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I spotted an (insert obscure car name here) classic car today! (Archived)
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But gee, even R2s are easy to find at a very affordable price. Here's one for $15K and it doesn't look like a beater by any means:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.azcarsandtrucks.- com/1964avantirsrw.html
Here's a gorgeous one (how much better can you get) with a $25K or best offer listing:
http://www.collectorcarads.com/Avanti-R2/14495
I bet it went for around $22K or so.
I think you see expensive Studebakers FOR SALE, but I don't think you'll see very many of them sell at high prices.
This is *good* actually, since you get a lot more car in an R2 than if you were bidding on a 64 GTO 4-speed, for a good deal less money, about 1/2 the price of a tri-power GTO coupe.
The only downside is that Ronny and the Daytonas didn't write a song called "Little Avanti R2", so alas, the car is not in the American Mythology, like the GTO, the Corvette, the "Hemi", American Graffiti and all the rest.
Although, come to think of it, that song about the Little Nash Rambler by the Playmates didnt' make Ramblers valuable. So maybe my "mythology theory affecting value" needs some further work.
google search: $25 per hour for cleaning bay area
Good GOD! read a few of those hits and think it over...
now choose a "$25 per hour" career detour during these hard times as:
A) Canadian assembly line worker or
hahaha! I'll race ya to Canada! could be worse ya know...Picture your car being used as a bay area housekeeper taxi for 3 kids, 2 dogs, and a cat! And drive faster because you've got IRONING to do when you return!
Shouldn't be too bad, if the car has a big enough trunk. :shades:
Now, my problem with the Maybach specifically, is that I just don't like its style. You can take one look at it and tell it's expensive, but expensive and pretty don't always go hand in hand.
If I were to be chauffered around, it would be in something like this!
Of course, I'd have to be extra careful not to track any snow or mud into it!
Many don't like the '55s because it has too much chrome BUT sales increased from 81,930 to 133,826 from 1954 to 1955 so Studebaker thought they were doing the right thing adding more chrome and bulk like the Buick which was selling great in 1953 and the years 1956-1958 were lost as a result. My Commander is actually a 1979 GM truck green because the Saginaw green had too much blue in it for my taste but I left original paint in the engine compartment and dashboard. It is pretty close. One guy kept trying to buy my Commander for $12,000 but I was not interested in selling. I think he wanted to ship it to Tokyo.
I got to see the Studebaker factory because of family nights as seen in this video clip. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m82tQuaNPfE My Grandfather took me to the foundry too where they seemed to be pouring liquid fire into boxes. I liked that the best. By the time the Avanti II was made, I was able to drive myself and had a friend who worked there. See images here. http://stude.net/commander.html
Some people avoid Studebakers because they wrongly believe that parts are hard to find. This is not true. There is still plenty of NOS and reproduction parts are being made. I plan to get the reproduction 1955-56 tail light assemblys for Christmas. http://www.studebaker-intl.com/2010_catalog.html. Last month Turning Wheels has a story by a guy who usually restores Mopars and he said the 1960 Lark was easier to restore and parts were easier to get.
Avanti always JLJac
Saturn Corporation officially goes out of business this month. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_Corporation Note how GM avoided Detroit as an area to have an assembly plant among the six locations where Saturns were built. I wonder why they did that?
$24.00 per hour is also a lot to pay a housekeeper. Meg Whitman, (the multi-millionaire from E-Bay who is now trying to buy the California Governor's office), only paid her housekeeper $23 per hour. http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100930200841AAATHCK
Yeah, $50K per year isn't exactly chump change, although if you're in a high-cost area like DC, it doesn't go very far, either. Back in December 2004, the guy who bought my condo made $50K per year...I remember seeing that on the documents. And he was a manager at a bank...not exactly an entry-level job. Now granted, that was almost 6 years ago, but with the way the economy has been, I imagine there are people who would kill to make $50K per year.
As for housekeepers, I imagine if you had a live-in, where you provided room and board, you might actually be able to get by with minimum wage. But around here, the only housekeeping I'm familiar with is services where they might come in and do a quick clean and charge you 60 bucks or whatever. However, that's what the company gets. I seriously doubt the actual cleaners get much at all. There's one housecleaning service headquartered near me, in the same mall where my mechanic is, and I don't think their workers even hablan Ingles. So I'm sure it's a safe bet they're being screwed.
Can't beat the timing... it's going down to 25 F, here tonight...
