[Power Surge]

Originally posted by REAL 1


Well, it all depends on how you look at it.

Ace was a neat little sports car. Certainly a classic. I give you all its charms.

Ask 10 average Joes on the street what an AC Ace is. Doubt the majority will know.

Ask 10 average Joes on the street what a Shelby Cobra is. Good chance 10 out of 10 will know.

Thats the difference. One is a neat little classic car the other an automotive icon. Shelby put the icon into what would have been today nothing more than what it is....a nice little classic roadster.

As to my pedals. Yup, I knew the originals had AC pedals. And yes I know my car is a replica of the orignal Cobra. No secret there. However, because its still a genuine Cobra from current generaton SAI in which CS the orignal founder and creator of the Cobra is involved I wanted the SAI pedals because its not an original and is a new generation Cobra which is more a product of SAI today. It doesn't have the AC center cap for the steering wheel either. It has the Cobra center cap. The insigna's on my car all indicate "Shelby" which is what it is. I see Carroll Shelby and SAI as instrumental in the existence of the Shelby Cobra and the AC Ace as the right platform in the right place at the right time by fortuitous circumstance. As I see it, Shelby turned something relatively ordinary into something extrodinary. Thats how I see it. You can see it differently. That doesn't mean AC isn't an important part of the orignal story. Without CS there is no Cobra and no automotive icon. Whether CS could have done it with a different platform no one will ever know.

The AC of today is far removed of the AC of 1965 just as SAI of today is far removed from the SAI of 1965. All things change with time. Whether you see that as bad or good is personal to each of us.

In the end it comes down to this. Carroll Shelby created the Cobra. AC did not. Period.

That's a great post, and I agree 100%.

Just to touch on part of what you wrote... When I was building my FFR, I was trying hard as I could to get it to look as close to the original as possible. When I realized that just couldn't be done because of design limitations, I sold it and ordered the CSX. The funny thing was after I ordered the CSX, I started looking at the few 4750 series cars that were already built. They were quite different from the originals in detail and parts, because of all the updated "better" components. My train of thought on building "my" Cobra went from trying to recreate the look of the original, to just having what I was getting in the new CSX and not wanting to change the uncorrect stuff. Why? Because the new CSX is still a real Shelby, and stands on it's own merits.