CSX2410 - from Barn to Concourse

[fastpace]

We're finally to a point that I think it would be good to start a build log for CSX2410 restoration which is being completed by Vintage Motorcar Company in Inwood, WV.  I will give fair warning, but I tend to get very heavy into the details so the posts will be long, but hopefully informative.  The whereabouts of this car have been unknown by the Cobra community since 1972, during which time it has been owned and stored by my father in law.  In July 2021 after quite a bit of discussion with my wife and him, we unearthed the car to determine a path forward to bring it back to it's former glory.  In general, the car has been sitting since he pulled the car home on October 3rd, 1973 behind his Mercury Cougar until September 28, 2021 when VMC came to pickup the car to start the restoration.

The plan for the car is to restore it back to original Shelby America specification at a concourse level.  We plan to restore as much of the original parts as possible, utilizing NOS or original used parts where possible, and then when needed using or making reproduction parts scrutinizing details and modifying when necessary.

If you have spare original parts which you might be interested to sell with the intent for them to be used in the correct rebuild of a CSX2000 series car, please contact me.

[fastpace]

History

CSX2410 was originally Princess Blue with Red Interior and Class "A" Accessories to include white side wall tires and luggage rack, antifreeze, radio, and antenna
-   1964, September 18 – Invoiced to Universal Motor Co, Richmond, VA
-   1965, June – Universal Motor Co wrote to Shelby America asking for help selling a Cobra which they had in inventory since October and requested tax refund similar to being offered on other Ford vehicles.
-   1965 – An unknown original purchaser, a doctor who only briefly owned the vehicle before realizing a Cobra wasn't the car for him
-   1965 – William Currence Jr traded a 1966 GTO plus cash to the original owner for the car
-   1966 – Car involved in minor fender bender, repainted Guardsman Blue during repair
-   1967, Late – The car was wrecked causing significant damage ruining the body and ultimately being the last time the car was driving
-   *unknown events, was potentially sold amongst family and friends of William Currence Jr as noted by William*
-   1971,  October 15 – Title reissued back to William Currence Jr
-   1972, August 19 – Purchased by Samuel Peoples Jr for $2600.  Condition at time of purchase was non-running, fairly complete with fiberglass body.  After owning the car for about a year, and only removing the fiberglass body, engine, and trans, Sam had decided the car was going to be a significant amount of work and didn't have the time amongst other projects.
-   1973, October 3 – Current owner purchased the car from Samuel Peoples Jr from an ad in the Aliquippa newspaper for $3,000.  The car was flat towed home behind the new owners Mercury Cougar back home.
-   *The car was moved between home garages and then placed in an enclosed trailer in the late 1990s*
-   2021, July 4 – CSX2410 was uncovered from its storage place in an enclosed trailer where it had sat for the last ~23 years.  Initial investigation and inventory pictures taken to embark on a restoration.
-   2021, September 28 – After reviewing several shops, the car was picked up by John Bassler and the team at Vintage Motorcar Company to start the restoration

During the time while CSX2410 was roadworthy, some modifications were made to include Shelby America Belanger drag race headers and rear Koni Special D Shocks (March 1965 date code).  With these modifications, William Currence Jr regularly auto-crossed the car around WV.

[fastpace]

Initial State

While the body is missing, the car is disassembled, and the panels look rough, CSX2410 has maintained a significant portion of its original components and hardware.  Luckily, as parts were removed in the late 60s, whoever disassembled did a fairly good job of reinstalling or tying parts together to keep that hard to find original British hardware with components.






The engine long block documents as original to the car, including correct 1964 C4OE-B cylinder heads and C5OE-9425-A intake.  It still features it's original sheetmetal oil pan with hap-hazard oil temp sensor installed with brazing.  Most accessories are still with the car including the 3623S fuel pump with Eelco elbow, distributor, ignition coil, and others.

[fastpace]

November 11th Update

Through early November, Vintage Motorcar Company has fully disassembled the car, inventoried parts, walnut shell blasted the frame, and sprayed a quick primer coat to protect it. 

CSX2410 frame sitting next to CSX2125




Part of the reason for our selection of VMC is their organization and detail.  Each part is bagged and tagged to not just include the where the part goes, but important details like thread type and dimensions.



A few spots have been found and cleaned up with original Princess Blue paint for sample to mix from.

[shelbydoug]

Wow! What a project! Best of luck.

[chris NOS]

Thank you for sharing the process !!please keep pictures coming !!

[Royce Peterson]

Looks like a great project!

Question - any history on the photo showing the 1968 Cougar XR-7 towing the Cobra chassis? Looking at the cars in the driveways across the street it appears there is a 1969 Pontiac GTO next to a 1975 - ish Pontiac LeMans four door sedan. The Cougar is wearing larger than stock tires and wheels and is sporting 6.5 Litre emblems on the fender, indicating a 390 engine.

[Coralsnake]

Very exciting!

An actual car thread on the forum. Its a Christmas miracle.

Look forward to following your progress

[fastpace]

Looks like a great project!

