[Kenco]

Having only recently started to check out what was being said about Viper Cobra replica cars and kits, I can see that quite a lot of misinformation is being disseminated and a lot of owners of cars and kits
wondering about which version of a Viper they own. or maybe someone has recently bought a Cobra and been told it was a Viper, but they are not convinced. On top of this there appear to be at least a couple of individuals who have set themselves up as 'experts' in this marque and are dishing out either misleading information and or are expressing outright hostility to the marque. It therefore seems to me that the record must be set straight so all members have a clear, true picture of the history of this marque and whether the car or kit they have, is indeed a genuine Viper.

I say all this as the designer and ex owner of the companies that made the Viper from its inception in January 1986. Over the years I have read so much nonsense written about me and the companies I was involved in,
and much of it disseminated through magazines and books. Originally I started off as an agent for the Sheldonhurst company, but within a few months and after I have made a demonstrator, they went bankrupt. I was offered the moulds and chassis jigs by those companies who owned them, (not Sheldonhurst I may add) I declined them as I knew that the car needed and extensive redesign. As I had invested a considerable amount of money in getting started and as Sheldonhurst were totally out of business with no intent to restart, and as I had orders for kits and cars, I redesigned the chassis and body and made new jigs and body moulds. The car was then launched as the Viper in Jan 1986. I have to say that the body was originally a copy of the Dax Cobra with widened friont and rar arches. The copying was done by a person originally involved in the early days of Dax.
Within six months I had designed a new chassis to take Jaguar Ser1//2/3 running gear. My company name in those days was Brightwheel Ltd, and this was changed in early 1987 to Brightwheel Replicas Ltd and we were based in Christchurch. From then on we were very successful in our sales
and the we unlike other Cobra Replica manufacturers then, specialised in making fully built cars. 95% of all the cars we made went abroad to Japan and Europe where we had many agents. We went on upto late 1989 , and through these years I added a Cortina based kit with fibreglass floors and footwells as opposed to the all steel floors and footwells of the Granada and Jaguar based cars/kits. This was hugely successful as a kit in its sales. However I had taken on Two American backers who took over the company in early 1987, in order to provide monetry backing for our expansion. They turned out unfortunately like so many Yanks, to be all bull and not enough substance. Whilst money was put into the business which did help, not enough was put in the fund our success.
As a result it became necessary for me to issue them with an ultimatum in late 1989, to put in more capital to fund our runaway success, or I would be forced to resign the company. I was an employee not the owner of the company. They were unable to do this and I left the company. However I still owned the rights to all the designs and the Viper Trade Mark name, and some of the equipment and I negoitiated to buy off them other items of equipment which enabled me to continue on my own again. They closed the business down. This resulted in many people in the trade at the time and since who were in opposition to the Viper marque, and many in the Kitcar magazines, to jump on the band wagon and slag me off personally.
I then started in early 1990 a new business, Classic Replicas. Manufacturing only the Jaguar based Viper,I dropped the Granada version and so from hereon in all links to the Sheldonhurst finished. I was asked by my then London agents Cobretti Engineering to keep them on as my agents for Classic Replicas and I was happy to do so. However about this time the economy was in a downfall, and kit sales started to fall. Cobretti was responsible for the sales of kits on my behalf whilst I concentrated on export orders for fully built Vipers for Japan. All went Ok untill early 1991, when car orders all dried up and I was asked to go to my Swiss agent in Zurich area to personally build a very expensive hot racing Viper. I was happy to do this as I felt that whatever sales of kits were to be had, could easily be handled by Cobretti in my absence.
How wrong I was! At about the time of latish 1991 they (Cobretti) learnt
that Chrysler was trying to register the Trade Mark name of Viper. The next thing I know is that Cobretti has copied my Jaguar based Cobra 100% and was actually selling it in the UK as a Viper! They then went on to also copy my Cortina based kit with a few changes. Needless to say I started legal actions, which are too complicated and long to do justice to in a few words. These unfortunately dragged on because of the wonderful workings of our legal system for years. At the same time I had to oppose Chrysler. Of course by 1992 I had finished in Switzerland and then a car build in Germany, and was back in the UK to pick up the peices of what was left of my business which had been highjacked from me.
Eventually after six years I won against Chrysler and the Mark Viper was duly registered to me. Cobretti in 1992, in order to prove to Chrysler that they owned the Mark had put in their own application to also register the Mark. So I had to oppose them too, but despite overwhelming evidence of my rights etc I lost out in my opposition. So to confound matters for the Public you had a position where TWO people were making the IDENTICAL Cobra kit from mid 1991 to now. I had my hands tied in being able to stop this situation and the confusing of the Public. I complained to the Patent Office about the matter of them also registering the Mark to a second person ( against their own rules) and about many legal gaffs they had made over the years. Eventually they conduted an enquiry in early 2006 and found for me, and stripping Cobretti (Read Busbridge) of his ownership. He has appealed this and we all await the eventual outcome to this saga.
Howver all this has been absolutely no good for the Public because they could end up, all those who have bought Cobretti Viper copies, not having a Viper at all, in legal terms that is. I say this because it was decided that due to legal irregularities Cobretti should never have been allowed to proceed with their application to register the Mark Viper.This going back to 1992.
So in a nutshell there are cars and kits floating around in the UK that were made by Brightwheel Ltd to Jan 1987, then by Brightwheel Replicas Ltd to Sept 1989, then by Classic Replicas from 1990 to 2002. A Sierra based kit was brought out by CR in 1997/8. Then you have the copiers, firstly Cobretti/Autotrak/Autotrak Cobretti etc etc. Plus to confuse matters even more in 1990 ther was a further copier one DMS, who made a truly awful copy of the Cortina based Viper, which they called Venom. This only lasted a couple of years due to they appalling quality etc.
Now I have seen comments made by 'experts' that the Viper is a truly awful car to put together, which is patent nonsense. I personally have built over 300 Cobras in the past 20 years, including samples of ALL the major manufacturers. So I can say from EXPERIENCE that the Viper is no more difficult to build than any other make/model. I can only say that some people will struggle even with a Lego kit and they tend to blame the kit and not themselves. I also see people saying there was NEVER any build manual. I was the first manufactuere to have a build manual for Cobras, and my manuals were never slagged off. On top of this all builders were able to ring me personally 7 days a week, all day, with any questions. No other kit manufacturer offered this service! They got to talk with someone who had personal experience at buildings all kinds of Cobras.
Plusnmanyother models of kitcars as I also made Countach's, Aston Martins, Ferraris, Mini Mokes, etc etc. Since 2002, when I retired, the Viper was first sold to a local company to me, Cadini, who apart from selling a couple of kits, never did a thing with it. Certainly never built a car as I have seen reported. Since then it has passed onto a couple of owners, and I have licensed them to use the Viper name.
I will answer, through the Forum, questions for a limited time. I must say that it is possible that many people have bought kits that have been passed off as Vipers, (genuine ones are built by me, that is) Many will be Cobrettis, and I cannot comment on them. My car/kit was always written about during magazine tests, with praise for the quality and handling, and the strength and rigidity of the car as a whole. I never ever got bad press on the quality, hence why it was the most copied Cobra in the UK and was also copied extensively abroad, especially in Germany because they liked the wide arches) So a PROPERLY built kit becomes a car that is as good as any other well known Cobra Replica. Ken Cook