ITSTOCK's 427 Cobra Replica

[ITSTOCK]

I was going to keep this car exactly how I ordered/had it built, but I have a little itch and it might not stay that way since I would like to learn how to drive (starting with autocross). So I might as well start a journal.

The car is a 1965 Cobra Replica by Backdraft Racing in Ford PPG Race Red, ordered in January?. They are made in a factory in South Africa, right along side the Superformance and the fiberglass Shelby CSX cars, and assembled here in the states (they come completed as Replicas, not true "kit cars", in the sense that literally all that has to be done is adding the motor/trans).

The Backdraft Racing cars are even more track oriented than a lot of others, including a 92" wheelbase instead of the more original 90" wheelbase. The rear suspension consists of a BMW IRS that is fully adjustable, and the front suspension is a fully adjustable "custom" coilover setup. The brakes are power-assisted BMW disc brakes. I might be upgrading these to Wilwoods, but for now, they stop just fine. It's got 17" Nitto NT05's all around, with 315's in the back and 255's on the front, mounted on "knock-offs".

The motor is a Dart block 351w stroked to 427 at 10.5 compression, edelbrock victor jr heads+intake/quick fuel 750 carb, xr294rf cam (576 intake/600 exhaust) backed by a TKO-600 5 speed. It should be around 530hp at the flywheel, so I'm hoping for 430+rwhp. I'll find out in a couple weeks and update this thread at that time. The car should weigh about 2450 without a driver, and I'll find that out shortly as well.

Now I just need some better pictures to add

[Scapegoat]

that is one car i would not want to be stuck in one gear with...

get that baby onto a road course and really drive it!

[ITSTOCK]

Originally Posted by Scapegoat

that is one car i would not want to be stuck in one gear with...

get that baby onto a road course and really drive it!

I'd like to get used to the manual steering and torture myself a bit with slower speeds with cone bashing before taking it to the road course, but that is the goal.

[caldwell]

this is possibly one of the sickest car ive seen on this forum...

PB&Jealous sandwiches for days...

[ITSTOCK]

The car got weighed about a month ago at R/T Tuning, and also went in for the dyno (I'll get to that next). I was extremely impressed with their shop/setup, top notch place.


2434lb's with 5/8 tank of gas, 2609 with a 175lb driver. A basic 48/52 front rear distribution with REAR bias NICE! I'm assuming the cross-weights will be able to come in a % or so closer after a proper setup is done on the suspension.


For the dyno, it only made 38xrwhp and 42x rwtq. The problem is a defective pedal assembly. This is the carb, opening at WOT according to the pedal, which translates to about 30% throttle. THAT explains a lot. The dealer picked the car up today and is fixing/replacing the pedal assembly and promise a completely different feeling car when I got it back next week. The problem is that there is not enough travel of the pedal to adjust the car down to idle, while being able to go anywhere near WOT. I'm actually happy to know that is the problem, and not a bad tune. The same motor dynoed 462rwhp/460rwtq through the same trans, so that is where it should be. About 550hp.

[DC2.2GSR]

Very nice car.

I've always had a fascination with these cars. I wonder though, why wouldn't you put something fuel injected in a car like this? Are the newer Cobra engines somehow different in dimensions, not as good, etc.? It seems to me that having a newer fuel injected engine in a car like this, where it's obviously not original and meant to be a toy, would be miles ahead of dealing with a carb. I mean, I understand that carb science has been around much longer and there are lots of racers making sh*tloads of power reliably with carbs, but I would think that given the choice of carb vs. fuel injected, dealing with a modern engine would be far better in terms of easy mods and making more power all while having the fine tuned adjustments available through the ECU and a tuning program.

This of course is showing my ignorance of all things carb related. Help me out here, I'm seriously curious! lol

[ITSTOCK]

A lot of people do put fuel injected engines in them. I just didn't want fuel injection. It actually would have been cheaper to put a new crate 5.0 coyote motor in this car. Fuel milage and year round drivability would be a vast improvement. But I like driving the car hard, and I won't drive it year round.

