plwindish
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Posts posted by plwindish
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Some comments about the design being dated are way off base. That outdated design was produced in the 60's, 70's, 80's and into the 90's before the ownership unsuccessfully tried to swing every buyer's taste to buying 4 doors or convertibles. I personally like the 2 door coupe and convertible, though the 4 door is starting to grow on me. I also liked the AVX modernization of design that was picked up and used in the Pontiac and Mustang based cars, but I think those platforms sacrificed interior room from earlier editions.
The comment about the Jenson Interceptor rear end being pure Avanti was accurate. Last week I was watching the British car featuring Edd the mechanic redoing a Jenson and immediately thought the back end was all Avanti. The program also had Mike going back to the factory and going through the car's original records. Too bad the various Avanti ownerships weren't that thorough.
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Just realized, my 76's pix as well as other examples are on the home page by clicking the link to the judging for the AOAI at Colorado Springs. Take a look.
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Would love to post a pix, but I haven't figured out how to reduce my pix size as they are around 700K and the max size to upload is 500K. I have no issues with it on the Studebaker forum or FB, just here.
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I have dealt with Gary before and he is very good to work with. When I switched from aluminum "magnum" style wheels to the 70 spoke Dayton direct bolt-ons, lug nuts needed to be changed due to age and also different lengths to the shanks of the nuts. At $6.00 per lug nut, they are pricey as are the wire wheels, but I'm an old fashioned type that thinks the best looking wheel on the Avanti is wire wheels on narrow white wall tires.
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I haven't had the opportunity to crawl under a 85-90 model. Did those models also have the hog troughs, or was the GM frame wide enough that it eliminated the need for them?
Also, had anyone looked into Art Morrison frames? His web site doesn't specifically mention Avanti, but I'm sure his group would be able to put a frame under anything as they do frame unibody cars as well. I'm just wondering if he makes any for less than 10 K.
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I started looking in earnest for Avanti #2 in my life during the summer of 2010. I had a 64 way back in time, 1966-69. Marriage, children, being drafted all got in the way on Avanti ownership back then. Forty-some odd years later, after raising 7 kids and a couple of careers, I wanted to get another Avanti, looking on Ebay and Hemmings. I found a 76 Avanti II located only 45 minutes from me through a Hemmings ad. I looked at the car and talked at length with the owner, a 76 year old deciding to downsize, selling the house and car as well. He had owned the car since 1984, keeping a file with all the repairs that had been done on the car. The car had 58000 miles, but he had not put 7000 miles on it during the 26 years he had owned it as proved by the records. I bought the car and he delivered it to me on 01/03/2011.
The spring of 2011 saw the car's 400 motor getting rebuilt and livened up for today's traffic. A rebuilt 200R4 was put behind the now 365 HP, 460 # tq 400 motor. Gauges were replaced, gas tank cleaned and sealed, gas lines replaced, Turner brakes added with rebuilding the rears and replacing all the brake lines. AC was worked on and recharged. 13 yr old tires were replaced before driving it to the Gettysburg AOAI Meet. 2012 saw the suspension being rebuilt, both front and rear, wire wheels added, 89 body mirrors added and an invisible bra installed. 2013 saw a trip to Colorado Springs for the meet, a drive to St Louis for the Upper Mississippi Valley Zone Meet and quite a few cruise nights. The next project is replacing some of the worn Gladstone acorn vinyl on the driver's seat-back bolster and center portion of the rear seat back and bottom as well as adding an arm rest consul that hinges down over the e brake.
I've had a lot of fun and enjoyment driving the car to meets and have the car to what I feel is reliable driver status. The car was repainted in 1989 but still shines and shows real well despite numerous touch-ups.
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My carbureted 76 rebuilt 400 SBC with a 200R4 gets 15 - 17 around town and 21.5 on the road driving @ 70 mph. 3:31 Twin Traction rear-end. New pistons were used in the rebuild along with a hydraulic roller cam, original heads were kept and cleaned up for better flow, new aluminum intake, 650 carb,MSD ignition and headers. Before the rebuild, 12.5 was it for mpg with the smog equipment and THM 400 trans.
