The finish is a mix of aluminium powder and polyester resin - thinned and sprayed on through a proprietry process which is currently with my lawyers (I just made that bit up).
I probably had 4-5 months of nights and weekends on the body work, and then another 2-3 months trying to get the finish right. I used a spray polyester which I blocked to 180 before spraying the aluminium. It goes on very think (needs to as it gets sanded back) so I didnt need to sand any finer the 180. Once it dries I wet sand and then hit it with the scothbrite pads to get the brushed finish. The stripe is polished in using a metal polish - masked and sanded back on the edges.
I ran into all sorts of problems doing this finish, including one paint of the whole car that had to be completely sanded off (in the end it helped me get the car a bit flatter) - the problem is getting it even all over, quite thick, and not sanding through that top coat. In the end I sectioned the car off, and created join lines on the edges of the stripes in order to paint small sections at a time.
Les - thankyou for suggesting it looks like a ridgey didge alloy cobra - according to soulmans logic, if it looks just like something, then it is that thing - so my plasic car with is actually a real cobra now.....cool