[mavgarb302]

Originally Posted by patrickt

You haven't got a lemon. Really. You haven't. Cobras are just a completely different breed of cat. When I had my ERA built for me going on 17 years ago I had what I consider, and still consider, the finest hands in the world build my car and my engine (an FE, of course). That said, I still have had what some people would describe as "constant maintenance issues" up until this very day. Now, I've only had to perform emergency on-the-road repairs twice in order to get home, and I've only had to be towed home once. I've never had the car in a shop ever. These cars are really easy to fix. They are very much like the POS cars we all had in high school. Of course 50 years ago I would use coat hangar wire on the u-joints when I couldn't find a bolt -- I know better now. The point is that these cars must be viewed as joys to work on. And, you need to start learning how to do that. I can already tell from your posts that you are quite capable of learning how to do any of these repairs. You might need a couple of extra hands helping you, but wives and kids can suffice... usually. If you don't take that approach, you will be missing a good part of the Cobra experience.

I've build my jet boat motors (never touching the AMC 401 again..lol) and tuned my own VMAX etc etc, always been a do it yourselfer. Issue is under warranty I cannot touch this for a year and HAVE to pay for it to be repaired etc or let it sit. Having the clutch slipping fairly early coming onto load just makes me wanna park it. Yeah I'll work through this whole thing, I just find coming out of pocket on something brand new on something pretty dang important (paint/clutch) a hugely unfair hit to my wallet.