Avantmobile!

[mfg]

Many years ago a fellow by the name of Ray Cash  converted his Studebaker Avanti from Paxton 'R4' power to Oldsmobile power.

What was Ray's (then) reasoning for doing this?

[r1lark]

I remember reading about this swap in one of Peterson's Engine Swap Handbook (or some name similar to that).

There was a thread about 4 or 5 years ago about this car and a similar Avanti (owned by a Robert ________ ??) that both got an Olds V8 swap. Seems like there were a lot of opinions about why the R4 was swapped out -- blown up, wanted more cubic inches, and/or just had a lot of issues on the street due to detonation with the high compression ratio. 

Dredging all this up by memory...........

[mfg]

38 minutes ago, r1lark said:

I remember reading about this swap in one of Peterson's Engine Swap Handbook (or some name similar to that).

There was a thread about 4 or 5 years ago about this car and a similar Avanti (owned by a Robert ________ ??) that both got an Olds V8 swap. Seems like there were a lot of opinions about why the R4 was swapped out -- blown up, wanted more cubic inches, and/or just had a lot of issues on the street due to detonation with the high compression ratio. 

Dredging all this up by memory...........

Well, your memory is doing alright Paul,...According to a period AOAI newsletter , Ray blew up AT LEAST ONE (possibly two) of Paxton's R4 engines before he decided a big cube, less 'stressed out' engine was the way to go!