Question - any history on the photo showing the 1968 Cougar XR-7 towing the Cobra chassis? Looking at the cars in the driveways across the street it appears there is a 1969 Pontiac GTO next to a 1975 - ish Pontiac LeMans four door sedan. The Cougar is wearing larger than stock tires and wheels and is sporting 6.5 Litre emblems on the fender, indicating a 390 engine.

The picture is from Oct 3rd 1973 when my FiL purchased the car.  The picture was taken and provided to us by Sam Peoples who he had purchased the car from.  It's at Sams house at the time in Aliquippa, PA so the cars across are his neighbors who he mentioned were into cars as well.  He believes he has video of the car being pulled away and is still on the hunt for it.

I will have to ask my FiL on the Cougar, but from our past discussion he honestly doesn't remember too much about the car.  He has a very sharp memory, but the Cougar at the time for him was his "regular" car.  He purchased the Cougar to be able to stop putting the miles on his 1968 GT500 which he was the original owner on and still owns today (will start a complete different thread on that car at some point, but it needs full restoration).

[Coralsnake]

Willing to provide any technical information I can on the GT500 restoration.

www.thecoralsnake.com

[Cobrask8]

I very much enjoyed talking with you and your family about the car before you had it sent to the restoration shop. And meeting the both of you at the Shelby Cars & Coffee! I hope any advice I gave will help.

I too will eagerly watch this restoration!

Dan Reiter
Lehigh Valley PA Region

[fastpace]

December 22nd Update

One thing that will probably never stop is the continuous searching and sourcing of original correct parts.  Quite a few key pieces that were missing have been sourced, with the most critical being the body which was ordered through David Kirkham and is currently en-route across the Atlantic.

A few other parts so far include a spare Motorola 324-TC which will be used along with a Cobra radio purchased from Dave Wagner to ensure we have a working original accessory.  While the radio is basically useless, it does offer and interesting talking point and was originally optioned to the car.




We were lucky to locate a spare C3OF-12127-D distributor with matching date code 3MB to our original which had been found by someone who purchased a storage unit at auction.  This particular distributor looks to have seen very little use and still had its original FoMoCo cap installed.




While the bigger work of frame and body repair is being completed, we're working concurrently to start the restoration of some of the smaller accessories to have them ready during reassembly.  One of the first items is the gauges.  2410 was missing its speedometer and had an incorrect oil pressure gauge installed, but all other gauges remained.  A NOS Stewart Warner D-353-Z oil pressure sender and a spare Stewart Warner D-362-N temp sender were sourced to complete the full package.  As you can see in the picture a comparison of the original 362-Y versus the replacement 362-N temp sender.  The steel nut 362-Y are near impossible to find and while we have both originals from oil and coolant temp for 2410, the oil temp sender has been damaged and while we navigate its repair we wanted to ensure we have a backup plan.  The 362-N sender with slight modification can be made to appear and operate the same as original.

[fastpace]

Willing to provide any technical information I can on the GT500 restoration.

www.thecoralsnake.com

The GT500 is going to have to wait at least a year.  The positives on its side is that it's 1 owner, fully complete, and ran when parked in the mid-70s with 34k miles on it.  The downside is that it wasn't stored well during that time and will require at least the front floor pans replaced based on very initial assessment at the body condition level.  In the end, we would like to complete a concourse restoration with it as it has the completeness and condition to properly do so but taking it on concurrently with the Cobra just isn't feasible.

I very much enjoyed talking with you and your family about the car before you had it sent to the restoration shop. And meeting the both of you at the Shelby Cars & Coffee! I hope any advice I gave will help.

I too will eagerly watch this restoration!

Dan Reiter
Lehigh Valley PA Region

Dan, unfortunately missed you when we stopped through at the Lehigh Valley show in September, but I know he enjoyed catching up at the Cars and Coffee.  We will definitely keep in touch, and if you remember keep him in the loop on local events and gatherings and I'm sure he'd enjoy getting more active in the club.

[Royce Peterson]

Much appreciated. The timeline would make it more likely to be a brand new 1974 Pontiac LeMans four door (photo from the web attached). I was guessing Aliquippa based on your earlier post. 

Looks like a great project!

Question - any history on the photo showing the 1968 Cougar XR-7 towing the Cobra chassis? Looking at the cars in the driveways across the street it appears there is a 1969 Pontiac GTO next to a 1975 - ish Pontiac LeMans four door sedan. The Cougar is wearing larger than stock tires and wheels and is sporting 6.5 Litre emblems on the fender, indicating a 390 engine.

The picture is from Oct 3rd 1973 when my FiL purchased the car.  The picture was taken and provided to us by Sam Peoples who he had purchased the car from.  It's at Sams house at the time in Aliquippa, PA so the cars across are his neighbors who he mentioned were into cars as well.  He believes he has video of the car being pulled away and is still on the hunt for it.

I will have to ask my FiL on the Cougar, but from our past discussion he honestly doesn't remember too much about the car.  He has a very sharp memory, but the Cougar at the time for him was his "regular" car.  He purchased the Cougar to be able to stop putting the miles on his 1968 GT500 which he was the original owner on and still owns today (will start a complete different thread on that car at some point, but it needs full restoration).

[shelbydoug]

Very exciting!

An actual car thread on the forum. Its a Christmas miracle.

Look forward to following your progress

Let's hold hands and sing!