Shelby Daytona Cobra Coupe Dual Restoration Build

[griffin-gt40]

Years ago I purchased a Gunze Sangyo Cobra Daytona Coupe and started it. Recently I picked up a HRM Cobra Daytona Coupe off of ebay. I started the GS one years ago, but it needs to be redone. The HRM was started by someone else in the past and needs to be redone. I'll go into details on each as I go. For now, a few pics :



HRM wheels/tires I picked up along time ago (left) to replace poor quality white metal wheels from the GS kit (right) . In the back ground the GS body.





Close up of the HRM wheels



Last week I got some of replacement parts from Jeremy of Clearly Scale that he casted of the GS white metal parts. His parts are very nicely detailed and pretty clean. Only the suspension parts needed some clean up, but that's not an issue.



Shots of the HRM kit:







Also included in the HRM kit was 2 sets of VRM decals for the 1964-65 Daytona Coupes.



The decal sets have a nice booklet that have some detail drawings of the Coupes as raced at various races during the 64/65 Seasons.









I plan to strip the paint off everything this weekend and start over fresh. As of now, Im not sure which chassis numbers I want to do and for which races but I have some time to figure it out.

David

[LenWoodruff]

I love the Cobra Daytona's.

[griffin-gt40]

Small update:

With the body, interior tub, and chassis in the SuperClean bath for a clean up there hasn't been much progress yet. Before going into the bath I noticed an issue I'm going to have going forward, due to improper storage over the years the body, interior and chassis have all twisted. See pics.











As you can see I have some work cut out for me. Sooooo if anyone has any tips on straightening out HRM resin I'd appreciate some tips.


David

[griffin-gt40]

Another update:

After about a day and a half in the CSC bath the inside of the HRM body and hood were totally stripped, however the exterior paint, which I figure had been on there for close to 10yrs was hardly touched. Small areas were flaking off but that's about it. So I was able to tracked down some 91% IPA, which isn't really that easy in Canada, had to pick it up at Target in the US, and dropped the HRM body, hood and interior tub into it. It took about an hour to completely remove all the paint, I was totally amazed at how fast it worked. Now as impressive as the IPA was at stripping the age old paint it also had a negative effect. The ventilation scoops on the hood and body, were thinly cast and the IPA made them so soft they lost their shape. Also the resin itself began to soften up, so washed the parts hoping the resin wouldn't soften up any further. I think I got lucky, no damage to the body, just the weather strip on the inside of the engine compartment became abit wavy but once I taped the hood it place it straightened back out. I'm going to give the HRM body a couple of days to air out and hopefully recure.

Some pics: On the left the GS Coupe body with the warped HRM interior tub taped to it to try remove some of the twist from the tub. And on the right the HRM Coupe, taped to the GS interior tub, that's straight, in and effort to remove abit of the twist out of the HRM body.











The GS Coupe body hasn't been stripped yet, and as you can see the IPA really cleaned up the HRM Coupe, looks like its never even been painted.

Comment and Criticisms welcome.

David

[griffin-gt40]

Small update:

The GS coupe has now been stripped, took about 15mins total in the IPA. I decided to order some replacement parts from Harold of HRM for my Daytona Coupe instead of trying to straighten parts, too much work. I also ordered many of the missing components from Harold for the GS Coupe. So until I get those parts in progress with be slow as I don't want to get too deep into building anything without all the pieces on hand.

I did manage to get abit done today though, my HRM kit had an extra hood that was pretty warped that I wasn't able to straighten. So I removed the hood hinges by cutting out a section of the HRM hood.



I then removed a piece from the GS hood and grafted the hinge section from the HRM hood in place.



I need to add some more putty and sand it out. I'll put some primer on it in the morning and see how it looks. I also added the inner fenders which need some clean up too. But I've got time while I wait for my parts.

David

[Eric Cole]

Interesting project. I'm watching this one as I also have both the GS and the HRM kits to build, neither of which have been started yet.

You're doing a great job.

[Greg23]

I have always loved this car. Almost bought one (1:1 Factory Five) but it was really cramped with low visibility. Instead bought an '88 Conquest, redid my kitchen, bought a 2DOF sim racing rig, took my wife to Greece, France (Monaco) Barcelona, Ireland/Edinburgh for the Fringe. No regrets about not buying the Cobra.

[NeedMYModelTime]

Hand held shirt steamer works wonders on warped plastic and resin bodies. Just concentrate the steam on the part until it softens up and twist back gently to correct shape or apply weight against it on a flat surface. It may take a few tries, but it works without melting the plastic.