Author: Boyd Ingram

With the help of 2 friends, Chip & Bo, we got the body off today and onto the body buck. The body will live the next few months (at least) on this support while the rest of the roadster is being built.

Next I marked all the aluminum panels where they overlap and where they will be mounted to the frame. Then I removed all the temporary screws and removed the panels. Now I’ve got the bare basic frame. As Bo said, “Like an artist’s empty canvas”.

Tomorrow I start drilling and temporarily reassembling.

Met some new friends  from the Capital Area Cobra Club this morning at Boatyard Grill in Eastport (Annapolis). Lots of good people and a few very nice cars. I was the slowest one to eat because I was talking so much. Lots of experience building cars here. Looking forward to getting to know these folks better.

Here’s a video of 3 of the cars leaving. 2 Cobras and a Daytona, all Factory 5’s. Yes, there were spectators, thats who you hear speaking.

Started putting together the coil-over Koni shocks today. Found I am missing 2 snap rings for the front shocks that are not listed on the inventory. Will get that taken care of. Otherwise, got all 4 shocks assembled with no issues.

First things first… I need to do a complete inventory of everything F5 sent me. There’s 37 pages of stuff that needs to checked and its all packed in 21 boxes. I’m not even touching the car itself yet. So Inventory, inventory, inventory.

Plan right now is to be done inventory by Monday evening when Chip & Bo are coming over to help take the body off and get it mounted on the body buck.

Update 10:30pm Friday night: Inventory complete! No missing or wrong parts. I think tomorrow I’ll separate some parts for powdercoating and maybe assemble the shocks.

Just got the call! My car is loaded on the Stewart Transportation truck in Massachusetts and will be delivered Wed, Feb 15 between 11 & 2. I’m taking the day off!

Its been a very long time coming. I’ve been following and watching Factory 5 for years.

Factory 5 (F5) started as a company that makes kit cars.  They made a Cobra replica that used many parts from a 87-93 Ford Mustang. This was very successful and made for an affordable, cool, fast car that could be built in your own garage.

Fast forward and F5 has grown. They now offer 5 models of cars and you can build them as originally designed, with a donor, or as a complete car that uses no donor parts.

I’ve been planning this for a long, long time. In August of 2014, I joined 2 forums dedicated to F5 cars.  That December, I begin building my spreadsheet where I was planning my car.

Today, Feb 1, 2017, I ordered my car. I ordered a complete Roadster (no donor).  I plan on many upgrades and plan on using only the highest quality new parts.  I expected it to take 4-5 weeks for F5 to put together my kit… I got an email 10 minutes after ordering that it would ready in 10 days, on Feb 11.