63 Champ with Powershift on Ebay

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How rare are Powershift Champs? Really off the wall question but were the two R2 Champs 63s or 64s?

Jeff DeWitt

Studedude wrote:

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Jeffrey DeWitt

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I suspect the Powershift was added at some point. I doubt that even the factory R Champ automatic was a floor shift. More likely it used the heavy duty truck tranny. I was surprised to see the Powershift too. Until I communicated with JT I thought my '64 Champ was the only one. I bought it from a wrecking yard in Berkeley, CA in 1970 for $200 along with the remains of a wrecked '64 Avanti ($150). While it was a foreign car yard, the owner was in to Studebakers. He had bought the Champ new with a five-speed, but he had so much clutch linkage trouble that he converted it to a Powershift (3.73 TT rear). He also stuck a '63 Lark front panel on it (which I liked). I dropped the 1500 mile R-1 engine from the wrecked Avanti in to the truck and drove it until I couldn't buy high enough octane gas for it any more. I swapped the R-1 for a good '64 289 that JP had. The R-1 went to the '64 convertible that JP sold to Skip Lackie then bought back, sold to Nate, bought back then sold to Jim Turner. Paul Johnson

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Paul Johnson

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How did he match the Lark front panel to the Champ hood? I've only seen this done once, and was not impressed by the results (appeared to be two hoods lap welded together, with a lot of bondo covering the seam.) It wasn't your truck, of this I am sure.

nate

Reply to
N8N

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Unfortunately I don't know. Everything was fitted nicely except that the dual headlight assemblies blocked the heater air intake that the original front panel had. If I can find some old pix of the truck, I'll post them. Paul Johnson

Reply to
Paul Johnson

Yep, my PowerShift T-Cab is also the result of a '64 GT Hawk donor car that was T-boned. I too found the linkage in a former '64 T-cab to be troublesome especially the clutch pedal that would shear at the weld point for the shaft that went through the pedal support. I liked the truck but swore that the next one would be an automatic come hell or high water...

JT

(T-Cab should be on ebay sometime in the spring...)

Reply to
Grumpy AuContraire

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