Few Cars Have Captured the imagination of the imagination of the performance world as the AC Cobra did in the mid sixties It was the time honoured tradition of trying to get the biggest possible engine in to the lightest chassis. The AC marque was founded back in 1901,the COBRA story starts with the 1953 introduction of the second generation ACE engineer john Tojeiro had created his own sports two seater modelled on the Ferrari 166 Barehetta Tojeiro's cars were powered by MG or Bristol. He sold the design to AC who installed their own 85 hhp 2-litre six-cylinder engine; in 1957 a Bristol 2-litre version was introduced giving another 30bhp and a maximum aronud 115mph. A Ford 2.6 liter version followed in 1961 with anything from 100-170bhp In 1962 when Carroll Shellby inprcssed by the performance of the AC Bristols in American racing. persuaded AC to drop a Ford V-8 into the spacious engine compaetment. Fitting the initial 260 cn.in. 4.2- litre lightweight engine was little problem but the suspension and drive-train needed considerable beefing up to take the power output.