PANAVIA's DAYTONA COUPE BUILD THREAD - AKA Car #54 where are you >?

[PANAVIA]

Greetings all, I thought it time to start a build thread on my Daytona Coupe, #54.

Background;

I always wanted a Daytona Coupe ever since I saw one in a Hot Rod special edition magazine in the eighties. Being a working class kid in Mtn View California in the 1980's the Cobra / Daytona story was my favorite tale. From beating down Ferrari in FIA, to shutting down Sting Rays and XKE's = the Cobra and Daytona Coupe have been in my blood and daily thoughts.

You may have followed the progress of my former build / technical articles on the BRG Roadster "Lily" that has a New EFI BOSS 302 ( 326 ) and a T56 6 speed.

I ahve strived to make every car better than the last, serviceable and usable by the driver, this shows in our paid work at the Mustang Ranch in Santa Clara Ca, - ask yourself what is not just the 5000mile fix, but what is the 50,000mile fix on your build.

Sometimes when you are building something you short-cut something and eventually have to pay for the same real-estate twice, which I personally HATE doing. --

if there is a slightly more labor intensive permanent fix, -- then that is for me the pathway.

Alternately, if there is a way to reduce complexity and increase serviceability with a little extra effort -- so be it.

In addition we always think about -- can this be fixed in Moscow Idaho with parts from a NAPA>? -- a true test if your build is good.

With that preamble, down to the Meat and Potatoes.

Coupe # 54, was delivered to a Dealer in New Orleans, just in time for Hurricane Katrina to hit.

since it has never been titled, it is still on its MSO, and has never had an engine in it until Bob and I put the intended motor in.

There is another WebForum out there with all sorts of experts out there that have conjecture on the car and its parts, and how it was totaled , salvage titled, blah blah blah.

well, they are all wrong.

Here is the true story of Coupe # 54, My friends Ashton, Bruce, Peter and Doug, and how a Kid from Mtn View California is realizing his dream in the year 2011.

The Superformance Daytona Coupe is a limited edition beast with some 140 original "SPC"component chassis built-up, as far as I have information. After the original run of 140 or so, the MKII coupe was due to be released, and eventually this became the CSX 9000 car, sold as a Shelby. for the puprose of comparison later in this build, I will refer to them simply by the short letters SPC and CSX.

As we mentioned, #54 was damaged in a hurricane and was under 12 feet of water at one time, brackish water that eventually was pumped out, however when the water was dispensed, it had left its mark - not only on this chassis, but a people as well, our brothers and sisters in New Orleans.

In conversations with folks from there, the stories, the crushing weights of hopelessness and entrapment have educated me in a way that I don't know if I can do justice to by relaying them here. I do not think it would serve up a useful tale, so i will omit them from the build story.

So I will start from when the car arrives at my shop.

ANTICIPATION ; Is making me late -It's keeping me waiting - Carly Simon.

The coupe on the the truck seemed to take forever after its pickup in NOLA, it had to go to Florida, then to Barret Jackson in Scottsdale before eventually showing up in northern CA. -- so in 2011, my coupe has traveled literally across the country before an engine ever graced the bay.

It was a tight schedule, as I was also awaiting the arrival of another Daytona Coupe, car #73,- this one piloted by Peter Brock himself for "Peter Brock Day" at the Mustang Ranch.

a tense time at the Ranch' cleaning and preparing for multiple things, working on customer cars, - making sure deadlines are met all under the crushing weight of they year 2011.

When the car arrived , it came in an enclosed trailer scurried away in the top level of the carrier. - Troy came over to me in the shop and said, hey I think your daytona just go here. -- It was like Christmas , birthday, and new years eve all rolled into about 10 seconds. -- Clinically I am not a small guy by any stretch of the imagination, which freaks people out when they see an 1/8th of a ton of 6ft 2 American man scurry up a truck side ladder that was meant to hold maybe a fair sized house cat.

However , I could not wait, I had seen pictures, I was prepared for the worst, it might be a total write off, it might be beyond our capability, all of this ran through my head as as my feet worked their way op the collection of crushed diet coke cans that was the ladder. when I arrived up to her level - there she was....under a car cover like a 1979 Catherine Denuve, a 1953 Lauren Bacall, a 1969 Ann Margaret, she is in one piece, - she needs a bath and a lot of work , but amazingly intact and only some minor patina showing her battering at the beck and call of brackish surf.

She had arrived.