R5 Avanti

[8E45E]

quote:Originally posted by StudeMichael

This is the good stuff for sure! i was surprised to see a thread this old come back to life.

THANKS to Richard Bennett for thoroughly investigating previous posts here on the Forum before starting a brand new thread![^]

Craig

[Bob Caser]

I have attached some photos of the Due Cento sitting in a gas station, next door to Paxton Products on Olympic Blvd.
These were taken in the summer of 1965.
As all old race cars, it had little value at the time.

The 1964 gold car in a previous post picture, had a R4 engine in it with air conditioning.This transplant was I believe done in the 70's.

Bob Caser

http://s833.photobucket.com/albums/zz259/mrbobinc/?action=view&current=twoavantis.jpg&newest=1

mrbobinc

[Alan]

Bob, It brought back memories, those pics. They must have have been taken in the evening or weekend since there are no other cars in the employees parking lot. The side pic where you can see the fence is the top of the Santa Monica Freeway concrete wall, the freeway is about 30 ft. below. The pic. taken to the South East towards SMCC. That Shell gas station was a meeting place for a bunch of bikers with full dress Harleys. Rich Bennett called me about a week ago and we B.S.ed about the old times. Since I was a part time employee I did not see him leave with the car. I assumed he rented a trailer or a tow dolly at least. But Bill Burke gave him a tow bar to tow a car across country with no engine. Good thing the EX cars had positive caster King pins.

[Bob Caser]

Alan, I had just moved to California, when I took those photos.
I remember the Shell station as well. I was a potential customer for a R3, and visited Paxton as well as Andy's son Vince, he was doing engine swaps over on Wilshire Blvd out of one bay in a service station.
Vince quoted me $2,500 to install a R3 engine in my Avanti. I thought it to be to much money and used the $2,500 dollars as a down payment for a 289 Cobra instead.

mrbobinc

[63r2]

Thanks for the photo's Bob.
Interesting to read the letter from Halibrand to Paxton about the cost of supplying wheels, Dated 11/10/63.
pb

[r5duecento]

It was great to hear from you guys who saw the car when it was in California and I especially enjoyed the pictures in the parking lot. I am always in search of additional history, any photographs, information or the whereabouts of any parts that were used on the car. I am also in search of anyone who was involved with the car when it was run either as the Prototype R3 in 1962 or as the Due Cento in 1963. I am told that numerous parts were tried at Bonneville and during the runs many changes were made.

[HNCadet]

StudeMichael: EX-2143 is still around, I bought it some 15 months ago, sitting in a field outside of Colorado Springs, CO. Currently it has been loaned out to SilverHawkDan @ Racing Studebakers who is now prepping the car to be run at Bonneville this year. You can follow the thread here:

http://racingstudebakers.com/stl-web/bulletin/bb/viewtopic.php?t=1855

Recently, Steve Burke discovered the original Purchase/Build sheet......it is 63R-1006! It was an early Avanti that became an Engineering car before being sold to Bill Burke Sr. in mid-1963. Richard Quinn and I went searching for this data a year ago and he narrowed it down to 2 cars, 1006 was one of them. Thankfully Steve Burke found several boxes of info on the car stored at his Dad's house. Dan was hoping to tow the car to the Petersen meet in March, depending on where he was with the Bonneville prep work. He's looking for some help from the community to get the car ready, so visit the site and see if you can help!

The Kamphefner car had an R4 engine in it that Richard bought from a fellow who bought it from the Burke's. Richard has passed on, but his wife still drives and enjoys the car as much as she can!

Oh, and the comment about loving Halibrands? I did too.......until I had to polish them for ~6hrs. prior to every show. Within days after the show they oxidize over and after 45 years this alloy of Magnesium is pretty brittle and not the best driving wheel out there. They do bring nice comments at the shows, but I'm pretty tired of the maintenance already.

[r5duecento]

quote:Originally posted by StudeMichael

Do you have any recent pics of the car?

Just some pictures of the car in bare fiberglass in the body shop undergoing restoration. Not very interesting.

[lschuc]

Gary:
the story and more photos of the Trans International Airlines that flew the Avantis around to dealers ran early last year, or the end of 2008 I believe, in Avanti Magazine.
Lew

quote:Originally posted by JBOYLE

quote:Originally posted by Guido

Joe,

I seem to recall reading that Studebaker used the services of Trans International Airlines (purchased in 1962 from Kirk Kerkorian) to shuttle Avanti's around the country for their debut.

