Order Placed!

So having mulled over the various options for a week or so, decisions were made and it was time to place our order.

So at the beginning of June I travelled back up to Peterborough to place my order in person.  I spent a very pleasant couple of hours with the guys, running through the order form, drinking tea and chatting about cars, bikes and sheds!

I have ordered the following:

• Gen III chassis - with mountings for Chevy LS3 engine and Tremec TKO500 gearbox
• Body in grey gel coat - standard bonnet scoop, single fuel filler on drivers side, standard style dashboard, standard transmission tunnel, external boot hinges
• Twin 3-legged Stainless Steel Roll Bars
• Stainless Steel Engine Bay cladding - fitted
• Factory fitted wishbone bushes
• LS Power Steering system
• Coil-over Shocks and Springs
• XJ40 handbrake cable
• Stainless Steel brake flexes
• Stainless Steel LS Fuel Tank

Delivery date will be end of October 2018 - excited!!!

So now we need to find and order donor parts and start refurbishing the necessary bits ready for the chassis arrival.

First though - I need to clear some space in the garage which means a new shed is in order...

Local Cobra Builders

So when I was placing my order, it turned out that another prospective builder with a similar postcode to mine was also planning his own AK project.

I asked Wendi to pass on my details, which she obviously did, as I got an email from Richard introducing himself!  He only lives 6 miles from me and his kit will arrive just before mine so we should be on similar build timescales.

He is slightly ahead of me at present as he has already ordered his donor parts and started stripping down the axles (he has plenty of room in his garage, unlike me...)

I have added a link to Richards build blog at the right.

AK Sportscars Open Day - May 20th 2018

A gloriously sunny Sunday morning saw Sam and I head up to Peterborough for the AK Sportscars Factory open day.

Spotting the factory as we approached was easy due to a number of Cobra's parked opposite and the sound of the side pipes from one of the AK demonstrators!

Carla was on hand greeting arrivals and co-ordinating test rides for the day and I was pleasantly surprised on arrival to be directed straight into the passenger seat of the latest AK demonstrator car, the candy green and aptly named "Apple" which is powered by a phenomenal 630hp LS7 engine.

AK Demonstrators - "Rufus" and "Apple" (Photo courtesy of AK Sportscars)

My driver for this experience was Trigger, one of the long standing members of the AK team.  As we drove sedately out of the Westwood Industrial Estate I already had a huge grin on my face.  But when we hit the dual carriageway sections on the outskirts of Peterborough and Trigger used a bit more throttle (within the speed limits of course!!) the grin gave way to an insane cackle.  The power and handling of that car were insane.  My stomach was somewhere in the boot!  

One of the many Carroll Shelby legends is that he used to place a $100 bill on the dashboard of a Shelby Cobra 427 and if the passenger could pick the money up when the car was under full acceleration then they could keep it.  I think if AK did that challenge then there would be very few, if any, winners!!!

I was grinning from ear to ear as we returned to the factory (and for several hours afterwards).  I have to say that I was very impressed that, without me even asking, Carla arranged for Trigger to take Sam out for a quick drive (I'm guessing even more within the speed limit than my trip) which I thought was a really good thing to do.  Sam didn't quite have the same grin when he returned; in typical teenager fashion he just summed the experience up as "that was loud".

I think he was impressed...

We then spent some time looking round the factory.  There was a rolling chassis which I took several photographs of for future reference, a bare body/chassis package ready for shipping out and some customer builds in progress as well as a couple of finished cars to look over.  We also had a look over some of the owners cars that had turned up for the event got some good feedback about their various AK experiences.  I met Mark Clayton again and spent some time looking over his car in a bit more detail (and asking him yet more questions about his build).

Rolling Chassis

Bare Gen II Chassis

Customer build in progress

Jon Freeman (owner of AK Sportscars) gave a factory tour, taking us through the build process including chassis construction (explaining the differences between the various AK options) and body manufacture as well as talking about some of the factory builds in progress.  

Factory Tour (photo courtesy of AK Sportscars)

Body in mould

Finished Body

Now before making the trip up to Peterborough I had warned my wife that I was very likely going to place an order at the open day.  But after talking to Jon and Wendi, and looking round the cars on show, there were a few final details / options that I decided I needed to mull over before taking the final plunge.  The decision to go with AK was clear, but i was now unsure as to whether to go for the Gen III chassis or the Gen II.  I had assumed I would go with the latest Gen III but in talking to Jon he suggested that the Gen III was only really needed for track days and the Gen II would be perfectly adequate for road use. 


So having filled up on the excellent selection of cakes that had laid on, we set off home pondering chassis options, number of fuel fillers, style and number of roll hoops, nudge bars or quick lifts..............the choices are endless!

Stoneleigh National Kit Car Show - May 7th 2018

My son and I travelled up to Stoneleigh for the Kit Car show to have a look at all the Cobra manufacturers and maybe make the final choice on which kit we would build.

The page "Other Cobra Manufacturers are Available..." covers my initial research into available kits and which ones suited my needs.

