Club Cobra - SAI questions (split from another thread).

The following was posted on a GT40.com site. Interesting fodder to the CAV thing. You may want to go the the site and see the replies and questions answered. I could not the link to post. Was posted originally 12-30 I think.
Richard

When we started CAV in Cape Town in the latter half of 1999 I suggested to my partners that it might be a good idea for me to go to Port Elizabeth (500 miles due east of Cape Town) to meet up with Jimmy Price owner of Hi-Tech Automotive like on a diplomatic mission.

Port Elizabeth, incidentally, is often referred to as the Detroit of South Africa for it was there that the Ford Motor Company of South Africa was established in 1924 and two years later General Motors of South Africa.

I duly flew to PE and as I walked towards Hi-Tech's reception I wondered what Jimmy would be like. I was told that he was quite a big guy and could a big guy building big macho V8 sports cars be a mean, tough cowboy?

No, just the opposite. I was met by a friendly, smiling Jimmy who immediately said, 'Listen buddy, before I invite you into my office for a cup of tea or coffee I want to warn you right up front that I also intend building a GT40 sometime in the future'.I thanked him for the warning and said that if we both were to build a handful of GT40s each per month we wouldn't be scratching the surface in the US or elsewhere in the world.

I was then invited into his office and was I turn introduced to Marlene his PA and other staff members. I took along my journalistic scrapbooks going back some 35 years. As someone who only became involved in the car business in 1989, aged 43, he said he envied me my history in particular having lived in Europe from 1962 to 1968, (the swinging sixties!) the era of the Cobras and GT40s. I said that history is all very well but it doesn't put money into your pocket other than getting paid some small amounts for writing articles! I returned the compliment and said that he had shown many of us the way in the rather hazardous world of building sports cars. In 15 years Hi-tech Automotive has become the largest replica car manufacturer in the world and the second largest privately owned specialist car builder either after Morgan or TVR, I'm not sure which.

Talking of history, it's amazing how when one is involved in a particular sphere of activity certain people keep popping up in one's life. At the 1963 Le Mans my American Porsche colleague, Randy Edwards from Orange City in Florida (wonder where he is today) and I were standing in White House corner just after mid-night when a car came though in the mist, lost it and rolled with head lights arcing through the sky. At the time I didn't know who it was it was but it turned out to be Bob Olthoff in his Austin-Healey. When I met Bob a year later in London I was able to tell him that a fellow countryman was witness to his whoopsy. Today Bob is the Superformance distributor in North Carolina. A group of us from Porsche went to Le Mans together that year including one Evi Butz, now Mrs Dan Gurney. I did a posting on this many months ago but it might have been missed by some of the new forum members. Another complete coincidence is that Robbie Senekal, who is heading up the new GT40 Mk11 project was a partner with Ron Rosen, the Ohio Superformance dealer, in a rear window louvre (like Miura) manufacturing business in Johannesburg in the early 1970s. Small world indeed!

During that first visit to Jimmy he was about to order the tooling for the replica Halibrand wheels (in LM6) and immediately agreed to supply CAV. He also offered that his lady, who specialises in the rather complex export procedures, would be available to advise, guide and train the young lady we had appointed at CAV for that purpose. When I thanked him for his generous offer and in particular to a potential opposition company he said, 'It's a pleasure - we are there to help one another'.

I greatly admire 'Big Jim'for his unique achievement. He's a straight shootin guy with a great sense of humour and who plays it strictly to the rule book. I'm honoured to be able to call him a friend!

In 1976 my friend Richard de Beer formed a company, Rich Industries, in Port Elizabeth to manufacture fibreglass products and to build sports cars. In the early 1980s he became one of the first people in South Africa to build a Cobra replica. He also developed an MG TD replica powered by a Ford 1600 'Kent' engine. At this point, in 1989, he met up with Jimmy Price who had been involved briefly with another car project. Jimmy has a civil engineering background and up to that time had built buildings, roads and tennis courts. He was also a power boat racer and in this sport won his Springbok Colours, South Africa's highest sporting award. Jimmy was interested in being more involved with the world of cars.

Jimmy and Richard became partners and an order was received from the US for 26 MGs per month. After only one MG was sent to the US the Sullivan Code kicked in and all imports from South Africa were banned because of its unacceptable race policies. Back to the drawing board!

In 1992 Jimmy and Richard parted company and Hi-Tech Automotive was formed. At the time there were heavy duties on imported luxury cars and Jimmy saw a legal gap whereby he imported luxury cars in CKD form from Europe and the US, assembled them and sold them at competitive prices. This basically funded Hi-Tech Automotive's car building side in particular the Cobra replica. It didn't come easy and Jimmy told me that once he was so broke that he had to trade in empties to buy a Coke! He also spoke of sleeping on the factory floor after working long hours to meet production schedules.

As Bob Olthoff and Bob Bondurant (ha, ha, remember the name spelling saga of a few months ago!!) raced Cobras together in the 1960s a deal was put together whereby Olthoff would go the US to North Carolina to become Jimmy's agent and Bondurant would assist in the venture in several ways and by making his workshops available for a start. Thereafter various Superformance agents were set up.

Cobra replica exports to the US were as follows - 1994, 40 cars; 1995, 60 cars; 1996, 85 cars; 1997, 130 cars; 1998, 170 cars; 1999, 250 cars. Today about 40 cars per month go to the US.

Since then the Superformance Coupe has been developed as has been the S1 Roadster, a modern version of the Lotus Seven. Jimmy has also replicated all the press tools for the steel body for the 1932 Ford Hot Rod. About 20 Noble M12s are sent to the parent company in the UK. This is another success story. Lee Noble comes from the UK kit car industry and has to his credit the Ultima, a Ferrari P4 replica and the Noble M10. He then designed the Noble M12 and this car without a history in the formal sector, let alone a racing heritage, has taken on the big names big time! The M12 is now available in the US. Whereas NASCAR is part of the furniture in the US the oval concept is relatively new in South Africa and Jimmy builds all the South Africans SASCARS, virtual copies of their American cousins.

Just after the Christmas shut down the entire Cape Town staff on the GT40 project hired a mini bus to go to Port Elizabeth to meet their counterparts at Hi-Tech. They had a barbeque for about 600 people - QUITE A BIG ONE! The Cape Town gang booked in at a caravan park, near Hi-Tech and close to a mountain pass. Then one of Jimmy's guys turned up in Jimmy's personal, blue Noble M12 (the one in the pic) and proceeded to take his Cape Town cousins up and down the mountain pass, one after the other, in the M12. There were many pale faces and the guys just couldn't believe the shattering performance and race car roadholding of the car!

Fate decreed, as did some other factors, that Jimmy would set up his GT40 factory in Cape Town and not Port Elizabeth. Perhaps one day, when the time is right, I'll tell the full story! One thing is for certain, the MK11, with full monocoque will be one of the finest GT40 replicas ever produced. I mentioned in an earlier posting that it was only when I saw all the loose, laser cut monocoque panels laid across the factory floor by Robbie Senekal, that I realised what a complicated structure it is. Someone on the forum asked if a MK1 will follow. Yes, that is the plan.

Here's hoping that 2004 will be a great year!
Andre 40.