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Wow, that's gonna be a shocker. It got warm enough today that the house heated up, and it's still 78 degrees, according to the thermostat. Got to get a little top-down driving around today with the convertible. It's only supposed to get up to 59 tomorrow though, so I guess if I want my old car fix, I'll have to drag out the LeMans.
Working in an auto factory totally sucks. I wouldn't do it for that money. I'd rather deliver papers or something. Assembly line work is monotonous, noisy, makes you crazy, beats you down.
Seats. You make seats. All day. Every day. For the next 40 years. Seats. Endless seats.
Yeah, but some days they are gray, and other times they are beige. Ya know, it really breaks up the monotony.
The $15K one you posted, I noticed says "Needs a little TLC to become a driver, or ready for professional restoration". That makes one wonder about the Avanti achilles heel: "Hog troughs". A thing I noticed right away is the lack of "Avanti Supercharged" front fender emblems, or holes where they would go, which of course indicates bodywork or at least paint.
Avantis stayed relatively high right from the start...and stayed there, or even went down some. On the other hand, condition-for-condition, hardtop Hawks will bring at least as much, and in fact with Avanti engines, will usually bring more than an Avanti. Larks with factory R2's bring unbelievable money...even needing work. No other closed compacts from the same period come close.
I dunno...IMO, most work is monotonous. One of my friends delivered newspapers for awhile, and I wouldn't wish that on anybody. He had to pay both halves of his social security, which hit hard, had to work every blessed night of the week, holidays too I think, and bagging the papers, loading up the car, and driving the same route every night got really dull. And he was probably bringing in all of $7-8/hour, after taxes, but not counting fuel, wear and tear on the car, etc.
When I delivered pizzas, it got monotonous. I swear, the same people would call the same time every week, so it seemed like nothing changed from week to week, other than the car's odometer. The classic rock station played "Innagoddadavida" at 6:00 every blessed Saturday, and at some point late in the night I'd hear Springsteen bellowing out "It's a town full of losers; I'm pulling out of here, to win!"
Sure, there was a little excitement sometimes to mix things up. Like getting T-boned and having my '86 Monte get totaled. An attempted robbery here and there, and evading a speed trap once or twice.
But yeah, I don't think I'd want to be in an assembly line making seats all day, either. But, for $24-25 an hour I'd rather do it, than deliver papers for a pittance. Or deliver pizzas and put my life on the line. In an assembly line job though, would they at least rotate you through several different jobs during the day, to break up the monotony? For instance, say you do seats in the morning, steering columns in mid-day, and gas tanks in the evening?
That's especially true for Larks. We buffs are lucky that we are still buying parts out of what's left of the factory parts warehouse in South Bend!
In '93 I bought NOS doors, rear quarters, trunk lid, grille panel, and rear panel in South Bend for my '63 Daytona Skytop R1 that was headed to the restoration shop, and I didn't have $700 in those NOS parts. People are stunned to hear that.
The two-door rear quarters are pretty much gone, but for '64 and later, they still have tons of NOS front fenders, even.
I'm off my Studie soapbox on this forum for now, at least. I expect some posts of cheering about that!
Actually, I think it's interesting stuff, so feel free to keep it up. Unless you want me to fill in the void by discussing the nuances of the different years of Mopar R-body. :P
Just out of curiosity, how good is the reproduction stuff for Studebakers? Is there much of a quality drop between the NOS and the reproduction?
The repro stuff tends to not be as good as NOS in a lot of people's minds (mine included). We're lucky there's enough demand to reproduce stuff, but I think a lot comes from God-knows-where and when there aren't 100K cars to spread the cost around, well...you get the picture!
Speaking of NOS...there's still NOS upholstery available too, but no longer in South Bend...somebody bought all of it. My wife bought me a complete NOS seat set for my Daytona for Christmas one year from South Bend. I got the last bench-seat bottom in solid red for my car. After a decade or so it's cracking a little in the pleats, but I'm still pleased. Total cost of all seat upholstery was something like $360.00.
As for Avanti values, the operative word is "stagnant for years".
I think pound for pound, car matching car, the Big Three coupes will outbid and outsell a Studebaker or AMC product any day of the week.
The reason? Because the Big Three coupes offer so many more options and styles.
Sure you could match the most rare-optioned Hawk against a Belair 6 cylinder stripper and you'd win, but unless you load the dice like that, dollar for dollar you can't beat the value in a 50s and 60s Big Three car.
