Ebay Avanti

That frame and the "replaced" hog troughs would scare me on a rust belt Avanti. The doors flying open, is a hint that something is going on.

Mark Anders> I'm not an Avanti expert by any means, but is this a not so bad deal > for an Avanti II?

Did you see the pic where the lower frame plate is buckling with all the rust?. Famous old saying "If you can see rust, there's a lot more you can't see"

This is one for a gambler...I contacted the seller the first time ( a couple of months ago ) when the car received no bids and told him I might be interested in a "few months" after I put a few dollars together. I had a little life change since then, I rushed back to work from Reedsville only to find out that I was no longer employed!!!

That's another story, but the reason I was interested in the car in the first place, was that even if the frame were beyond help the drivetrain would cost close to the starting bid. It's a ZZ4 Crate motor, D port aluminum heads, full roller cam, 350 gauranteed from GM, horsepower with lots of good parts inside the motor. Retail on a ZZ4 is almost $5,000 without shipping, a bargain is $3995. The trans is a 700R4 and I know all too well that you can spend upwards of $2,500 to do that conversion. Upgraded brakes, custom exhaust ( necessary with the trans ) Edelbrock 750 carb, wire wheels...there is a lot of money in parts in that car. If you were building a Hot Rod or wanted to upgrade your Avanti II, you would get the parts cheap and you wouldn't have to fabricate anything, just swap them over and sell the Avanti as a roller.

If I were a little more certain of my economic future right now, I'd be on that car. I have a ZZ4 in an '84 El Camino and based on its performance I can say that Avanti, with the right rear end gears is a mid 13 second car.

I can tell by the pictures that the TV cable to the trans is connected to the carb in a manner that makes for a very hard 1-2 shift, but that's easily fixed. The pop top sunroof is a bit tacky but at long as it doesn't fly off at 100 MPH at the end of the 1/4 mile, I could live with it.

Ernie R

So a fellow could drop in a $1000 Goodwrench motor and a turbo 350 and relist the car.

Big E wrote:

The real killer, John, is I have a 350 and TH350 Trans that came out of the El Camino! But I don't have anything for the ZZ4 so I would have been looking to keep the Avanti. Starting a new career and buying another project don't go well together but that could be a fun Avanti or be the donor for someone's needy project. You know a guy with imagination, an eye for a good deal, someone that may have a few Studes laying around that could use a killer drivetrain...know anybody??? (G)

Ernie R

Ernie; What happened at work!!!!! I immediately got a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I'm really sorry to hear about your job. Are you likely to find similar employment with another dealer? Are you going to stay local or move? Geesh, I'm really sorry. I hope things go well for you.

Now, for my obligatory newsgroup question. The real killer, John, is I have a 350 and TH350 Trans that came out of the

Some good thinking there Ernie but what's up with the work situation? You can respond in the NG if you throw in some info on adjusting the TV cable...

Brooksie (fingers crossed for some good luck to come your way...)

The TV cable is attached like the cable for a TH350 should be. The 700 and 200R4's need to be up and back a little. There are two ways to do this, use the BowTie overdrives kit for the Edelbrock carb, which is probably the best, or get an adapter from TCI, B&M etc.

If your cable attachment is correct, the hard shift could be from an "overbuilt", for the application, trans. In the process of correcting my no lock up problem the tech told me he changed a spring in the servo to ease the shift firmness. He put in a Corvette spring instead of the two springs that were in there. The allure of "level 2" style transmissions pitched by their manufacturers as only a "few dollars more than the level 1's" gets you a trans that is built to handle much more torque and horsepower than what our Studes will be delivering.

There are two symptoms that get the same description...the improperly positioned TV cable gets you an extended shift that when it finally goes into second, mimics a full throttle shift...at part throttle and slams into second. A " more trans for the application" shift is firm but occurs at the right time, like 15 MPH at light throttle, 35 at mid etc.

As far as the job, I won't bore the group with details but I'll send you and Richard a note. Thanks for your concern.

Ernie R

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