[DeTomaso] fiberglass body cost

[MikeLDrew at aol.com]

In a message dated 1/5/08 2 08 16, mvinson9 at bellsouth.net writes:


> Hi .... Is  someone makeing a complete fiberglass body of the pantera ???  
> If so ,  what  price  are they  in , and  do  you think  they  will  be just 
> another kit  car  or  will  they  go up  in value like some of  the  
> fiberglass hot rods ????  Any  idea what  the cost is for a complete  body ???   
> Thanks  alot  ,  Mark  .mvinson9 at bellsouth.net
> 

Several have tried, and failed, to make a go of it in the fiberglass Pantera 
business.   It's a fundamentally dumb idea, because the cost to buy all the 
nickel-and-dime pieces to complete the car is FAR greater than the cost to buy a 
REAL Pantera!

Having said that, if your heart was really set on it, there are molds out 
there and Chris Wilkins in Phoenix has a one-man kit car business, and would 
probably sell you a Pantera in fiberglass if you wanted it badly enough.   He has 
made one or two for himself; he drove his red GT5 fiberglass car to Las Vegas 
a few times.   His main business now is making almost-Cobras on current 
Corvette chassis.

I saw him at the SEMA show and he gave me his card, but I seem to have 
misplaced it.   

Larry Stock just bought a full 52-foot semitrailer filled with molds for both 
the Pantera and the Mangusta.   He's still in head-scratching mode, trying to 
figure out what to with them.   Glass is the really hard part; if he can get 
new Mangusta glass made (and reportedly Wilkinson is tooling up to make new 
windshields and side glass in the USA), then it wouldn't be much of a stretch to 
work with another company that builds chassis, such as RCR (Race Car 
Replicas), and soon they could be rolling out the door.

We'll see...

Mike


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