Before the show I had in my head the order of preference as AK427, followed by the GDMk4, followed by the Pilgrim Sumo.  I had ruled out the Hawk 289 (as being a 289 and not a 427) and the CR427 (as likely to be out of my price range) but would still have a look at them at the show.

First stop was the Hawk stand.  I had a very good chat with the representative on the stand. He was very helpful and answered all my questions very patiently!  The Hawk 289 was indeed a very nice car and couldn't fault it or the company other than I really prefer the look of the 427 Cobra and don't want to upset those who are selling authentic replicas by going down a more modern route in some areas of the build.

Next was the AK Sportcars stand. They had brought their latest demonstrator a candy apple green LS7 supercharged beast putting out about 630hp as well as their LS3 powered demonstrator the candy red "Rufus" plus a couple of owners cars as well.  

AK Rolling Chassis

Interior of "Rufus"

Carla of AK Sportscars was extremely helpful, answered my long list of questions, and made sure that I was definitely on the list for the AK open day and had a test ride booked.  The quality of the cars and the rolling chassis on display was really good and the guys on the stand were helpful and answered some follow-up questions that I had after looking round the show further.

The JK Sportcars stand was (for me) a bit disappointing.  There were no completed examples of the Dax 427, only a couple of (just about) rolling chassis, one of which was fitted with an unfeasibly large Viper V10 engine.  They did have a very nice Dax 427 Coupe, which looked very well finished, but not what I was interested in.  I had a brief chat with John Kox, who was very helpful and managed to answer some of my questions, but I have to say the look of the stand did not reassure me as to my concerns of the longevity of the company!

Gardner Douglas were next.  Another large stand with one of the GDEURO rolling chassis on display and a number of owners cars as well as a couple of the GD T70 sport cars.  Meena gave me a full overview of the GD427, explaining the benefits of the GDEURO chassis in terms of handling and the safety aspects of the car including the "Whole Side" impact protection.  A couple of the features of the GD that I really liked where the fact that the body is fully demountable allowing easy removal in the future should the need arise.  The other aspect was that GD offer an option to include racing stripes within their gel coat finish thereby potentially saving the need for painting the car.  The example on the stand finished in gel coat only looked pretty good to me.

GD427 with Gel Coat Stripes

Next we visited the Crendon Replicas stand.  Again I had a good chat with Anthony Hall who runs the company.  He was very passionate about his product and the quality looked very impressive including the fact the body is bonded to the chassis for increased strength.  However one of Anthony's big selling points was the authenticity of the CR427 and, as with the Hawk, I don't want to offend the purists by not building a true replica.  

Crendon CR427 Chassis

Finally we visited the Pilgrim Motorsports stand.  Now maybe the chap on the stand was having an off day but despite me walking round the car on the stand for several minutes and trying to attract his attention there was no attempt to come over and engage in conversation.  Eventually I went over to him and tried asking some questions to which I got very curt responses with none of the enthusiasm which all the others had given in talking about their products.  At that point I'm afraid Pilgrim got crossed off my list.

Mulling over what we had seen and heard, we wandered around the rest of the show, which included an interesting chat with Cris Glover of Brasscraft (supplier of windscreens and petrol filler caps amongst other things to the Cobra replica scene) and Ben Thomson of Simply Performance (who provide full Jag axle donor packages for Cobra builders).

Having narrowed the choice down to either AK Sportscars or Gardner Douglas, with Gardner Douglas surprisingly just in front, we returned for a final look at the stands.

Now just as I had decided on Gardner Douglas primarily because, as an Engineer myself, I was extremely impressed with their ladder chassis and the GDEURO chassis being based on all new components, my son made an observation.  He noticed that the transmission tunnel in the GD427 was slightly larger compared to the AK427.  Obviously with the ladder chassis enclosing the gearbox on the GD427 the tunnel does need to be a bit bigger.  However suddenly my eye was drawn to this and, while I'm sure it is actually only slightly bigger, it appeared huge!  I could not un-see it!

We returned to the AK stand, and having checked out the interiors on their cars, my decision was made.  It may not be be the most logical or considered reasoning behind such a choice; but AK was now the first choice.

On the way back to the car park we stopped off at the Cobra Owners Club area outside.  I had a good chat with Mark Clayton (his build blog is listed to the right) about why he chose AK and how his build went.  Everything he said convinced me even more that going the AK route would not be a bad choice.

Next step would be the AK Sportscars open day on May 20th.

Welcome to "Project Snake"

Hello everyone.

Welcome to the "Project Snake" build blog.

My son and I are about to embark on a Cobra adventure and together are going to build an AK Sportcars AK427 Cobra.

Our current inspiration is the AK ex-demo car Ruby - it will be interesting to see what we end up with!

Photo courtesy of AK Sportscars

We plan to share progress updates, issues and anything we learn in the process of the build and hopefully it will benefit anybody reading and following in our footsteps.  

I'd also like to thank the authors of many of the other build blogs (all listed in the links to the right) that I have read through and already gleaned plenty of information and advice before having even started on our own build!

Thanks for reading - first updates to follow soon!

Mark and Sam