I've had a lot of people ask me about reference material for building accurate models of Cobra race cars.
When it comes to Cobras I tend to lean on the same handful of books repeatedly.
'Tier 1' books that I almost always have close at hand:
Cobra Ferrari Wars by Mike Shoen
Great photos and writing. Recently re-issued, although with slightly degraded photo quality. I pretty much never put this one away.
Cobra Daytona Coupe
by Brock, Friedman and Stauffer
Specific to the Cobra Daytona, but you will not find better than this. They were published in 1990 or so, and are very hard to find now, and are expensive when you do. I sold a friends copy a year or two ago that had a page cut out for scanning - got $800 for it.
SAAC Registry
Not as good for pics as the majority of the pics are fairly recent and B&W, but lots of good info on particular configurations, race histories, colours, and options. VERY reasonably priced, especially considering the HUGE volume of informatin contained.
Cobra, the Real Thing and
The First 40 Yearsby Trevor Legate
Trevor posts on Club Cobra and is a good (and knowledgeable) bloke. His Cobra books are the best (IMHO) general subject books available. The First 40 Years is still available - get one while you can.
Tier 2 books I reference often:
Shelby American Racing History
Shelby American Archives
Carroll Shelbys Racing Cobra
Remembering the Shelby Years
All by Dave Friedman. Friedmans books are mostly vintage photos with captions. Some of the captions are fantastic insights into the racing stories from back in the day and are a fun read. Photos are useful, and the books are not terribly expensive if they are still available.
There are really the ones I consider essential. There are a lot more available ranging from pretty good to vile (Beki Adams Cobra almost qualifies for this - the ony saving grace is the 1966 Sebring pic of CSX3016).
Some websites I use also are:
www.racingsportscars.com - great vintage photos with Cobras represented.
www.nvsaac.com - Lots of photos, info all kinds of stuff Shelby related. Navigation is a bit inconsistent, but still worth getting lost in for a while.
www.csxinfo.net - Some photos of Cobras by CSX number - the site seems to develop slowly but is worth a visit every so often. The webmaster might be busy with other sites...
http://www.forums.autosport.com/foru...php?forumid=10 - Great forum for historic racing - pics posted, question sanswered - I once got stuck there for 3 days!)
www.public.fotki.com/BobDavella/ - Bob is a friend of mine, and he does some great stuff. Check out the photos of his works in progress.
http://www.public.fotki.com/VRM/ford...shelby-cobras/ - My own online photo album. My main interest is sports/GT cars of the 50's and 60's, but Cobras get their own section.
Feel free to add to the list...more information is always good - unless you get like me - too wrapped up in the research to actually build anything...
I hope this is useful.
Steve
Books and reference for model builders
Linear Mode