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I did not get to drive my 76 up Pikes Peak due to it having its own fireworks on the 4th & 5th, so the "back-up" vehicle, my wife's 07 Honda Odyssey made it to the top and back down. All drivers need to keep their eyes on the road as the road has very few guardrails. One Stude we saw go up to the top was a 45-47 1 ton stake bed truck. It must have been in "granny low" the whole 16 miles to the top!
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Lew, Great job as usual in taking and posting pictures of the meet. Well done.
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My issues seem to be the confluence of bad luck. The car got finished on Thursday and will be picked up this Wednesday and hopefully get back to me by the weekend.
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At least its movement in the right direction.
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I could have used an Avanti specific shop. After a trouble free 1100 mile trip to Colorado Springs and 4 trouble free days just driving around the meet hotel, I filled up with Shell 87 regular(not the E 85) and had coughing, sputtering and backfiring 9.5 miles after the fill up. Two flatbed tows to two different shops on 7/4 and 7/5 saw the MSD distributor cap and rotor replaced at the first shop(AAA approved and recommended). I picked up the car, driving to the hotel and back, with backfiring completely blowing apart two brand new mufflers installed before driving to Colorado Springs. The trip to the 2nd shop,same ownership, but open on Saturday, found the spark plug wires shorting out under load, along with some of the plugs shorting. A new set of wires, asbestos boots on the plug ends, and new plugs installed, the shop declares the car is running like a "scalded dog". The mechanic felt heat from the headers and the wires being encased in the metal ignition enclosure caused the wires to break down. 2 1/2 years and 12,000 miles on the wires and plugs. Mufflers will need to be addressed after transporting the car back to to Chicago sometime next week as Midas out there had no such animal as the stock number of the Midas mufflers installed in my home town near Chicago on 6/27. Today's mechanics need the onboard diagnostic systems to help them fix cars. An older mechanic at the 2nd shop could work on the SBC 400 without the aid of computer diagnostics. I'm still scratching my head and emptying my wallet over the whole thing.
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If you are on Facebook, there is an Avanti Owners page on Facebook. There is mostly social activities discussed there, but its an interesting group to belong to.
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What type of wheel is on your 76 now? My 76 came with a Momo, I think. It is a wood wheel with 3 flat aluminum spokes with the Avanti horn button. The mounting plate for the wheel has 6 metric screws securing the wheel to the hub.
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Great video. Lew S. had posted it on the AOAI Facebook page earlier and it was a good view. The owner reflects many fellow Avanti owner's sentiments about our car.
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The DeLorean Motor Company started again in 95 or 96 when a businessman had acquired all the nos inventory of the motor company. Total production, according to Wikopedia was around 9000 cars. The Texas company will assemble a "new" DeLorean from existing now parts. Those cars were from a different era with safety bumpers and other federal restrictions in place than the Avantis from 63 & 64. Later Avanti's probably used a lot of the nos Studebaker parts, until frames were an issue along with the federal safety regulations that started in the early 70's. It would be interesting to see if DeLorean's being assembled today are covered by the 81 regulations in place when the parts were made. If they were made to come up to today's standards, they probably couldn't do that.
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A year ago I bought a used set of Dayton wires for a very good price from a forum member and had them sent directly to Dayton to get "reconditioned". Turned out the set of 5 I bought were no where near as good as they looked in the pictures. Two were bent beyond straightening, one other was too rusted to re-do. Dayton said it would cost more to recondition them than to buy new wheels from them at a nicely discounted price they offered me.
All together, with reconditioning 1 of the old 72 wire wheels and buying 4- 70 stainless steel spoke direct bolt on wheels with the back spacers, 3 bar "knock-off" type center caps, the price was just over $2100. They were shipped to me then it was off to the tire shop to get them mounted. All was well for the first three, trial fitting 3 wheels on the car before mounting and balancing tires, attaching center caps and final mounting. The 4th wheel wasn't trial fit before mounting the tire. Guess what, the wheel had a different center hub than the other three and the tire had to be unmounted and the wheel sent back to Dayton (Monday or Friday wheel making day?) I had the older reconditioned spare mounted and waited for about 3 weeks for the turn around for them getting the wheel and putting the correct center in and shipping back at their expense. Dayton does send their logo that is put on the center caps, but I opted to buy the Avanti stickers and use them instead.
