Aussie Mike's Odesy (1100 Miles later and the Cobra is home)

[Aussie Mike]

Hi All,

Well my Cobra kit is finally home!!!

What a journey, My friend Guy and I packed up my trusty F-truck and departed for Sydney at 6:20 AM Friday morning. We made good time and arrived at the outskirts of Sydney at arround 2:30 PM. It then took another hour to get across Sydney to arrive at Classic Revival's Hornsby Factory. Ian had the kit ready to go and the three of us lifted it onto the tandem trailer. Guy is a demon at tying things down onto trailers so I let him go for it (550 miles later and the Cobra hadn't moved an inch).

Sloth turned up to say hello and to drop in a seriously cool modified BT56 box for his LS1 powered Cobra. It's nice to finally put a face to a name.

We then left at about 4:30 PM to brave the Sydney traffic and head off home to Melbourne. Peak hour traffic is no fun at all when you're towing a trailer as wide as the lane you are driving in. The lanes on Sydney's roads are a lot narrower than Melbourne's too. We spent a nervous hour trying not to destroy the panel work on some of the speedy Sydney motorist's cars. Once on the freeway the F100 ate up the miles with ease. The trailer towed better with a bit of weight on it. You wouldn't know it was there unless you spotted the cobra tailgating you in the rear vision mirror. We arrived at Guy's place at about 2:30 AM Saturday and got some much needed sleep. Next morning we drove the last hour and a half to my house and unloaded the Cobra.

We welded together a trolly for the chassis to make it easy to move around and it's at a good height to work on. The body is now sitting on a pallet in the back yard waiting for it's frame to be finished. I had to stick a couple of tyres under those beautiful curvy guards just to see what it'll look like.

I've started bolting up some of my suspension components and hope to have a rolling chassis together in a couple of weeks.

I still can't believe it's finally home!

Cheers

[Aussie Mike]

Here's Sloth with his body getting ready for some paint.

[Aussie Mike]

Sydney peak hour traffic and a Cobra tailgating me all the way.

[Aussie Mike]

Saturday and the Cobra is finally home.

[Aussie Mike]

Here's the chassis on the operating table.

[Chris Lidgerwoo]

G/day Mike

Certainly enjoyed the pics. Its great to see she's arrived.I'll give you a couple of weeks to acclimatize before I invite myself over for a perve and to talk about all things Cobra.

Cheers Chris Lidgerwood
Melb

[stephen low]

Mike

You lucky dog, I'm still twiddling my financial thumbs but am curious about two objects in your pictures.

First the sloth and his body, no no the car, the box with the four holes on the RH rear of the engine bay what goes in there, I presume brake servos etc can you advise.

Secondly the chassis pic. shows the dash support/flyover but what is the attachment towards the RHS for as well.

Regards

Slowy

[Aussie Mike]

Hi Stephen,

The 4 holes are for the two brake master cylinders (seperate front and rear cylinders with a balance bar), Clutch master cylinder and steering shaft. The steel atachment on the dash bar is the pedal box where the pendant style pedals hang from. CR's new kits use this style over the under floor type to give a bit more foot room and for ease of service. This ataches to the inside of the foot box to give a very rigid structure. I didn't get any pedals with my kit as I figure I'll have a go at milling some billet alloy items. Good luck with your decision making/finances.

Hi Chris,
Family commitments over the next few weeks are out of control. But after that come on down, I'll talk Cobras all day.

Cheers

[Sloth]

and the body paint went well too, 'cept it took a while in the shower to get it off!! Thanks for the pic Mike. Glad you made it home safe. The traffic here sux a bit like that. Funny thing is, "you get used to it"...!!!

cheers

[Ray Russell]

Enjoyed the photos of gettin' your car. I know how excited you must be. My knees were knockin' together when I got mine. Nothing compares to firin' that Mutha up and tearing down the highway. Every trip is an adventure! What are your plans about what it will look like when finished?

[Aussie Mike]

Hi Sloth,

Is your body back from the paint shop yet? What colour did you decide on? Wheels, Wheels, Wheels! have you got them on it yet? I really want to see wht the OZ Wheel 17s look like on the car.

I was in Adelaide last week visiting family and Peak hour there lasts about 10 minutes! Oh to have traffic like that in Melbourne.

Hi Ray,

I'm realy looking forward to firing it up. It's just not the same sitting in the empty shell making brumm! brumm! noises. I haven't had much time to work on it what with family and work commitments but I should get a heap done over the next few weeks.

Paint will be silver with no stripes and interior will be a mix of red and black. I'll have the single 3 point drivers side roll bar, bumpers with overiders and silver HPC coated side pipes. Wheels will be 17" 3 piece Halibrand replicas that look similar to the compomotive HB replicas.

Got any pics of your Superformance? I'm always keen to see silver Cobras and Superformance make a beautiful car.

Cheers

[Ray Russell]

Here's a couple of pics. Hope they turn out ok.

[Aussie Mike]

Very nice car Ray.

The idea of black stripes is starting to grow on me now. I've got a 1/18th scale Cobra model in that paint scheme and liked it as soon as I saw it in the shop. What to do? well I've got 6 months to a year to make the final decision.

Cheers

[Ray Russell]

Hey Mike...here's a friends car done up like you were thinking about doing yours: no stripes, polished seventeens, ceramic coated pipes, bumpers etc. Lookin' good!

[Sloth]

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Hi Mike,

Unfortunately, my body is in a bushfire affected area, and the paint guy is spending most of his time protecting his and other nearby properties. Them's the breaks. The wheels are (almost) on, and i will be taking some pics of completed roller minus body next week. Just need to get some wheel nuts for the front.

As for the colour, i went with Guards Red (Porsche colour), with no stripes. The wheels were powdercoated gunmetal grey (i think, it was a long Christmas...!!)

Will send the pics through when developed and scanned. I love Adelaide. I lived there for two years.

Happy New Year.

cheers.

Sloth

[Aussie Mike]

Hi Sloth,

I've been watching the progress on the fires from here in Melbourne. A friend of mine is an active CFA fire fighter and had been asked to go up and help out. We've had a spate of hot weather so he's been pretty busy down here and attended 2 fires on Sunday alone.

Hope all is well and your family and property are safe.

Looking foreward to seeing some pics. I've been thinking about wheels lately and the front clearance looks like it will limit me to a 17"x8" or 8.5" so the 275s may go on the back after all. I may still get 17"x11" rims for the rear and stretch the 275s on to them. I figure my first set of rear tyres won't last long any way and the next set will be the 315s.

Cheers

[Jamo]

I sincerely hope that none of you guys have any family or friends hurt by those fires--and the best for those in harms' way. We know fires here in California--I saw Oakland after those dam* Australian "weeds" (eucalyptus [sp]) went up.

Good luck on the build!