1. Building the Aardvark - Background 1

 I started building a garage with an apartment on top at our house in North Carolina, back in 2021, during the COVID pandemic. I'd been saving my money to build a new Factory Five Racing '65 Daytona Coupe, but those savings evaporated into the construction project. Just as we were finishing the construction ordeal, I was thinking about what kind of car I could build in the new garage, given my reduced financial circumstances. 

Just then, out of the blue, my old Cobra friend Neil Larson contacted me to see if I could help his brother, Gale, sell Gale's unfinished car kit: a Factory Five Racing '65 Roadster Cobra replica. Gale's health and other circumstances prevented him from completing the kit which was getting to be seven years old. Serendipity happened right there! I contacted Gale, and we agreed on a deal to sell me the unfinished kit as-is. I drove to Michigan, rented a trailer, and met up with Gale and Neil to load up the kit for transport back to our new garage in NC. We temporarily crammed the engine/transmission and everything we could onto the rolling Cobra frame, stuck the fiberglass body temporarily on top, pushed it onto the trailer, then jammed the remaining boxes (and boxes and boxes!) of parts into every vacant space in my truck. Then I headed out. The hospitality and kindness of Gale and his wife Lainie during what must've been an emotional transaction assured me these were wonderful people. We got to be good friends over the next few years.

Unloading went pretty smooth...except I almost cut off the top of my finger as we let gravity push the rolling frame/body combo off the trailer down into the garage. A quick trip to the emergency room fixed that problem good enough for me...funny which finger was injured! 

This blog will show the photos of the build from my point of view. As the car was being built, I made plans with two cousins to take a trip down Route 66, from Chicago to Santa Monica, CA, in May, 2024. Of course, that meant I was going to drive this Cobra replica I bought from Gale on the adventure. Factory Five took an interest in the project, and helped us publicize the trip and the charities we represented as we tried to raise donations during the trip. More on that later. It all came out great! 

My new garage in North Carolina, Aardvark's home-to-be

Pick-up Photos from Gale's home in Michigan













Unloading disaster almost got my entire finger! 







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