Gary

I recently found a photo in one of my aircraft books of an ex-USAF Fairchild C-82 Packet with Avanti titles that was used to fly early Avantis around the country for dealer previews.
The aircraft is not marked with any airline name.

I've been meaning to write the author of the book and get permission to send the photo to the Avanti, the AOAI magazine.

63 Avanti R1 2788
1914 Stutz Bearcat
(George Barris replica)

Washington State

Lew Schucart
Editor, Avanti Magazine

[lschuc]

quote:Originally posted by StudeMichael

Do you have any recent pics of the car?

Again, there was a recent story and photo of the Due Cento Avanti owned by Richard, also in a recent Avanti Magazine issue in the past year or so. I don't have back issues with me at this time, though.
Lew

Lew Schucart
Editor, Avanti Magazine

[StudeMichael]

Will the restored car have a cloned R5 engine with dual paxtons and a novi unit?

[r5duecento]

The Due Cento article in AOA Magazine is an article on Jim Lange's Avanti which more correctly should be referred to as 'Due Cento - The Next Generation' as Jim has named his car (see the lettering on the door of his car). Unfortunately, this has caused alot of confusion with the Granatelli Bonneville Avanti, the original 'Due Cento'. Jim certainly has accomplished remarkable things with his Avanti and Jim is a great guy. However, this car has nothing to do with the "Factory" run Bonneville cars. It is a production Avanti to which Jim has made all of the modifications himself, which certainly attests to his ability as a performance engine builder.

Another item of confusion; 'Due Cento' does not mean 2 superchargers which has been written in many articles. It means "200" in Italian, the speed to which the Granatelli's were shooting for. There was only one R5 engine and there was alot more to it than two superchargers. Two superchargers on a Studebaker engine does not make an R5! The R5 engine on the Due Cento was a basic R3 engine with a Bendix Fuel Injection unit that sprayed the fuel into/through the dual superchargers and then into a custom built sheet metal intake manifold which fed into the intake ports of the heads. It ran a Gilmore pulley and belt system to eliminate belt slippage, a special grind camshaft (several different grinders made camshafts for it but nobody remembers which one was used), and a Shiefer magneto ignition. It did not run a dry sump system. The blowers ran the blower fluid through a reserviour and cooler in order to cool the fluid which was needed as they were producing about 20 lbs. of boost.

Dick

[r5duecento]

quote:Originally posted by StudeMichael

Will the restored car have a cloned R5 engine with dual paxtons and a novi unit?

No it will not, as the R5 engine with the bendix unit could only be run at full throttle. It will initially have the original R3 installed which it ran in 1962 when it was the prototype R3 Avanti that set the 29 Land Speed Records as it had in the film "Bonneville Record Breaker" as this is a streetable engine. Later, I will try to put as much R5 induction, etc. on the car as possible if it can be made driveable.[8D]

[Gunslinger]

Here's a December 1963 article on Studebaker's run at the Salt Flats, including pics and information on the R5, plus other cars and even Paula Murphy and her cross country drive in an Avanti. How accurate the information is I don't know. Since it's the December '63 issue, it was likely on the news stands at least a month or two before that...before Studebaker announced the shut down of US car production.

Since Car Life doesn't exist anymore, I guess I'm not violating any copyrights reproducing the article here...at least I hope I'm not.









Poet...Mystic...Soldier of Fortune. As always...self-absorbed, adversarial, cocky and in general a malcontent.

[r5duecento]

quote:Originally posted by Gunslinger

Here's a December 1963 article on Studebaker's run at the Salt Flats, including pics and information on the R5, plus other cars and even Paula Murphy and her cross country drive in an Avanti. How accurate the information is I don't know. Since it's the December '63 issue, it was likely on the news stands at least a month or two before that...before Studebaker announced the shut down of US car production.

Since Car Life doesn't exist anymore, I guess I'm not violating any copyrights reproducing the article here...at least I hope I'm not.
[img]

http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii281/Boris_Badenov/cars/misc%20car%20pics/pg1.jpg[/img]








Poet...Mystic...Soldier of Fortune. As always...self-absorbed, adversarial, cocky and in general a malcontent.

The article is accurate as far as the Due Cento is concerned. However, the pictures are misleading. In the four picture segment, the two pictures to the left (interior shots) are of the number 8 car and not the Due Cento. This is typical with magazines. They take a bunch of pictures, take them back to the office and don't remember which is which. This was a very good article and Car Life did several on the Bonneville Avantis. I would love to be able to find the original pictures Car Life took, especially the 3/4 shot with the chute out. Does anyone know any contact information with Car Life since they are no longer producing that magazine?

Dick