Fans of Studebaker will remember the short life of the Avanti, the personal luxury car of 1963 and 1964. The end came quickly for the Avanti when Studebaker ceased auto production in the U.S. But the Avanti was revived in 1965 for two former Studebaker dealers and the car (now called the Avanti II) carried on for another 40 years. Unlike the early Avanti IIs that switched to Chevrolet engineering under the same bodies, the last generation of the Avanti was based on the Ford Mustang GT platform. From 2004, this is one of those cars with just 135 miles on the odometer.
The Avanti II had several ownership changes after the founders of Avanti Motor Car Co. died or sold their interests in the 1980s. Avanti Motor Corp. (the “other” AMC) came along in 2001 and built at least 367 cars using the Pontiac Firebird or the Ford Mustang as the base. Try as they might, these Avantis looked very little like the original Avantis or Avanti IIs and came across (to me) as fancy Mustangs with some reskinning done. But at a higher price tag.
A new 2004 Avanti might have run you $78,000 (per the seller), but you got modern engineering rather than what Studebaker managed in the 1960s. Part of that cost can be attributed to the machines being hand-built and you got a full factory warranty (from Ford or AMC?). Under the hood of this example lies a 4.6-liter Ford V8 with an AOD automatic transmission. After it was sold, this Avanti was shipped to Kuwait and only accumulated 135 miles, no doubt purchased as a collectible.
If the oddity of this one-owner car intrigues you, it can be found in Crownsville, Maryland now, and is available here on eBay for $50,000 OBO. So, saving it for future resale has resulted in a one-third depreciation, not including what the dollar was worth in 2004 versus 20 years later. Too bad it doesn’t look more like the original Avanti as the styling was the biggest part of the appeal.
Kind of an insult to the original design. horrible color to sell. Nice interior. But as many have said “you can put lipstick on a pig , but it’s still” . . . .
It’s an insult to both Avanti’s and Mustangs. When the seller uses the first 3 paragraphs of their and as a wordy history lesson followed by a brief description of the car that is the subject of the ad, you know it doesn’t stand on its own merit.
This is another example of an original buyer without a good understanding of the car market buying into contrived “collectible” that the current seller is perpetuating. The 2009 Challenger featured on this site earlier today, even though overpriced, is an infinitely better deal, it at least has a following.
Steve R
That color would look good on an original with some chrome to play against and a brighter-red ’60s interior.
This reminds me of how Cadillac took a Chevrolet Cavalier and rebranded it as a Cimmaron.
That’s about as much an Avanti as the 1962 Rambler American I used to own was a classic Corvette.
Well, at least it won’t leak oil all over the driveway.
Dixon this has you written all over it. Rare ride. Avanti. Add a shift kit to the AOD, some 3.73 gears ⚙️ and she’ll move out nicely 🏁
The color does nothing for the body. Needs some chrome to off set the color and enhance some of the lines. The front is not bad with the headlights starting in the front hood. The interior is nice and it should be considered where it came from. All in all a nice car but certainty not an Avanti and certainly not $50k.
Gosh my thoughts are 360 degrees from these previous harsh comments about this car. The appearance looks sharp to me. The price is another story.
Well, it is different……………….
I’ve always wanted an Avanti. This one not so much.
Selling my 1963 Supercharged(R2)
Beautiful torquise original paint. Blue/white interior
64k original miles!
Whoops! That wasn’t your car in the May eBay auction.
Actually, this color works for an Avanti. The slab sides seem odd, but they are very Avanti-esk. If it had a manual transmission and a much lower price, I’d be interested. I would drive it through.
The only good thing about the design is the sloped windshield. Ugly headlamps. Why as money wasted on this? It completely lacks any relevance.
The Brits have the perfect term for this one. BODGE
Missing continental kit, curb feelers and simulated gold emblems.
This is cool. Very imaginative. Good mechanicals, interesting body and it’s a convertible. Trifecta if you ask me.
What a piece.
It may draw a few looks at the local cruise-in, but that doesn’t make it worth anything.
Kinda like it, no one else has anything like it. If I was back in US offer $25,000 and see what happens
Looking at the ad shows location is maryland …
The “Avanti II” moniker was retired in the mid-late ’80s, around the time or shortly after production switched to GM chassis, once the supply of NOS Studebaker Lark convertible chassis ran out, after which subsequent cars were just called Avanti without the “II”.
I regard those GM-chassis cars as little more than Avanti tributes, sharing nothing but the general body shape with the Studebaker originals, whereas the Avanti IIs differed little from Studebaker production, still using the same Lark chassis, same dashboard/interior, and same body moldings with minor alterations to accommodate a switch to GM powertrains (front end lifted by an inch or so, and front wheelarches lowered to close the resulting wheel gap).
(cont’d)
(cont’d)
In the early ’90s, stylist Tom Kellogg (primarily responsible for the original Avanti design, whereas Loewy only supervised the design team) got involved in a project to design an all-new Avanti prototype called AVX (AVanti eXperimental), as a rebody of a 4th-Gen Camaro/Firebird F-body platform, which were built on a Fiero-like spaceframe with plastic body panels bolted on, so not at all difficult to swap panels. Kellogg was particularly pleased to find that a tail-end casting taken from an original Avanti fit perfectly around the haunches of the ’93 Firebird spaceframe they were using to build the AVX, which thus featured a tail nearly identical in contours to the original.
The idea behind the AVX was not to produce a replica/tribute/revival of the original/continuation Avantis but, rather, to imagine what what a thoroughly modern Avanti might look like if it had remained in mass-production all along, with its signature styling cues evolving through successive generations up to the present day. I rather liked this very sleek, lean and clean AVX design, which won enough praise and interest that they entered a very limited production run of sorts, rebodying clients’ 4th-gen F-bodies.
Alas, here the Avanti fell victim yet again to being based on a platform already near the end of its production run, so they had to switch underpinnings once again, this time to a 5th-gen Mustang basis. Unfortunately, that car being a unibody rather than a spaceframe restricted what was feasible for body modification, so IMO here the Avanti styling cues translated rather more clumsily to the Mustang’s thicker, blockier proportions, coming out looking less like a natural evolution and more like a crass caricature, as we see here.
One glance at the front end and you can tell it is Avanti, unless you’re blind. Ugly color though
car really ran out w/the “Part II” when they stopped the 4 door. To me these “Part III”s just have nothing to do with the style, lines or distant mimic of a ‘face lift’ model’s minor changes. Entirely different cars whichever of the Big Two’s basics are use to place a smattering of the Studi Avanti on to. Cease’n desist immediately. I wish I’d never seen it.
What a piece of what. Say it….
It would be more appealing, IMO, if they put the parking lights/turn signal vertical like the original and put the backup lights on the trunk like the original.
I agree with everyone else that more chrome is needed to offset the color. I like the color but it does need breaking up.
Those headlights are weird. I prefer the original or the ll
Somehow, they managed to make expensive leather upholstery look like cheap Walmart seat covers.
I like the color, but what’s next? Slapping some Avanti emblems on some hideous EV-SUV?
Let the name die with dignity.
It’s not a Mustang, it’s not an Avanti. It’s the color of anemic liver with a face only a mother could love and she’s not sure…