Chapter 9.5 - Lowrider

[nolastyankee]

The day after Christmas it was 55 degrees here in Northwest Arkansas and my dad, I, and the male contingent of the in-town relatives decided to get out of the house for a while and head to the local sporting clays course. Our goal for the day was to knock flying orange discs from the sky but we mostly succeeded in filling the woods with unmolested lead shot. On the way to Wal-Mart to pick up a trunk full of shells, we ended up travelling down main street in Rogers behind one of those cars that have a set of gold plated Dayton wire wheels sticking out 6 inches past the body...You know the kind. This beauty was complete with old english script in the rear window, a set of curb feelers, and the ubiquitous fart-tube muffler. I like to think of myself as being generally open minded, but I could barely stop laughing.

With this image fresh in my mind, dad and I set to mount up our new Trigo wheelset on New Years day. Mind you, Trigo's normally require a narrowed Jag rear end and adjustable coil over shocks. Undaunted by this detail, we mounted them anyway just to see how they looked and to determine how much we needed to change our suspension arm width to accomodate the wheels.

Much to my horror, upon getting our beautiful new aluminum wheels mounted up, our Cobra looked suspiciously like that lowrider that I laughed at a few days earlier.



OK, so it's not quite that extreme, but a hypocrite I was. With measurements in hand, we then took two steps backward in our build by pulling the rear end and rear suspension out of the car. Since we were going to be narrowing the lower arms anyway, I figured that it was probably a good idea to have the differential rebuilt too. We sent the rear end to all-around-good-guy Butch Capps who called this week to say that the part arrived in beautiful condition in the bulletproof crate that we built. Ironically, despite our efforts to ship the piece in pristine condition, the rear end was trashed because it had spun a bearing some time before our ownership. Fortunately we had some help with a new casing (Thanks Alan) and our new differential will be done next week. Anyone need a 75 lb. door stop?

While our differential gets surgically corrected in Knoxville, the suspension arms and axles are being set up in North Carolina. With any luck, we'll have all the parts back in one state by the end of this month, and shortly thereafter we'll be rolling on real FIA knockoffs. Is it worth the expense and effort? Who knows, but to me those six-spoke beauties just make this car. Doesn't it give you goosebumps?





Unique 9122 - 289 FIA Cobra - The Legendary "Spence" Car

[pgermond]

Nice little boxes with X in them

Phil

427 Roadster, #4279436
Southern Automotive FE
3:31 and Toploader

Roseville (N.Cal)

[nolastyankee]

Hmmm...No pictures. I'll try again tonight. Sorry.

Unique 9122 - 289 FIA Cobra - The Legendary "Spence" Car

[gasman]

Brian, I think I know why your pictures don't post. The link(s) for your photo(s) are on two seperate lines. Edit post and put a hard return in.

Steve Foushee
Unique #4279389

[eliminator]

Problems are overcome with the opportunity of change.

Rick
#4279405

[nolastyankee]

Got pics...

Unique 9122 - 289 FIA Cobra - The Legendary "Spence" Car

[pgermond]

What kind of stereo and speakers do you plan on using in that wide ride?

Seriously, those are some ni-i-i-ice looking wheels, to be sure [^]

Phil

427 Roadster, #4279436
Southern Automotive FE
3:31 and Toploader

Roseville (N.Cal)

[eliminator]

More evident in the rear than the front.

Rick
#4279405

[jhaynie]

Man I like those wheels. It's not only that they look good, but its nice to see something different.

John

Unique 289FIA #9367
351W Fuel Injected

[nolastyankee]

A quick update for all, our differential is back from Butch Capps and it looks amazing! That guy does great work, I recommend him highly. Our suspension arms are also back from being narrowed by Mike Fields and they look equally beautiful. The whole mess (suspension arms, intake manifold, wheels, etc.) goes out for powder coat tomorrow. Dad is coming to town in 4 weeks and we plan to have the rear end back on the car, the wheels (with tires) mounted, and the engine dropped into the frame. Pictures and story to come.

Unique 9122 - 289 FIA Cobra - The Legendary "Spence" Car

[Brent]

Butch is a perfectionist, thats for sure. Hell of a good guy too.



Brent
427 SC Chassis #4279401
Candy Apple Red/White
402 FE/Toploader/3.54

[eliminator]

Brian,

Does it look like it just came from the JAG factory with all the markings and everything.

You should see my Toploader, looks like it came out of a 1964 Ford Crate, all the little painted inspection markings, ect.[^]

You have to love what your doing to add all those little things for other people. And the inside is just perfect.

Rick
#4279405

[nolastyankee]

Brent and Rick, yes this differential looks just like it rolled out of the Jag house yesterday with all of the factory markings and such. In fact, I dare say that it looks better than it did when it was new. I couldn't be more impressed. I wish I had more work to send to Butch...Now, if he only did paint work.

Unique 9122 - 289 FIA Cobra - The Legendary "Spence" Car

[ralphscott]

For Butch this is a labor of love I got my toploader from him and he re-did the rear end when we found out it had the wrong chunk (wrong mounting angle) the markings and the finish is great. Brian it is better than original.

Ralph