A really nice Avanti was worth $20K in 2003, in 2005, in 2010 and in 2020 (adjusted for inflation). Supply and demand rules supreme.
"All I'm saying is, that's at least as much or more than your average '63 Big Three closed car, short of Corvettes, and certainly more than any '63 AMC product...Larks with factory R2's bring unbelievable money...even needing work. No other closed compacts from the same period come close."
Here's a link to a Super Duty '63 Tempest I referred to in an older post. Final ebay bid was $226,521 for the car pictured below missing its original engine, trans, aluminum body parts, etc. And totally beat up too.
It's one of only twelve Super Duty Tempests built in '63. According to this article in Hemmings, Pontiac engineers took six Tempest Station Wagons and six 2 door coupes to prepare them for drag racing. Actually, I like the bigger Super Duty Catalina which is just a better all around platform for the 421.
I've read that approximately 180 Super Duty Pontiacs were built in '62 and another 88 in '63, and that the overwhelming majority were Catalina models. (There were even Grand Prix models in '62.)
Here's a link to 2007 BJ auction which sold a '62 Catalina Super Duty for over $180K. Look for lot # 1343 and then click on the link for pics and description of the car.
Mecum auction sold one of the very rare "swiss cheese" lightened '63 Catalinas for $450K, look for lot # 388.
Anything in the Studebaker line compare with that? Compact or not? Drop top or not? Restored or rotting in Michigan?
A few rare-optioned, well-kept Studebakers couldn't compete in the car market back then or at the auction houses today. For many years the heavy hitters have been paying big money for Big 3 Detroit iron and the evidence is everywhere. Studebaker has always been interesting. Just never in that league, then or now.
Still hard to believe that the rusting shell of a Tempest could draw nearly a quarter mil.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
A good friend recently (last month) sold a solid '64 GT. It's a driver but a nice car. Reproduction (color a bit off) interior, two-barrel, column-shift automatic, no tach, for over $10K on eBay. A guy I know sold a very nice '63 Daytona Hardtop R2 4-speed, missing a couple nameplates and emblems, on eBay about three years ago for $25K. I'm not picking gnat-sh*t out of pepper; these are ones I'm familiar with.
Those Tempests and Catalinas...were they in the brochure, or did you have to do some sneaky stuff to get one, like COPO Chevys? None of the Studes I'm talking about are like that. Now those Pontiac prices, THAT'S picking gnat-sh*t out of pepper.
Actually, I like '61-63 Tempests a lot. I'd love to own a '62 LeMans coupe with the V8, but you never see them (lots of '63's with them).
Shifty, there are two '63 Rivieras on eBay now. They're nice cars, not trailer queens. One is bid to $6,600 with four days left; the other has a BIN of $14,500.
I like early Rivs. But would you say the same thing about bothering to restore one of those, as you did about Avantis? I'm not being a smart guy; I just want to know.
I like the '64 with the smooth, plain trunklid better, and you could get a front-half-only vinyl top on the '64 too. I'd love one of those. Unfortunately, I'll be lucky to keep the two Larks I have with college looming on the horizon for my daughters.
The chrome was perfect and it was real chrome -- it had the color that chrome was when those cars were new and not the bluish chrome replating I see on some cars now. Is that a difference in the base plating or is it a difference in the actual chroming process and the element used?
I followed the car hoping they were heading to shop and I could get great pictures when he parked. But they kept going after the bank drivethru. He drove the car like he stole it; he did not baby it. This sighting made my day.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
You can see this in the 'recreations and replicas' market. The Cobra replicas are best sellers, but all Avanti recreations have failed.
However, Big Three 60s style still appeals to younger buyers, as evidenced by factory retros such as the "new" Mustang, Camaro, Charger. I doubt you could sell a "new" Lark or Avanti or Rambler in the modern idiom.
The "Super Lark" R2 was an interesting car, a mixture of innovation and the familiar. The car had very good power (0-60 in about 7.5 seconds), bad handling, great brakes (front disks like on a Jaguar, and 3 years before Corvette) and the sturdy but oil-consuming 289 V-8.
Studebaker barely publicized the car. You had to dig through the brochures to even find out about how to order one. Probably this was because the Avanti was not doing well, sales-wise, and the last thing they needed was to publicize a cheaper but formidable performer like the R2 Lark.
These cars are pretty rare. Cars That Matter Price Guide suggests about $30K for nice one.
Seeing that picture has made my day! Thanks for posting.
