yet, too many other things
in 'normal' life get in the way. But I took some pics this evening.
Judging from THESE pictures .. can anyone guess what ELSE I bought this
past week? Friday night to be exact. The hint is its not IN the pictures. :wink:
Front rotors :
Rear rotor :
Front and rear rotor :
PBR Caliper on front rotor :
A little comparison between the factory rotor and the Cobra rotor :
Opening the boxes made me say "oooooooo , aaaaaahhhh" kinda like you
hear when people are watching fireworks. With the zinc plating, they dont
have that gooey grease on them to keep the rust off like the Autozone GT
Mustang rotors I bought.
Tom
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Tom, did you check the accuracy of your tstat? 140 seems too cold for the motor ....
Drove the car to work yesterday, the temp stayed between 140 and 150 degrees regardless
of speed. Never exhibited any of the usual signs of running hot. I dunno. My Avanti is a
freak of Studebaker maybe?
Tom
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I purchased the other Saturn deflector ( PN# 21030181 - $5.52) and installed it to see the difference.
I do believe I like it better, if you remove the body screws to the lower radiator frame, it will slide right into place with no modifications needed.
I have over 7 inchs of ground clearance, thats with 2 inch drop spindles. It also hides the lower radiator frame on my '87 Avanti while dropping down about 3 more inches into the air stream.
Jim
Sounds really good, I like the "no mods" part. I wonder if it will fit the Studebaker frame also??
Tom
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Tom,
Do you know for sure there's a tstat in your car?
There are people that think the car will run a lot cooler with NO tstat at all, so they remove it. (previous owner?)You know .. I dont know Dan, I have never had that apart, the only thing I have done on
the engine in this car is valve seals and spark plugs. It runs "good" though, I mean as
well as a stock R1 with 103,000 miles can.
I wouldnt recommend removing the tstatsince its really needed, I have read about overheating problems FROM removing the tstat
and the water moves too quickly through the radiator.
Tom
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Tom, did you check the accuracy of your tstat? 140 seems too cold for the motor to be very efficient, and definitly too cold for an Avanti. I have heard that the tstat and guage may fail after a while. Just curious...
No, I have not confirmed the accuracy, but given how the car runs, I dont have any
reason to believe that it IS running much hotter. Usually when they get up there in
temp, you can smell the water getting hot, and the engine tends to run poorly. I dont
have any answer to why it seems to run about 50 degrees cooler then other Avantis.
I am running straight water and its even got a leaking core plug or two! The gauge
starts out at 0, and moves up slowly to 140, it tends to just hover around 140. (maybe
I am thinking 160 - I need to look at the gauge again - but its still very low temp). I
drove it arond for hours on sunday, driving it VERY hard, it wasnt pinging, which you
would expect with the compression of an R1, and the gas we have today. My tach got
stuck at 3000 rpm during the testing, and my gas gauge stopped working a few years
ago, so anything IS possible. The temp, Alt, and oil pressure are the only gauges that
are still working to any 'dependable' degree.
Tom
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In traffic, or real hot days, w/o fans, temp goes to almost 200 degrees. Turn on the fans, (I have a manual switch to two relays, don't trust the after-market thermostatic switches) it drops to 185.
Wow! When doing my Gtech testing for a couple hours, with time sitting and idling while
TRYING to figure out the settings, my Avanti never got over 160 degrees. As a matter
of fact, if memory serves it was at 140 most the time. It never felt, or smelled hot.
Tom
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look what came from UPS today!!
And my braided stainless steel hoses!!
The rotors are being shipping tomorrow, & MIGHT be here by the weekend
but chances are early next week.
Tom
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An Avanti II has a standard Chevy V8, so any kit that will fit another
Gen I block will fit the Avanti II.
Tom
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Your experiences with the G-Tech are like what I have heard others say. Its just a tool, it can't make your car any faster or slower. 10+ seconds for 0-60 sounds about right for what you have.
Yah ... but I think that the RPM's were off, I need to figure out how to check it.
My tach died during all the fun, its stuck at 3000 rpm.
