'63 Avanti

[Jeff K]

My '63 R2 has an air cleaner that only has an opening on the bottom. All the other ones that I have seen have a fully enclosed cylinder with the air cleaner partially sticking out from the rear. Why is mine different?

[Bob Preston]

Somebody may have changed it. The design isn’t brilliant because it’s sucking in hot air from deep within the engine compartment. If the whole affair was flipped to put the intake in front, it would be sucking in cooler air. 

[Dwight FitzSimons]

Not sure what you have, but below are '63 & '64 R2 air cleaners.  These were the only air cleaners used on '63 & '64 R2 Avantis.

--Dwight

 

[RS4478]

If it looks like this it may be a R3 air cleaner that pulled cool air through the wheel well

 

[Dwight FitzSimons]

IIRC the R3 air cleaner is the same "can", but with different mounting brackets, and it's mounted behind the grille.  See below.

[Avanti1963!]

13 hours ago, RS4478 said:

If it looks like this it may be a R3 air cleaner that pulled cool air through the wheel well

 

Later R2s used this style as well as the R2 Larks and Hawks.  R3s had a mounting bracket welded to them.

[mfg]

21 hours ago, Jeff K said:

21 hours ago, Jeff K said:

My '63 R2 has an air cleaner that only has an opening on the bottom. All the other ones that I have seen have a fully enclosed cylinder with the air cleaner partially sticking out from the rear. Why is mine different?

Yes… sounds like a prior owner installed the ‘64 style air filter assy on your ‘63 Avanti …Upside down!!

[mfg]

On 2/8/2026 at 1:49 AM, Dwight FitzSimons said:

IIRC the R3 air cleaner is the same "can", but with different mounting brackets, and it's mounted behind the grille.  See below.

I understand Studebaker was desperate to get the air filter assy out of the super hot Avanti engine compartment, frankly though, the factory filter location on the R3’s couldn’t be worse for an Avanti in everyday use!