1964 STUDEBAKER AVANTI R3
“YOU PUT YOUR FOOT DOWN IN A CORNER AND IT'LL GO SIDEWAYS. IT'S LIKE A DRIFT CAR"
My first car was a Studebaker – an Australian-delivered ’63 Lark that cost me $500 when I was 18 – and I’ve probably had 10-15 Studebakers, but one day I drove an Avanti and I fell in love with it. It had a real sports car feeling about it. None of the production cars we got in Australia had a supercharged engine and it was a really nice car for the era.
I bought this car out of the US. The ’64 squareheadlight version really appealed to me and I like the woodgrain interior and supercharged engine. I started restoring it in 1990 and it took four and half years including doing the right-hand drive conversion, which I had to do if I wanted to drive it in Victoria then.
Studebaker made two R3 versions, with 380hp and 420hp 304ci engines, and mine has the high-output 420hp V8, factory four-speed and heav y-duty clutch. Studebaker sent engines to Paxton and they rebuilt them with forged pistons, different cams, valve springs and heads, blueprinted and dynoed them, and sent back to Indiana. My R3 has two, four-barrel Carters under a pressurised air box and the front carby is different to the rear.
The ’64 is pretty rare, they only made about 830 and not many in Avanti Grey. Mine has an AM/ FM radio, which was an expensive option back then, power steering and air-conditioning, which R3s normally didn’t have because of the position of the supercharger. The internals of the air-con are factory and I fitted a compressor where you can’t see it. It did have the factor y wheels on it but I wanted wider rubber – especially when it had the 4.09:1 diff – and fitted Boyd Coddington alloys.
It’s awesome to drive. I like the power-tohandling balance. You put your foot down in a corner and it’ll go sideways but you’re under control, it’s like a drift car. It weighs 1750kg, like a Commodore, but it handles so well.