To ensure I have all the dirty donor part jobs out of the
way before the chassis and body arrive in October I suppose I should start
looking for donor parts.
The traditional first place to look for donor parts is
generally to scourer the classified ads for a donor car and liberate the required
parts. It would though, leave me with an almost complete car, which is now considerably
more difficult to move and dispose of owing to the fact I would have removed
both axles for the Cobra. However, there is an argument to be said for continuing
with the break down of the car and sell off the remaining pieces. Although as
my aim is to build a Cobra, I would rather spend my time doing this rather than
hours and hours stripping and selling Jag parts.
Luckily there is a common solution, which is to purchase
just the required donor car parts from a breakers yard. AK recommended two specialized
Jag breakers, Simply Performance and Black country Jags, which were hence my
first port of call. Having contacted both companies and obtained quotes for
their donor car kits, I decided to go for Simply Performance. This was not the
cheapest of the two options, but I found them by far the most helpful when I
was asking my initial stupid questions. They were also able to effortlessly accommodate
my desired delivery date and take a few photos for me of the donor car.
Photo of donor car taken by Simply Performance
Two weeks after paying just over a thousand pounds, the donor
parts had been stripped from the original car, shipped to my address and are
now sitting on the floor in my garage. Whilst to most this looks like a pile of
scrap metal an ties, to me it’s the start of a new AK Cobra.
Photo of donor car taken by Simply Performance
Photo of donor parts being delivered
Photo of donor parts as delivered
The donor parts included in the Simply Performance kit are:
the front and rear subframe from an XJ40, handbrake assemble from an XJS, V5
documentation for donor car (required for age related registration later) and 4
slave wheels to use with the car. So whilst they are not all the donor parts I require, it’s
a good start.
Photo of donor parts with covered removed
After removing the protective black cover, you can see in the photos how
the parts are shipped. Whilst the wheels might not look secure sitting like
that on top of the subframes, they are well held down with ropes. Taking the
wheels off, I get my first look at the required subframe.
Donor subframes ready for stripping
XJS hand brake handle
Over the coming entries I will strip these down to the parts
required for the AK Cobra.