Carbs are incredibly simple, just like the rest of the car.

What easy mods are there to do where a fuel injected car would be better off, in a car like this? It's not like I'm changing exhaust any time soon.

[DC2.2GSR]

Originally Posted by ITSTOCK

A lot of people do put fuel injected engines in them. I just didn't want fuel injection. It actually would have been cheaper to put a new crate 5.0 coyote motor in this car. Fuel milage and year round drivability would be a vast improvement. But I like driving the car hard, and I won't drive it year round.

Carbs are incredibly simple, just like the rest of the car.

What easy mods are there to do where a fuel injected car would be better off, in a car like this? It's not like I'm changing exhaust any time soon.

That's just it, I don't know. lol

Not really sure what the point of my post was I guess, I just always thought carbs were a pain in the ass. I've always been under the impression that fuel injection was the "phew, finally!" invention for cars and people could finally not deal with whatever issues they had, and that it would be most desirable no matter what purpose the car was being built for. Like I said, it's just my ignorance from lack of experience speaking here.

I know the concepts are the same, give it more fuel, spark and air and it will make more power. I suppose I've always seen carbs as nothing more than old technology that was annoying to deal with rather than a somewhat equal alternative.

[exits to go read about carbs]

[ITSTOCK]

I mean, you're partially right. Carbs can be finicky with seasonal changes, or to start after sitting, aren't as efficient with fuel, etc. They just have much less to go wrong though.

[jesse096]

Car looks sick! I think I seen this at the weekly Shadybrook car show...

-Jesse

[SikneSS]

looks great man, i love these things. i was at NJMP last thursday (8/30) for a little track day and there were 2 of these in the group i was in, doing paced progressive laps. a silver w/ black stripes from PA (he had the 5.0 coyote) and a blue/purple one (not sure what he had or where he was from). the silver one was awesome tho and he was tearing up the course (we were on Thunderbolt).

[cmr076]

Originally Posted by ITSTOCK

The car got weighed about a month ago at R/T Tuning, and also went in for the dyno (I'll get to that next). I was extremely impressed with their shop/setup, top notch place.


2434lb's with 5/8 tank of gas, 2609 with a 175lb driver. A basic 48/52 front rear distribution with REAR bias NICE! I'm assuming the cross-weights will be able to come in a % or so closer after a proper setup is done on the suspension.


For the dyno, it only made 38xrwhp and 42x rwtq. The problem is a defective pedal assembly. This is the carb, opening at WOT according to the pedal, which translates to about 30% throttle. THAT explains a lot. The dealer picked the car up today and is fixing/replacing the pedal assembly and promise a completely different feeling car when I got it back next week. The problem is that there is not enough travel of the pedal to adjust the car down to idle, while being able to go anywhere near WOT. I'm actually happy to know that is the problem, and not a bad tune. The same motor dynoed 462rwhp/460rwtq through the same trans, so that is where it should be. About 550hp.

100whp from a pedal swap! Not a bad upgrade

You gotta swing by the shop one day, we're almost fully moved in now.

[Scapegoat]

i hate you

[qbcsvt]

That is beautiful! Great machine, enjoy it and keep us updated! Cant wait to see some pics of it in action.....

[ITSTOCK]

I got the car back last week, and have been enjoying it ever since (not today...obviously). The pedal issue was addressed, 500 mile service done, everything looked over, and the car runs great! I still think I want to get it tuned locally just to check the tune.

Sikness, I believe that the silver coyote car you are talking about was built by the same shop as my car/same manufacturer.

Jesse, not me at the car show. I hate car shows....but I'll probably take a drive down to Chickie and Petes tomorrow night just because it's so short...and it's at chickie and petes.

And I also got the Gopro Hero2, so hopefully I'll get some video up soon.

[ITSTOCK]

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[Big_Jim]

Any more pics? All of the pics in the OP are gone.

[ITSTOCK]

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[ITSTOCK]

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[Shipman]

Replica or not this thing is awesome