I am NEW and have Questions

Hello,

I am Sid Dunn and live in Fairmount,IN (ring any bells?).I have just completed a Cobra and it is for sale and looking for my next project and i am leaning to the 550 Spyder and because i live in Fairmount a James Dean look alike comes to mind very quickly. I have a few questions.
1. What is the best kit (company) to buy, I have a Hurricane kit for the Cobra and it was very easy to build, it came with all the parts except for the wheels,tires,drivetrain, I am looking for a complete like that.
2. What engine is best? (for all round then best for resale)
3. Air cooled or water cooled?
4. What is the best tranaxle?
5. The Cobra is fast and fun but at 10 mpg it takes some fun out of it,How fast are these cars and what mpg should i get?
6. When i would go to sell how is the resale market?

Thanks for any help you can provide.

Sid

Hi Sid, Please do a thorough search of this forum and Spyderclub.com and you will find a myriad of arguments and disertations on all of the subjects you seek counsel on.

There are no simple pat answers for any of your questoin, but there are a lot of opinions out there. The real answer to "what's best" is "whatever you want/have", it's different for everyone. And a lot of your questions can be simply answered with "depends..."

A question for you: Sounds like you are building just to re-sell?

Doug,
No not really wanting to build to just to sell. I have draged race for the last 20 yrs and really just got tired of all the time away from so i sold my dragsters and built a Cobra to fill my time. I have enjoyed driving the car but i might have enjoyed building it better.
The reason i ask about the resale is i think the Cobra market has really slowed down or just stopped. The 1 thing i have learned about the Cobra world is the thinking that only a Ford motor can and should be in the car,by now you can prolly guess that mine has a Chevy mnotor in it. And being a Chevy guy i am the odd man out so i am ready to move on to my next car.So the question on what motor should be in these car is a real big one for me.IN THE 550 REPLICA WORLD.
Plus i would like to find a car that is real cool to drive with a great HP to weight ratio that does not cost $30 to $40 for a short drive.

Sid

Doug,
I forgot to ask what motor set up do you have it looks like you have run it on he track.

Sid

Hi Sid, Welcome to the Wonderful World of Spyders!

I have a CB Performance 2165cc VW Type 1 motor that put out 186 peak HP on the engine dyno, and IIRC about 150 lb/ft torque. Or there abouts... The whole car weighs 1408 ready to go on the track so it scoots along quite nicely.

As to what motor SHOULD be in these...the 64 million dollar question. My first choice would be the Porsche 4 cam motor. But they are a little pricey, and rare, and finicky, and not really practical from any viewpoint. A lot of people use VW Type 1's. And a lot of people use VW Type 4's (my next motor BTW). Still others use Porsche 914 motors, 911 motors, VW/Audi 4 cylinder water cooled, Subaru motors, Alfa motors, etc. From this you can see that most cars have a flat 4 configuration, with a few going to 6 cylinders, and a few outlyers with a straight 4 config. Oh, and one crazy (a GOOD crazy mind you) man we all know about put a Northstar in his!!!.

A lot of your choice depends on what you are going to do with the car. I chose my configuration because I didn't know any better at the time I specified the build and my builder recommended that motor. If I did it again I would go with a Type 4 motor, mostly because its a more robust motor with higher torque output. I wanted a car that I could split between fast drives on the street and track day duty. It had to have street manners but still be a blast on the track. I'm very happy with where I ended up and have no complaints.

Any of the above motors will get you a pretty quick ride with the weight so low on the car. You could weigh in how "True" to the original you want to be. A 4 cam motor being 100%, then 914, then vw, tehn Subie, then...you get the idea.

Also think about complexity: air cooled vs. water cooled makes a big difference in all of the "stuff" you have to hide in a very small package.

Lots to think about.....

Hello. Wieghing in from the water-cooled side. I have the VW/Audi inline four. 125 hp from the little engine. not bad but i am thinking of doing a turbo once Carey from Special Editions works out the kinks. That will boost it to 225hp. I went with this motor for the ease and convience. Its fuel injected, starts every time, no hassle sort of thing. watercooled with the radiator in the nose. fantastic car, fantastic follow-up care from the boys in Indiana. Any questions please don't hesitate to ask!!! Good Luck

Thanks for the help with my questions, are any of you guys going to James Dean days next week i would like to see your cars, i will have my Cobra there with a FOR SALE sign on it.

Sid

Post photo's of your Cobra replica in the Classifieds with a price

Have you thought about buying a completed car and upgrading/ refinishing to your own standards.

Thats what I did it saves a huge amount of time and if you don't like it then you can sell it!

The beauty of these cars is they wiegh so little ( 500kg) and for a moderate state of tune in the engine dept ( say 120 to 140 bhp) you can get 0 to 60mph in about six seconds, and still return 20 to 25mpg!

Good luck with your search




Magwa

The Cobra ad is in the FOR SALE forum with pics

Sid