Dan,
Thank you (as always) for your substantive postings.
You are welcome. There were/are literally dozens of publications (hard and soft bound books and magazines) covering all the cars of AC, Rudd and AC, and Hugus/Shelby and AC. I have so many books we built a book case (with our grandchildren’s help) to hold them all in our guest room. I don't have a copy of everything I am aware of. Some are not very good or have so many mistakes they are painful to read. I have dozens of period magazines following the stories as they happened.
Different countries, companies, clubs, and private parties have their own frames of references. If you only read publications centered around Mr. Shelby you get one view. If you read books written by former Shelby American, AC Cars, or Ford employees involved you will get different perspectives from the all. The Shelby American Automobile Club versus AC Owners Club, very different points of reference.
AC Cars Ltd built all the chassis in England. CSX2000 was a running prototype test mule at AC Cars for quite a while. Its coachwork (a.k.a. body work) was left bare aluminum. The 221 2V Fairlane engine and Borg-Warner T-10 transmission provided through Ford Motor Company was removed before the chassis was shipped to America. It landed so to speak in Dean Moon’s facility to get returned to a running car with the serial number one High Performance 260 engine and a transmission. Many people know the story of the crew polishing the aluminum skin into a uniform appearance.
Most, but not all, Cobras and 427 Cobra chassis that came to America were complete cars down to outer body paint less engines, transmissions, radiators, expansion tanks, most coolant hoses, and ancillary small parts required for all the installations of components. Very early cars had radiators of AC Cars design installed in England by AC cars. For most, not all, chassis the windscreen (a.k.a. windshield) assemblies, all the exhaust system components, and charging system mounting components were shipped from AC Cars separately.
One very close friend really gets a laugh at shows when a clueless bystander asks him what exactly his car is. His answer is along the lines of it was a kit made by AC that some guy name Shelby finished. The typical response is a deer in the head lights look as the person walks away totally clueless that my friend just described a genuine 1960s Cobra.
Until replicar or later ‘continuation’ production of something looking something like an original 1960s Cobra or 427 Cobra grew beyond a curiosity the leaf spring chassis cars were very often known as Cobras or AC Cobras. From my recollections it wasn’t required to know who made what as long as every car that started off at AC Cars before the 1970s in England. With no telling how many people of companies were making replicars some distinctions arose over time. You might have an “ X Cobra” where X could mean an original 1960s car, any one of many replicars including one off home builts, or the continuations that Mr. Shelby commissioned or AC Cars or AC Heritage. I have been told that there may be something like 60,000 or more replicar/continuation cars out there somewhere now.
Data mining the Registry is interesting. Very early cars were often sold as “SHELBY AC COBRAS”. After Ford Motor Company became fully entrenched so to speak 86% of those identified as such in the Registry were Cobra-Ford or just Cobra cars.
Invoice Name..................... Percent
Shelby AC Cobra................ 9.1%
Cobra-Ford......................... 75.2%
Cobra ................................ 10.7%
86.0%
A detail most people miss is that Mr. Shelby's places and teams were not the only “one” completing new CSX2xxx cars. Ones that I know of include.
AC Cars
Dean Moon's facility before Mr. Shelby got his own facilities.
Ed Hugus’ Continental Cars
Shelby’s various places and teams
Holman-Moody
Most miss the detail that more than one “shop” prepared race cars at some time or another. Ones that I know of include.
AC Cars
Continental Cars
Shelby’s works
Holman-Moody
John Willment Automotive
Alan Mann Racing
Plus several privateers
Different countries, different small installation ancillary parts, different facilities, different companies, different teams even within a given company, different ideas on how to do things, and evolving specifications results in a very complicated Cobra history. Thank you keepers of the Registry!