Chapter 11 - The Craftsmen
This story is as much about people as it is about a neglected vehicle making a long awaited return to life. Inasmuch, you may have read about the origin of my screen name, and how I acquired the need for crutches. You also have seen the fruits of our labor as a shiny Cobra starts to emerge from a rusty and dirty bunch of parts. This transformation would not be possible without all that I have learned from a couple of craftsmen who have had a significant impact on who I am today.
My wife and I recently returned from vacation where we covered 2900 miles through 9 states in 10 days. The first leg of our trip was to southern Minnesota to see my aging grandfather. Gramps was always the life of the party with a funny story or a joke. My favorite tales were unfortunately ones he seldom recounted of his days on a diesel submarine in WWII. Mostly though I remember the workshop in the basement of his home. During the long Midwest winters, three generations of Carlson men would descend upon the shop to turn out some of the most over the top Cub scout projects that a WeBeLo ever completed.
My dad didn’t fall too far from the tree as he has worked in a machine shop for as long as I can remember. I learned my love of projects and perfection from him and can recall some fairly significant undertakings such as building an airplane in the garage when I was young. Since then we have built a train layout and a boat. This Cobra, you see, was more of an eventuality as we had all other modes of transportation covered.
I couldn’t help but reflect upon our lineage of craftsmen while watching my Dad wrap up the fabrication of our engine bay aluminum over this last weekend. The panels are all 0.050 T6 and hand fit to the inner fenders and the footboxes. Stealing an idea from Rick, Butch, and Brent, our footboxes are also welded for strength and aesthetics. In an attempt to better simulate the real Shelby’s and to provide more protection from road grime, we extended our inner fenders well below the fiberglass so it is almost even with the frame rail. Our Hawk front suspension allows us to drop the aluminum closer to the suspension beam because the shock towers are mounted outboard of the chassis.
That good looking manifold in the center of the engine bay is what will sit atop the 351W that I am currently bolting together in my garage. (I’ll provide more on this story in a week or so) This is an EFI stack system from VeryCoolParts. This should combine very nicely with the electronically controlled transmission that we are going to use.
I’m doing my best to live up to the standards set by those two elder craftsmen that I still look up to today. Though the trunk is small on this little Cobra, I very much look forward to it carrying plenty of memories and a tradition of hard work and good results. As always, nice work Dad!
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Unique 9122 - 289 FIA Cobra - The Legendary "Spence" Car