Tom
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I no longer have the order guides and specifications to the late great '94 - '96 Impala SS's and various police Caprice variants. I do know that the last police '96 Caprice sedan, with the LT1 and not the L99, that I delivered had the mechanical fan....but I'll leave that debate to a non-Studebaker forum, maybe it wasn't a 9C1 car - I don't know.
The mechanical fan was not a standard option for a 9C1, but it could be ordered with it. I would bet
that the car you delivered was going to used for towing by the department, maybe to move those
signs around? At any rate .. I was only correcting that not ALL 9C1s got a mech fan. Using a dual
fan gives you more flexibility, since you only use both fans when you REALLY need it.
Tom
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Actually Jim, it is worth noting that in the heavy duty applications of the LT1, like in the 9C1 police Caprices (the general platform for the performance based Impala SS of '94 to '96), they all had a mechanical fan and fan clutch setup. Check it out, its not driven off the water pump because of the LT1's camshaft driven water pump.
This is not true, the 9C1 and Impala SS both had only two electric fans. The only
LT1's that got the electric & mechanical fans were station wagons with tow package.
I have a 95 Impala SS clone in my driveway built from a 95 9C1 CHP Caprice.
The guys on the Impala forum remove the mech fan when they build up wagons.
As to airflow at idle and city driving speeds - I haven't seen the specific cfm figures. However, I would note that virtually all applications with a fan clutch have much larger fan diameters and blade sizes than any electric fan.This is true, which is why many dual electric fans are used for extreme use. Our 86
IROC only has a single fan, later 350 versions got dual fans. I would go with the
dual setup, and set them to go on at different temps.
I really have nothing against Mark installing electric fans on his Avanti, but the idea of moving the radiator to make space for the electric fans seems like an obtuse solution for a simple matter.I agree that moving the radiator can cause new problems.
Tom
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Finally got out to play with the Avanti today. I used 3500 as my weight, &
stuck to 0-60 60-0 runs. I not sure if I had everything set up right, but I
wanted to get out and use it, then figure out what I did wrong. Instructions
for the Gtech give a LOT of info, but without USING it, they dont make a
lot of sense.
Here is the Gtech mounted in the car above the mirror :
The process just to get it setup took about 20 times longer then they said
in the manual, of course, the next time will go quicker. The results, as all
have said, not what I was hoping for. Also, I had trouble getting out of the
hole without wheelspin, and to do a 60-0, you have to do a 0-60 to start
the test. My first attempt at the 0-60 60-0 went poorly, literally slamming
on the brakes!! Needless to say, the rear does lock up, but I should not
have chosen a recently oiled road
(duh). Also found out was thatthe drivers rear caliper is not grabbing the disc correctly, the rotor is not
completely "cleaned" of surface rust left by rain. A friend thinks that there
might be a little air trapped in that caliper, causing that wheel to lock (the
other side did NOT lock). After a few runs I was getting better at dealing
with the excitement of vrroooom-stooooooop! My speedo is off by 10 mph
with a real 60 mph not being acheived until indicated 70 mph. A few runs
did not record a 0-60 (this thing is REALLY cool). The Avanti held up pretty
well in the couple hours of driving around beating on it, here it is sitting on
the side of some oil-free road taking a breather :
The fog started to roll in after a hot weekend, so the road was getting a bit
too damp for really good take offs/stops :
Here comes the fog monster!! :
Shes kinda dirty and tired :
Gtech mounted to the windshield :
A shot from the drivers door :
A shot from the back seat :
You are probably wondering "just how bad did it do?", well my best time
0-60 was 10.679s. Thats a stock R1, crappy pinched exhaust, 3 spd truck
trans, 3:31 axle, and my amateur shifting. I bet Ted could have squeaked
out low 9s.
My best 60-0 was 169 ft, which was surprising. I think that I could have
done a LOT better on a different road, that oil was slick. I also wish that
there was a way to ONLY do a 60-0, doing a 0-60 first makes more work.
The HP and torque ratings are kinda depressing too, but not that surprising
considering the exhaust on this thing. Best HP is 96.9@3500 rpm, the best
torque was 203 ft lbs@2200rpm. I am just glad I didnt blow something up.
I dont think that I ever got the RPM set right, so thats gonna screw up the
results quite a lot. This was the learning test, I want to do a test in the 95
Impala next, and then compare to what it should run/stop.
