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The first 427 super coupe

Started by strada5300, December 10, 2008, 22:16:16

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strada5300

I was researching the so called "Super coupe" for a story when I realized that the auction company that sold it at Monterey CA was saying at the time of the sale that there were two Super coupes--that after Brock inspected the chassis and its outsize body at Radford,he rejected it for being too far off his measurements, and he ordered another car built on a new chassis  (CSB3054?). I heard the Shelby Museum in Colorado has a second unfinished 427 coupe so I was wondering if that is the abandoned one rejected by Brock or yet another car? I find it hard to believe Radford would have thrown away a 427 chassis...onc ethey peeled off the body, it could have been rebodied as a Cobra roadster.

1984MkIV

I´ve been in Boulder at the Shelby American Collection two weeks before. The Willment Coupe and the CSX 2299 Shelby Daytona Coupe are exhibited there. I discussed the Super Coupe with Steve Volk and Bill Murray, two of the founders of the collection. Definitely there is no Super Coupe at the exhibition. As far as I know, there is only one Super Coupe in existance. Pete Brock never finished the work on the car at Shelby American. The car was under a dust cover for a long time and finished later by an enthusiast. However, the chassis of one of the six 289 Shelby Daytona Coupes was lengthened with the intention to put a 390 unit into it. This project was cancelled, too. The chassis was later rebuild and the 289 engine refitted.
   
   Michael

1984MkIV

According to Michael Shoen´s "The Cobra Ferrari Wars" your information is right and there was a car build at Radford in Hammersmith near London. Pete Brock and Carroll Shelby went to Radford to check the progress of the fabrication of the Super Coupe. They found out that it was totally out of shape; the body was eight inches to wide. Michael Shoen quotes Pete Brock: "The first car was taken out to the scrap heap and just thrown away". In "Daytona Cobra Coupes" by Brock, Friedman, Stauffer Pete Brock states "I scrapped the junker, cleared out the shop, and started over". So lets go to Hammersmith near London and look at all scrapyards for a Super Coupe Body and chassis, which is eight inches too wide!
   
   Michael

strada5300

Although I think 1984MkIV is pulling our collective legs with the comment the car might still be there, I no longer doubt that old leads are worth following, as Michael Lamm has documented that some old GM dream cars were found at a junkyard close to the GM Tech Center decades after they were scrapped. Also Jay Leno followed up on an Old Wive's tale of a Duesneberg in a NYC parking garage by treking through numerous garages until he found out the rumor was true. He bought the car, the garage having confiscated it from the owners in lieu of unpayed parking fees that must have covered half a century!