I love the look of wires on the Avanti, but they are a pain in the _ ss to clean, even with the wire wheel cleaner. Wires are like Thomas English muffins, "nooks and crannies" to get around, clean and polish. Would I buy a new set again?? If I did, I'd probably keep the old wheels I had on the car before I bought the wires, get another set of tires and switch out to the wires for shows, but that would create another interesting set of problems like having 2 sets of tires that need to be replaced because of age instead of mileage, storage place for the wires in a climate controlled place to prevent rusting, etc.etc.
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Just starting a company that's making Avanti's from existing cars like 02-07 models would be cost prohibitive, let alone making a totally new car from the ground up. Federal safety regulations and safety mandating would empty out the deepest of pockets assuming someone very well financed, self or otherwise, would want to undertake such a risky proposition.
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Why?
in Avanti Pub
Unfortunately, "Polarizing" is exactly the term to use for Avanti's design. Being of the vintage to see the response of the public when the Avanti first came out, people loved them or did not care for them. I was in the loved them camp from the first moment I saw them on display at a Farm Progress Show in Morton IL in late September 1962 as a freshman in high school. I bought a 64 R1 in April of my senior year in high school in 1966. I sold the car in 1969 to get a 67 Chevelle SS396 and regretted it for many years, finally getting a 76 'II in January 2011. The past two years I've had a lot of work done on the car and have had a ball with the car. I'll probably hang on to the car until I stop driving. Time has certainly proved the value and timelessness of the car's design. The car outlasting Studebaker through various ownerships for over 43 years is a validation of the design. Please name any other car model that went back into production 2 years after the company stopped making them and continued on for the length of time that Avanti did.
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David LeVesque's business card lists his phone number as 618-997-4238
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Is the car driving as good as it looks? I'll be on the look out for it when I'm in South Bend on Friday, May 3rd.
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I looked over the pix pretty closely and did not see any fire damage on the outside of the hood or cowl area. The rest of the car body and interior look in really good shape. Wiring????? I think it would be great to pull the old motor out and put a more powerful one (LS would be my first thought) and have an already nice looking 88 with a kick ass power plant. Were the 88's computer controlled? Even if you replaced the toast 305 with another, the whole computer electronics would probably have to be replaced, so why not go the more power and reliability route with a nice LS? What's it going to cost? Probably more than 15 K to get the car, motor and installation, Rewiring might have to be in the works also. If you're not worried about putting that kind of money in it, then full speed ahead.
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It looks like it would be fairly easy to bring the car back. That has LS swap written all over it.
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What is so different on the Homage edition that the price goes from $119 to $234? Maybe that is where the supercharged comes in, referring to the price jump.
Avanti before it's time
in Avanti Pub
Posted · Edited by plwindish
The three clowns on the History Channel that have the car show most recently were featuring land barges with the winner driving the new Vette Stingray. To me, the Vette has evolved into a fantastic performing machine, but it has also lost the Vette identity. Other than being a fiberglass bodied 2 seater, there is no other lineage going back to the C1's, C2's, C3's, & C4's. Again it looks like a fantastic driving machine with a great motor, but no "dna" of the earlier models. To me, it shares more of an identity with the newer Camaro than anything else.
I think Newman and Altman along with economics charted the course for the continuation of Avanti. The economics played a big factor because how cheaply they were able to get the parts and tooling and at that time in 1965, and still build a very futuristic car. Using the supply of parts for 20 years kept the style virtually unchanged. Cars changed a lot since 1964 when Studebaker closed the coffin for the first time on Avanti. Had Studebaker still been in business during the 80's and 90's, does anyone seriously think they still would be using the 53 styled frames and suspensions? The continuing owners of Avanti knew the old frame supply had been exhausted or were not safe to use, going with Chevy frames was the most economical option for them, getting newer frame and suspension technology without spending a ton for engineering and government mandated crash testing. I applaud Bunning for bring the new design forward in the AVX and getting the "new" generation of Avanti started. Some of newer supercharged Pontiac based Avantis are absolute monsters in the power and handling departments. If I were 4 inches shorter and 100 lbs lighter, I would love one.