The Viper marque was probably the most controversial, most talked about Cobra kits on the market.

In late 1984 Sheldonhurst a new company based in Birmingham, run by Bill Cook, launched their Ford Granada V6 based car.

 In August 1985 Brightwheel Ltd was formed, run by Ken Cook (no relation to Bill Cook) and his son, They quickly became agents for Sheldonhurst, building one of their demo cars. After Sheldonhurst stopped trading in December 1985 the jigs and moulds were offered to Brightwheel, the offer was declined and instead Ken made a redesigned chassis using the Granada base and a new mould from a reworked body and the 'Viper' brought onto the market.

In mid 1986 a Jaguar based version was introduced using a new chassis design. The Viper's wider wheel arches are simply so that the whole front and rear Granada and Jaguar suspension could remain as standard. A narrow track Jag based kit was offered but later dropped due to lack of demand. 

A new investor, American venture capitalist, appeared in 1987 and a second company, Brightwheel Replicas Ltd, was set up with Ken as Managing director. The body shape remained the same except in this era a raised section behind the cockpit appeared following the hood shape when fitted, the idea was to keep the water from entering the cockpit, it was later dropped.

In 1989 the Cortina Viper 4 was added to the range and was an instant success selling around 90 kits in the first four months.

By the end of 1989 the Ken was dissatisfied with the way the company was being run and resigned, shortly after that the company Brightwheel Replicas was closed down.

The assets, jigs and moulds were sold off, some going back to Ken and some to a Swiss company.

Ken Cook then started Classic replicas, and appointed Cobretti Engineering, who had been the original London agents, to market the kit range. Allegedly this agreement was broken in 1991 when Cobretti copied the Jaguar based kit and used the trade name of Viper. This has resulted in an ongoing and bitter dispute including legal actions over copy right infringement and who has the right to use the name "Viper", for a long period of time there were two Vipers on the market.

Bob and Martin Busbridge started Cobretti Engineering in 1988 and as agents for Brightwheel they believed basically there was nothing wrong with the marque, it was well engineered, nicely finished and worked well. Cobretti copying the Viper raised a few eyebrows at the time and even Ford made attempts to try and stop them using the name Cobretti as it sounded like Cobra which Ford owned the right to that name.

Around 1990/1 Martin who had been disenchanted with things generally, parted from Bob and left the company.

The country at that time was is deep recession and nothing was selling let alone Cobras Kits. Bob Busbridge struggled on but the end was near and the SW London factory came to a close. After some period of time Bob Busbridge picked himself up and began again at his home address workshop in Malden Surrey. Cobretti are still producing Jaguar and Sierra kits today.

Mark Philips and DMS (Dorset Motor Services) in the absence of Brightwheel Replicas Ltd (BRL) from Sept 1989, made copies of the Brightwheel Granada Viper and the Cortina Viper, and to BRL specifications. The Mark Phillips only made a couple of dozen kits and his version was Granada both ends.

After 1989 DMS/Classic Replicas this situation was a little complex. DMS had simply copied the Cortina version of the Brightwheel (Viper 4) calling it the Venom.

In mid 1992 DMS was in new hands, a deal was done with the new owner Tony Barrass to produce the Jaguar based Viper using Ken's jigs and moulds along with the Venom, which was renamed back to the Viper 4. The reputation of DMS was terrible with stories of chassis having to be cut in half and re-welded to straighten them.

In January 1996 the now renamed Classic Replicas was once again owned solely by none other than Ken Cook after Tony dropped out of the business.

Come 1996/97 Ken set about improving the marque and stopped producing the Cortina version as Cortinas were becoming more difficult to source.

It was replaced with a new chassis using Sierra mechanics with custom made front wishbones. This new chassis had a steel floor and footwells and transmission tunnel, instead of the Cortina type fibreglass ones.

Ken Cook retired December 2001 and sold the company to Cadini Sports in the Bournemouth area where Cook had previously been trading. As far as I am aware Cadini never sold a complete kit, but did complete a customers car.

Subsequently Cadini sold the project to Adrian Percival which I believe was called Cheshire Kit Cars. Adrian did a lot of ground work asking questions with many Viper builders as to the build problems with the marque. His intentions were to bring the kit into the year 2000, updating it with the addition of a super light weight stainless steel chassis.

Sadly this did not come about, Adrian had delivery problems with chassis suppliers and one of his first customer got fed up with waiting demanding the release of his deposit. Subsequently Adrian's web site disappeared and one would assume the company was wrapped up.

The Viper is a formidable contender for most kits on the market today and still has possibly the strongest chassis on the market today.

Viper Spec.

Length                                   13’

Width                                    5’: 6”

Height                                   4’

Wheel Base                           90”

Track                                     60”

Ground Clearance                 5”

Kerb Weight (Jag Rover spec)                       1023 Kilo’s

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