If Karl has the most powerful Avanti, I have the fattest pig.
Tom
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In response to the questions about Avanti's future existence. Avanti Motor Corp. ......
Is there any way to confirm this actually came from Avanti Motor Corp? I thought that "Avantidan"
was the spokesperson for AMC, the post above is the first post for "Avanti-Info". Seems odd. Did
Dan not work out for AMC? Does it confuse people if I call Avanti Motor Corp "AMC"?... hehe
Tom
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I did some preliminary investigation last night, and I didn't see any real reason why I couldn't push the radiator to mount in the FRONT of the radiator support frame, instead of the rear as it is right now. I'll look again tonight, and maybe I'll see the real reason.
The concern that I would have is the ducting of air into the front, if the radiator it too far forward,
then the air forced whiel driving, might want to "go around" the radiator. So you want to make
sure that it cant do that. Also keep in mind that you will be moving your weight balance even
farther forward on an already front heavy car. The radiator itself isnt too heavy, but the coolant
is, so keep that in mind as well.
Tom
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So, in an effort to reduce some parasitic power loss, as well as improve cooling, I picked up a flexalite fan kit. The kit is similar in dimension to the one discussed in the 84-91 forums......Has anyone moved the stock radiator? I would really like to gain a few inches of clearance here. My other option would be to get rid of this fan ($200 anyone?) and get a pusher electric fan for the other side of the radiator.
Well ... I dont think you want to try moving the radiator, that will create more problems. I am going to be
doing this same mod when I get to the point of driving the car more often. I dont know the dimensions of
the stock radiator, but I would assume that a dual fan setup would give you the clearance that you need
in the middle where the fan motor is now. Both my Impala and my Camaro have dual fans, which places
the fan motor on either side of the front hub. Chances are this setup is too wide for the factory radiator.
It IS possible with creative ducting, to use two fans in this manner. As I said, this is something I need to
look into more. There might be some smaller cars that have two smaller fans. I could measure the stock
Camaro and Impala fans for you later.
Tom
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A local mechanic told me the engine in my '69 Avanti II is a 307 Olds variety, not a 327 Chevy Corvette engine. He pointed out the long spout at the front of the engine for adding oil, saying that is characteristic of the Old engine.
Thats a new one on me. I thought that the Olds engine was more like the Pontiac,
and not a "small block". I know that Avanti ONLY used Chevy engines. That oil
fill seems to be factory for Corvettes too. You might need to find a new mechanic!
Also, I think that Avanti engines were purchased from the previous year, here is a
1968 Corvette engine for comparison.
Tom
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Pretty cool stuff. If my frame was bad enough I would certainly consider it.
Since you obviously have great skills, I have a suggestion that you might
want to consider as a sideline. Two areas of the factory chassis could be of
interest to you, to fab parts for. One would be to design a 4 link suspension
that utilizes the factory Dana solid axle, and front leaf spring mounts, and
adds upper control arm mounts to a bolt in crossmember in front of the rear
axle. Mounts on the axle could be added to a plate that attaches to the rear
cover, and goes over the axle to except tube arms, then coil over shocks
could be used to support the car. This could seriously improve the handling
of the car, and even the ride control.
The second area is the steering box, adapting a plentiful quick ration power
box from a newer car could do wonders to get a Stude around a corner.
Just some ideas to consider, I dont have the kind of money to afford a frame
and suspension like you are developing, BUT I could shell out the cash for
improvements to what I already have.
Wonderful work though! Will be interested to see how it performs!
Tom
What's the extra fuel line for?
in 1965-83 Avanti
Posted · Edited by SBCA96
If its the line I am thinking of, then its best to keep it, mine rusted away about 7 years ago and started
to leak all over the street. I JUST now replaced the line about a month ago. I have it run under the car,
but I havent hooked it back up yet. Its a pressure return line for the fuel pump, and a common thing on
new cars. I wouldnt remove it. I bought lines from Napa, and spliced them together under the car. It
wasnt overly difficult to do, but time consuming doing the bends by hand. It runs next to the larger main
fuel line on the outside of the frame rail on the drivers side.
Wayne .. you see the pics of my Avanti?
Tom