SC 540 Build Photos

[WKB]

Bruce,
You just can't imagine how skilled Denis is until you see this kit and the way it goes together.

Warren

[mike546]

Sorry newbie question. Does anyone know how this car would handle compared to the origional cobra? The weight should be pretty similar, but the dimensions are totally different arent they? Its a pretty wide car. Wonder how that would affect the handling?

[ROSS WEAVER]

Warren,

Thanks for sharing your photos. Can't wait to see more.

[gpbonner]

Mike,

Regarding cost. I'm sure Warren can provide more detail but I have been looking into this as a project and the basic costs I have come up with so far is the chassis for $22,000, a donor car for around $12,000 (I'm told you can pick up a written off XR8 for around $12,000. I'm trying to get to an auction later next week which has an XR8 6 speed auto up for sale. If I get there I will let you know what it goes for). I don't believe the standard seats and fuel tank fits the Cobra chassis so that is an additional charge, and I guess things like carpets and door trims would be also be additional. I would have thought you could do this for around the $40-$50k mark.

[WKB]

gpbonner,
$12-$14K should be the price for a BF XR8 depending kilometres and damage. $50- $60K probably closer the price range and this also depends on the amount of work (upholstery/paint) you can do your self and the price of the wreck( I know a person who bought a BA wreck for $8000).If you want the replica mags that will add a fair bit onto the price as well.
Apart from the doner car you will need seats, fuel tank wiper mechanism, gas struts for the bonnet, bonnet latchs, insulation, front shocks and coil overs, rear springs, lights, exhaust, interior trim and some other sundry items.

Mike,
This car is heavier than an AC Cobra. Dimension wise it has a 100inch wheelbase, marginally longer than my AC Cobra and wider than a Falcon. Just fits on my car trailer width wise(tyres miss the the mudgaurd by only mm's.

Warren

[wodahs]

wbk

can i ask with motor in and bonnet on how much clearance do you have between the both ?

i have about 85% of everything from a wrecked ba fairlane which i got from auction that had an engine bay fire , wrecked the body after gutting it , the motors wiring fuel lines and anything plastic in the engine bay coped the fire and have replaced most of this , had the heads rebuilt and worked (only 3valve heads) , almost finished rebuilding the engine with a whipple supercharger from a f series (hence the clearance question) and was going to drop this in to a 77 zh fairlane

but this may be more fun

[Fordzilla]

Looks Nice!

[WKB]

wodahs,
In the picture the red through the scoop is the top of the plenum on the motor. If the supercharger is any higher than a XR8 motor it probably will be to high. If you fitted a supercharged engine to the 540 it would make engineering and registration interesting.



Warren

[wodahs]

thanks for the reply
apart from higher horse power supercharged still comes in on emissions and adr rules
and now recon this body would be a good mach for the ba gear i have instead of putting it in to the zh fairlane
just alittle concerned about the motor height

[AC-460]

Tabbey25
Ive bought a 540 kit it should be ready mid march keep looking for a donor I bought this GT-P for my Donor Its a 6 speed and bought it for $11500 out of pickles auctions Adelaide Paid $550 to get it to Nsw I Sold the interior for $3000

[AC-460]

Wodahs
My plan down the track is to fit a Yella Terra setup in which runs under the plenum and doesn't increase any height

[wodahs]

thanks ac-460

had a talk to battens performance tuning and drp today

talked with battens about their inlet manifold which is similar design to mine but lower (a shame seeing mines already flowed and match ported to the heads)







and drp about their kit and the possibility to have them raise the scoop to accommodate the charger setup under and they will look at it for me , they have asked for pic of the motor and height dimension

so all the gear i have that was going to go in to the 77 fairlane may go into a drp-540



now to work out which path to go down

now heres another question are you guys running the air bag setup in the dash ??
i was told buy the licensing group over here in w.a. that i could do the fairlane but
a. had to run emissions
b. no moving parts of the charger out side the bonnet
and c. unless i could prove the proper/safe working of the air bags they had to be removed - ie crash a few with the evidence the airbag system worked correct in that vehical

[AC-460]

Wodahs
you may be able to just buy the yella terra manifold.... you may be able to make a scoop to go over the blower but the inlet pipe would make the scoop wide and ugly unless you could tuck the inlet down behind By the way it's DRB not DRP
Cheers Mark

[AC-460]

Iv'e ordered a 540 from DRB can anyone tell me did copy cat cars build these first before drb ..... warren had his floor lowered 50mm by copycat cars DRB don't offer this, can you still buy these from copycat cars... whats the go!!! just curious to know

[wodahs]

cant explain that ac-460
mixing up my B's and P's like that i havent been drinking , my screen is quite large and i had their web page open at the same time

now for the yella terra unit as far as i was aware only did a charger unit for the 4 valve boss motors and also used a different head unit and not the whipple , i have previously discussed supercharges with them before and after getting mine

but as for plumbing up the inlet pipes the inlet on the charger i have shown has been removed already to have a mounting for a twin 65 mill throttle body to come out alittle lower and at right angles like the boss motor instead of running up the length of the motor and we can have it angled down towards the rocker cover when re welding the t/b mount plate , throttle body has not arrived yet from state side yet to finish this

by the way i am at this stage under the belief that my 3valve motor with the charger on it isnt all that much higher that the 4valve with the plenum

[Beejay]

From what I understand Copycat Cars made the kit, produced the first few then sold the lot to DRB.

Ben

[WKB]

Copycat cars developed the kit and made a number of kits(mine is chassis 007)before DRB took over the production of the kits.

It was my suggestion to lower the floor. I cut out the area I wanted to be lowered and copycat cars welded in the new floor section. This had the flow on effect of reducing the room under the car for the mufflers.

The air bag sensors are removed, but the air bags and air bag computer are still in the car. The air bag computer needs to wired into the harness as it communicates to the other computers in the car. If there is no communication from any of the 5 or so computers the signal to start is inhibited.
The air bags needs to have voltage to start the chemical reaction that produces the gas to inflate the airbags. At this stage I am going to short the positive and negative wires to together to stop any chance of them going off. I would rather remove the device that makes the gas, but I can't find any one that works on air bags.


Warren

[AC-460]

Warren
What is the problem with leaving the air bags operational!! I was flicking through a old Just Cars Mag last night and found an advert from copycat cars for the SC540 dated january 08.. when were these cars first started....is copycat cars still in business... did Denis Beresford have copycat cars after selling DRB to Peter Hanson. The story I heard was denis broke his legs in a ski-ing accident and was forced to sell DRB... Don't know if this is true

[WKB]

Mark,

I think I would be nervous with the airbag sensor hooked up. I would be worried that a good bump would set the airbags off. I would like to see some testing done on the car before I would hook the sensor up.
Denis Bedford did own Copycatcat Cars, but I think he has retired now.
If you want to know about the sale of DRB the best person to talk to would be Peter Ransom.

Warren

[AC-460]

Warren
I'd like to do some more homework on the airbags, to me it makes sense to have them operational.... You dont hear of to many airbags going off for no reason!! do you? My donor car had the airbags deployed, I have ones to replace them. Where in the car are the airbag sensors for the dash and steering wheel? I sold the gt-p seats they had the seat airbag sensors hanging of the seatbelt stork mount they must only activate from side impact because they hadn't gone off. Warren you might like to start a thread on airbags to find out some info.
Cheers Mark