And of course, styling is subjective, but I've got to think this car looks far less dated than any '63 domestic I can think of, including the coveted (but gimmicky) split-window design, and fake scoops, of the Corvette:
http://www.studebakermuseum.org/p/archives-and-education/archive-collections/
I think that's how people could get away with selling it for essentially forty more years.
I do not need to make seats for 40 years because I invested three years in the army to get the GI bill for college, then four years in college and three years in law school. That was a 10-year investment of time to avoid working on a production line as my relatives did..
My grandmother and her sister sewed fabric at Studebaker for a combined total of
approximately 30 years and my grandfather’s pins for working there for 40 years are posted at the first page of my web site at Stude.net. He kept getting better jobs at Studebaker and became a foreman there after 25 years. Anyone who kept the same job classification for 40 years was definitely an under-achiever. Additionally, if I wanted to make seats now, I would have to move to Canada or Mexico.
It is very depressing to see that “Big Three” American vehicles are only a minority in California, somewhere between a third and a fourth, and most of those are larger SUV types that will be obsolete when the price of gasoline goes back up to $4.00+ per gallon.
Whether or not Chrysler will survive is an open question. Minivan and Jeep sales are their bread and butter. Therefore, when I read that they might have to stop production because the folks making the seats are unhappy with an average wage of $24.32 per hour, I see another nail in the coffin of Chrysler and I hate to see them go out of business.
What you're doing is 'cherry-picking", which is absolutely fine but it's not what we do to analyze an entire market. We cut off the extremes of high and low and come up with the bulk of sales that occur with verified transactions. We are not in love with a particular car. Our look at the market is cold, cruel and heartless. We are analysts of data. A good appraiser can't be biased.
RE: Buick Riviera --- it doesn't matter which car we talk about in terms of "worthy of restoration". If the car is only worth $25k--$30K all restored, as might be a nut and bolt Riviera or a nut and bolt Avanti, then there's no way in the world you can justify a restoration.
A '63 Riv is worth more than an Avanti, but not all that much more.
My point is that it is a much more nicely appointed car, not that it's worth so much more---it's not---$5K maybe.
Avanti II was a unique situation because they did not have any development costs. They continued to receive fiberglass body parts from the Studebaker supplier and they had a large supply of frames and other parts on hand at very low prices. They were successful so long as they limited production to approximately 300 cars per year in South Bend using the Studebaker frame.
Once they tried to expand production/body styles and bought their frames/platforms from GM and later Ford, they were dependent upon those companies keeping the Firebird/Mustang (or other models) in production so that they had running gear to put under the body. You are not likely to see anything like the Avanti happen again.
I dunno. Porsche has pretty much done it with the 911.
I saw an Avanti II based on the F-body Camaro/Firebird. It was very awkward-looking and fit and finish would've embarrassed an East German autoworker.
When the Studebaker frame was no longer being used ('80's), they went to the GM A (or was it G?) chassis...108.1 inch wheelbase (an inch shorter than the original Avanti). IMHO it made for an awkward rear wheel centering in the body opening...off a bit. A friend who worked at the Youngstown Avanti plant called them "Avanti Carlos" or "MontAvantis"!
When GM quit building Monte Carlos, they actually went to the Caprice chassis, cutting a section out (ewww).
The last Avantis from Youngstown had a more bloated look to the body and were made of Kevlar. There was a four-door, but I wish they'd have never done it. Also, a few years earlier, there was a stretched coupe. I wish they'd never done that, too! The Avanti looked OK as a convertible I think. I know an older guy with a late '80's Avanti convertible that was bought new by Michael Landon.
"Admittedly, it's an R3 and has provenance from being the President of Studebaker's personal car, but I'm not sure how much that means to anybody outside of diehard Studebaker circles. Excluding Corvettes and Hemis of course, I'm not sure how many domestic, closed production cars would have brought this kind of money."
Well, I didn't even have to look past Pontiac to trump your $75,000 gnat-pickled-pepper Avanti.
For every special, high priced, rare-optioned Avanti out there there's a better-loved, treasure trove of Big 3 Detroit COPO and other limited production cars at auction. Same goes for the more typical production line fare. Fans of an overlooked compact such as the Lark are drowned out by the dominant Pony Car clamor coming from Mustang, Camaro, and 'Cuda fans.
So laugh about the fortunes of Hudson and Studebaker and even Packard - if the host can bear it. Even if all those car makers were still in production, they probably wouldn't be building the kind of cars today worthy of collecting would they?
