1964 AC Cobra

This car was built in 1964 by AC Cars of Thames Ditton, originally specified in Bright Blue with red interior, and sold to Nick Granville-Smith, who used it for racing. After some club racing in early 1965, the car was entered into the Guards Cup race meeting on 9^th May 1965, where it was crashed. Mr. Granville-Smith returned the damaged car to AC Cars. The factory were keen to get their customer out racing quickly given the early stage of the season, so they removed the powertrain and running gear from COB 6040, supplied a new chassis/body unit, and rebuilt the car. This new car was stamped COB 6040-A and returned to Mr. Granville-Smith.

The original chassis and body of COB 6040 was acquired by Peter Lamplough and rebuilt into the car you see here. After passing through several owners in Europe, the car was bought by prominent Cobra racer Steve Hitchins in 1983. Mr Hitchins campaigned the car with extraordinary success in the FIA European Championship throughout the late 80’s and 90’s. The car won races at the Nurburgring, Spa, Silverstone, Donington, Dijon, Paul Ricard and Le Mans and firmly established itself as the fastest Cobra in Europe.

After retiring from its racing career, the car was converted to road specification by the current owner, which is how it is presented today. Since the car’s arrival at Alan Mann Racing, we have had the car inspected by two ex-AC cars employees, who have both prepared reports (on file) which confirm the car as an original Thames Ditton Cobra beyond doubt. The car is in fine condition and runs well. Also supplied with the car are the bare aluminium body it had while racing, a spare gearbox, and a 289ci engine built by Mathwall Engineering. The car is road registered and comes with a V5, alongside a substantial history file which includes the full chain of ownership since 1964, as well as its Shelby Registry entry and racing records. Race records include period race programmes and documentation from when Nick Granville-Smith raced the car.