Gasser replacement

[ignatzcatz]

I have posted a couple of pieces about my Cobra build but I do have difficulty in accessing my original thread so I'm going to start over in the first section of the the web under the 'all cobra talk' heading.
So why a Cobra kit car? Some years back, my 'other' vehicle was a Ford Popular, you call them Anglias which I had built up gasser style. It was sitting fairly high, tube front axle on semi elliptics all chrome, narrowed XKE rear end again all chrome and polished, medium s/b 302 with Barnes cam, edelbrock torker, 600 double pumper and nitrous. The trans was a C4 with a 10" GER converter. The car went well, 13's at the run what you brung but I just got bored with all the cleaning. Even on a dry day, fairly rare in England, you could go for an hours' drive then have to spend the rest of the day cleaning all the chrome. Also I had a desire to get on track and have a go at racing other than straight line stuff. So when at a car show, a guy made me the proverbial offer I couldn't refuse, I parted company with my lil' gasser Pop.
My airline company wanted me to move closer to the main UK airport - LHR so with an imminent house move some of the car funds went towards this and what was left which wasn't much went on an undecided new project.
In the UK we had one hot rod car magazine which was called Custom Car. It was pretty crappy but it always had a bunch of adverts in the back and it was one of these that caught my eye. A 95% built Dax Cobra kit car. It was not too far away so I went to check it out and found that although it ran and drove I reckon a model T Ford would have done a better job, and as for 95% built, it was more like 25% built and the remaining percentage just thrown together. But, big but, it was cheap and in its current state was exactly what I was looking for. The deal was done. I towed it home to my new house, with a double garage, and in the first week pulled the weedy little Rover 3.5 engine and automatic gearbox out then stripped out all the wiring which was plainly a fire waiting to happen. During the second week I had the body off the chassis so I could really get to work. Then, surprise, surprise, my wonderful airline said we want you in the States and promptly shipped me off to the beautiful Newark, the gem of New Jersey to head a new section.
To be continued

[767Jockey]

Don't worry about living in Sewark. Its a pit but there are beautiful areas to the north, west and south to live in. Just bring lots of $ for taxes. Take a look at the Sparta area. It's beautiful.

[ignatzcatz]

I do agree, NJ has some very nice places that I was able to visit on my days away from the airport. I also got to visit a few junkyards where I found two toploader gearboxes, one wide and one close ratio, a high perf 289 and a very low mileage 302 that all were shipped back to the UK, FOC of course. I had made a decision that I didn't want to relocate to the US so I didn't apply for a green card, my US visa was for persons with specialist knowledge, I think it was a B1. Anyway I spent my time getting lots of parts for my dormant Cobra residing quietly back home. The other factor for returning to the UK was that my wife was persueing her own career and was doing quite well at her company. So in between hitting the Englishtown Wednesday evening run what you brung drags, zooming over to Reading Pa for the weekend events and getting up to Watkins Glen when I had a couple days in a row off, I bought sets of pistons, heads roller rockers, manifolds, Holley carbs and loads of other neat stuff, all either shipped back or hand carried. I had a year in New Jersey and was quite pleased to get back home but although I was busting to get into the garage and start work, I was reminded that our house move was not that long ago so I had quite a lot of renovation and redecoration tasks put in front of me.

[Tommy]

If this is going to be a weekly serial, you're going to have to step up your cliffhangers. ;-)

[ignatzcatz]

My airline commenced operations from Gatwick which is in the South of England and the poor relation to the main Uk airport Heathrow. Then we managed to obtain slots at Heathrow so we started to become a slightly bigger player with a few more international destinations. Of course this meant a lot more work all over the UK and out to all these new destinations. So long story short and I didn't or rather wasn't able to touch my Cobra for quite some time. Actually, it was about ten years that the car sat getting a dusty tan in the garage. Massive changes occurred in the travel business, the worst being the horrors of 9-11. Everything was turned upside down and the industry was hit very hard. We had to say goodbye to half of our staff and we very nearly went under, but survive we did, however the job was never the same and it went from sheer joy down to something you did just to get the money. And on that particular subject I did my sums and was fortunate to be able to take a rather early retirement. I had worked for the airline for over 25 years so I kept all my concessions thankfully, you do get rather used to flying first class I have to admit. So now I have loads of time on my hands and, finally, I can restart on my badly neglected Cobra. But, and you guys still working will find this out that, suddenly, you need 48 hours in every day. New patios front and rear, summerhouse and recreation room at the back of the garden, new roof on the double garage, construct a third garage. Yes, the third garage is for parking the 911 so when you are working on the other cars, you don't have any red hot shrapnel flying around. And other cars happened to be a Porsche 356 I purchased with view to restore. The Cobra still untouched.

[ignatzcatz]

It was a case of new kid on the block, so for the next three years I devoted all my energies to restoring my little 356. I've been a Porsche fan for quite a few years and getting this 356 was something of a holy grail for me. And after three years work where I replaced all the front sheet metal, a left wing, centre section of the rear panel, all floors and front members plus started on the engine, a friend came by my garage asking if i could do a little welding for him. I said yes as long as it's not too involved. Long, very long story short the car was a very rusty Morris minor traveller, you know the woodie type and I ended up buying it off my pal then I slotted in a rebuilt and hot rodded MGB engine and overdrive gearbox into the car. The result was a 115mph Morris Minor which I sold soon after completion to help finance the 356 resto. That was another year gone and still the Cobra remained untouched. OK just a bit more. The 356 turned out great but and it was a big but, it still sounded like a Volkswagen even though I had a 1720 big bore engine on twin Webers it still sounded not good at least to my ears. The only solution, I thought, was to fit it with a 911 engine, which, over the next 18 months, I did. Now it screamed and it went fast and at Classic Le Mans and at all the UK shows, everybody thought it was pretty cool. So now I'm a fair bit older but I have a nice 911 and a trick little 356 so I reckon it's time I got cracking on my neglected Cobra. Hang on, did I mention my Harley. I had an old WL45 flathead which was a fun bike but oh so slow. I chopped it in to a custom bike builder over here and asked him to build me a Cole Foster lookalike street chop, and did he ever - one more pic then I promise it will be Cobra time.

[eschaider]

ignatzcatz, carriage returns and organizing ideas/topics into paragraphs makes your postings much easier to read and also respond to.

[xb-60]

Great stories so far, ignatzcatz. Very much looking forward to your Cobra build

Is there also a story behind your "handle" (ignatzcatz)? You have another name you answer to?

Cheers!
Glen