1987 AC 'Autokraft' Cobra MkIV Roadster

Description

The original Anglo-American sports car, the Cobra was conceived by Texan legend Carroll Shelby, who combined the pretty English AC Ace sports car and the small-block Ford V8 with sensational results.  The combination of brute power in a simple, lightweight tubular chassis proved a winner on the racetrack and Shelby’s Cobras were soon beating more fancied European competition both at home and on their home turf.  Today original Cobras are highly prized by collectors around the world and fetch enormous sums.  In the Cobra world, the name Brian Angliss is well known, initially as a restoration and parts supplier through his business Cobra Parts (later CP Autokraft) and later as a builder of high quality replica and continuation Cobras.  Angliss purchased the original jigs, body bucks and tooling, along with the name AC Cars Ltd, in February 1982 and put the Cobra back into production, suitably updated for the modern era.  Unable to use the Cobra name, Angliss chose to name his creation the Mark IV (in sequence with the last Mark III) and successfully negotiated with Edsel Ford II to establish a dealer network in the United States from 1984, along with Germany and the UK.  The Mark IV was powered by Ford’s 302-cid V8, either using 4V heads or EFI, along with Halibrand-style 15-inch alloy wheels made by Compomotive (later cars ran 16-inch rims) and a Borg-Warner T5 transmission as standard.  The recession of the early 1990s saw sales of the Mark IV slump and disputes with suppliers saw Ford apply to liquidate AC Cars in April 1990, leading to protracted legal action that ultimately saw Angliss’ operation wound up in the mid-1990s.  In total 494 Mark IV Cobras were completed between 1982 and 1995 according to the SAAC World Registry, the majority in left-hand drive guise for the American market.