Believe it or not, although I always noticed Studebakers and thought they were daringly different (we had a small but strong dealer in town)....I wouldn't hardly look at anything but a Chevy through my teen years...heck, even into early adulthood.
I prefer Gran Turismo Hawks to Avantis, honestly....but that $75K is one that is listed as available in the general '64 Stude sales brochure...doesn't require knowing someone at the main office, doesn't require you driving to a special dealer in South Bend or elsewhere....it's way less of a 'gnat sh*t' proposition than a swiss cheese Catalina. In '63 Pontiac circles, I'd way-more liken it to a 421 4-speed Grand Prix.
Don't get me wrong...I'd take one! But I have to admit I'd sell it, buy most likely a Stude or Corvair or '62 Corvette I like, and pocket the rest.
If you are a Pontiac guy, as I said I do really like early Tempests and my favorite big GM car is probably a '65 Grand Prix or Bonneville coupe, eight lugs, with buckets and console. Terrific interior.
Agreed. I see a silver color, four-door Avanti in the Santa Monica area, but it looks worse than a 1958 four-door Packardbaker. I am thinking of putting an image of it on my front door to scare away the trick-or treaters this weekend. Consider yourself lucky I have not figured out how to post images at this site.
A neighbor has one of the last Mexican built Avantis (a gold convertible) and I would share images of that with uplanderguy if I knew his E-mail address. The neighbor actually likes it when I park my Commander in front of his house.
I see no reason why a few hundred of the original Avanti and convertibles could not have been sold forever. I am seeing quite a few new of the 1970s style Dodge Challengers in the area and many retro- Mustangs that appear to be late 1960s.
One of my favorite movie cars was that black Dodge Charger in the Steve McQueen movie Bullitt. That car stole the show as far as I am concerned.
Oh no not I...Mustang fan myself. My references to Pontiac in this thread was an attempt (probably failed by now!) to point out how the mighty hath fallen even as their "legacy" still shines at the auction and car shows.
Pontiac was a crafty player in the muscle car era. Heck I don't know how much of their really good stuff ever made it to a brochure. GM corporate was probably not much help in that department! But for all the performance and amazing cars Pontiac built and raced, it's over now. Just like Packard, Hudson, Studebaker and the rest.
But I think the difference is that Pontiac struck while the iron was hot to shape the muscle car era and that's why they hold a higher place in post war history and at the auction blocks. They created the right image and the right goods to make the difference at the right time.
The host is better at explaining the imagery and excitement in car culture, so I'm wondering how he sees Pontiac "cache" among muscle car collectors in the future. Even compared to Oldsmobile or Mercury along with those other old brands which failed.
The collector car HOBBY (not the "market", but the simple hobby) was instigated by people who liked to play with old Model A Fords. These were not so much the *keepers* of the flame, as they were the igniters. We owe a debt of gratitude to them---our first conservators.
The collector car MARKET occurred in the late 70s and the 80s, when people saw that the "new" cars were not nearly as sexy, fast, stylish and appealing as the older ones.
So where does that leave us today? Right now, the so-called "boomers" are loving the 50s, 60s and early 70s, in both foreign and domestics. The very well-heeled but probably older, or aging collectors, if they can afford it, might pick out a few really spectacular pre-war cars to add to that----what we call "the heavy cars".
The future? I suspect the next generation might stop caring about 60s muscle cars---these cars won't *go away* or anything, but people 30 years from now may not quite understand them---in the same way many 30 somethings today really don't understand what makes a Duesenberg so very special, or the difference between a Pierce Arrow and a Packard and a Peerless. (they're all big, they all look kinda/sorta the same).
Will the affluent adults of the year 2050 want to collect Honda Civics? I rather doubt it, because the global market of today produces highly efficient but not very individualistic machines.
It seems that the ratio of modern "collectible cars" that are saved vs. the number produced and discarded grows smaller each year, not larger.
I met a guy recently who collects private JETS !!!! (no kidding). He's restoring an old Falcon from the 80s. I held a little relay in my hands that cost $3200.
it's all getting a little crazy.
Enzo-era Ferraris from the 60s are still superhot despite the "recession". You know, if you buy a $5 million dollar car, you are worth hundreds of millions.
It's hard to fathom the tsunami of money out there, that breaks over Pebble Beach each year. I wish I knew how to steal like that. :P
We're entering a new gilded age, there will be some crazy extravagance seen in the near future.