History of all Viper models

[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

[Purple AK]

Ken. Firstly Welcome :thumb: The rest of your post will have to wait till tomorrow though

[Miket]

Welcome, I also love your coffee and that new tassimo machine is great. :thumb:

Excellent post, well done. :thumb:

[wilf]

Ken - very interesting post, thanks for the history lesson.

One thing does jump out to me - you are obviously very experienced in building cars, and I think that may have lead you to be a little harsh when you say: "I can only say that some people will struggle even with a Lego kit and they tend to blame the kit and not themselves."

Having watched a pretty resourceful acquaintance through his build so far, I have to say that there are other kits out there I personally would find rather easier to build. But I will let the current Viper builders chime in.

[Kenco]

re yr observation on builds. I agree there ARE cobra kits that are maybe quicker to put together. Those that are are not as technically advanced as the Viper models are. On all the Viper models the rolling chassis work is dead simple. What does take more effort and technical ability is the putting on of the bodies and fitting of doors. However when done by someone with ablilty, if done properly the end result is a cobra superior in
in strength in relation to how the body is fitted to the chassis. Giving a stiffer car with NO RATTLES AND SQUEEKS you get from some other makes. Also results in avastly superior and strogly made car as opposed to some others.
I do have 40 odd years of experience in fibreglass including many years building power boats and including racing power boats. and the way my body fits to the chassis reflects that. No other Cobra has a body to chassis fitment the same as mine does. So you could say that some builders will struggle technically. As for fitting out, the rest of the car the Viper is no different than any other Cobra.

[TINKA]

I personally know of three people who are building Classic Replica Vipers and two bodies needed to be cut in half so that when the body was fitted the wheels were in the middle of the arches, not to mention numerous other modifications needed to be made on the basic shape of the body especially the boot area. As for the quality of the fibreglass the painter was horrified and more by one of the cars which needed to be turned over and have more layers added as the body was too thin and weak .All the hinges, pedal box & gearbox mount needed to be replaced as they were made of monkey metal and totally unsuitable for the job they were made for. The chassis for one of these cars was meant to take a jag V12 which it could not and when this was explained to you on the phone all you could say was " well ours does " not very helpful to someone struggling at this point. I have helped my mate with one of these cars and personally would say yes they could be a good car once assembled but you need to do far more work fabricating, modifying and changing things for it to even fit together. We have also found now that the shocks and springs supplied by you were wrong and most have had to be replaced.

Personally I think your post should be regarded with great caution as I have heard many stories so beware any one reading this

[kayjayd]

Fair play to you Ken for posting on here :thumb: I await reponses from the Viper lads with baited breath. Can opener for your worms anyone?

[Miket]

Where's Osgood when we need him.

[digger782]

Hi
I have a Brightwheel and am very pleased with it.
It is on cortina base with RV8 I have a couple of friends who have Sumos and they also impressed with it.:thumb:
I must add that I have not built the car and it was registered as a Brightwheel in 1990 so over the years other owners will have fixed the problems. That said I live up in Lincs and drive around country lanes and have a large grin all the way.
I can not say how it compares’ with other kits on the track because its not for me.
I think the main point is that every kit is different and the most important thing is that the owner is proud and has fun with it. Graham

[Iain]

I have just seen this post and I just could not resist posting.

Being a Viper owner/builder I to have my own opinions of the kit which (some) are :-

1. It does have the possibility of being a good kit.
2. Some of the mountings for the suspension and differential were not correct and took hack saws, trolley jacks and files to get anywhere close.
3. The body is just plain crap (I could use more basic terminoligy if you wish) - See below
4. The brackets you get with the kit may as well go straight in the bin.
5. The shock absorbers and springs purchased from Ken Cook specifically for that particular kit do not fit.
6. Some of the fibreglass panels designed for the kit do not fit (may aswell throw away as I had to make my own).
7. I gave up with technical support soon after discovering my first problem when the infamous phrase "well mine does" was said.

That's just for starters.

As for the body (specifically) :-

1. The mould is crap
2. The mould was not put together properly when my body was made producing LARGE ridges down the seams
3. Whoever made the body could not be bothered to use a release agent and so had to use a hammer to get the body out of the mold... Hmmm... Lovely star (spider) cracks...
4. The person who made my body had an aversion to using fibreglass. The body was so thing I have had to layer up the inside just to make it adequate!
5. The body does not fit the chassis (or my chassis anyway) as I had to cut it in half to get it to fit the arches properly)... Was the chassis made on a jig???... probably not!
6. The doors do not match
7. The doors hardly fit the apertures
8. The bonnet inner skin was not bonded to the outer skin therefore I had to cut out the inner skinso that the scoop was accessible
9. The boot is completely a different shape to the boot aperture. The boot was nearly cut in half and bonded back together in the correct shape.
10. Quality of the fibreglassing is very poor. Fibreglass was not formed properly into corners and as such you just get the gelcote holding the shape in the mold. Press on it and you go through the gelcote and there is a big hole underneath where the fibreglass has not layered up properly.

That's a reasonable start as I don't want to go into too much detail just yet!

I will allow the coffee man to retort! :boohoo:

Yes Ken... I bought my Viper from you! What a mistake to make! Feel free to look through some of my previous posts. You will get a true feeling of what a joy this kit has been to build so far!