diff --git a/lib/ansible/module_utils/facts.py b/lib/ansible/module_utils/facts.py
index aec54a7c785..0757a662183 100644
--- a/lib/ansible/module_utils/facts.py
+++ b/lib/ansible/module_utils/facts.py
@@ -34,7 +34,12 @@ import datetime
 import getpass
 import pwd
 import ConfigParser
-import StringIO
+
+# py2 vs py3; replace with six via ziploader
+try:
+    from StringIO import StringIO
+except ImportError:
+    from io import StringIO
 
 from string import maketrans
 
diff --git a/lib/ansible/module_utils/shell.py b/lib/ansible/module_utils/shell.py
index 0107911ba02..e1be749cf1e 100644
--- a/lib/ansible/module_utils/shell.py
+++ b/lib/ansible/module_utils/shell.py
@@ -19,7 +19,11 @@
 import re
 import socket
 
-from StringIO import StringIO
+# py2 vs py3; replace with six via ziploader
+try:
+    from StringIO import StringIO
+except ImportError:
+    from io import StringIO
 
 try:
     import paramiko
diff --git a/lib/ansible/plugins/lookup/ini.py b/lib/ansible/plugins/lookup/ini.py
index 3adbd2c7d67..0e68816dc32 100644
--- a/lib/ansible/plugins/lookup/ini.py
+++ b/lib/ansible/plugins/lookup/ini.py
@@ -17,7 +17,7 @@
 from __future__ import (absolute_import, division, print_function)
 __metaclass__ = type
 
-import StringIO
+from io import StringIO
 import os
 import ConfigParser
 import re
@@ -28,8 +28,8 @@ from ansible.plugins.lookup import LookupBase
 class LookupModule(LookupBase):
 
     def read_properties(self, filename, key, dflt, is_regexp):
-        config = StringIO.StringIO()
-        config.write('[java_properties]\n' + open(filename).read())
+        config = StringIO()
+        config.write(u'[java_properties]\n' + open(filename).read())
         config.seek(0, os.SEEK_SET)
         self.cp.readfp(config)
         return self.get_value(key, 'java_properties', dflt, is_regexp)
diff --git a/lib/ansible/template/__init__.py b/lib/ansible/template/__init__.py
index 991641fa24a..76c69762402 100644
--- a/lib/ansible/template/__init__.py
+++ b/lib/ansible/template/__init__.py
@@ -23,8 +23,9 @@ import ast
 import contextlib
 import os
 import re
+from io import StringIO
 
-from ansible.compat.six import string_types, text_type, binary_type, StringIO
+from ansible.compat.six import string_types, text_type, binary_type
 from jinja2 import Environment
 from jinja2.loaders import FileSystemLoader
 from jinja2.exceptions import TemplateSyntaxError, UndefinedError