99 Rio Red Cobra build

[Nicwitha99]

Whats up SVTP,

I'm new to the forum and wanted to start a thread about my cobra build. Ive owned this 99 for about a year and half now and have done a lot of work to it.

Back story is I bought off a kid in NY who delivered it to my house. 2 hour drive....I figured if he made it that far without problems and it looked ok then I was good. I was wrong hahah...Enjoy the build and i'll do my best to explain the pics.

Here are the first pics I saw of the car on craigslist.

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There she is in my driveway on the first day of ownership. All was great for about 3 days

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Here she is next to my girls cobalt ss....Missing those ambers woody!

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yeah all excited about my new ride...finally got her registered and ready to go, then after letting her sit for about 3 days, she finally cooled down from that 2.5 hour ride from NY and she showed me [video]

[/video]her true colors.

Blown head gasket, broken motor mount, and oil leaking everywhere.......3 days in and here we go

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#2 cylinder was a little jacked up but overall everything looked ok

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Had a chance to get the engine bay all cleaned up

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Little before and after of the engine clean up.

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She needed some tlc

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New fel pro head gaskets with arp studs

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gotta love those 99' heads and cams

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Gloss black powder coat

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Intake spacer

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Installed a New spec 2 clutch with flywheel while it was out.

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She's back in and back together. I replaced the old mounts with energy suspension poly while the motor and trans were out. Huge difference. Now after a month of working on her, I can have some fun with this thing.

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First ride and photo shoot

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[/URL][/IMG]ughh the 4x4 stance is killing me here

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This concludes stage 1 of this build, much more on the way. Now for some fun stuff.

 

[Stang Lover]

Ouch I would of been pissed! Glad you got everything straightened out though. Cobra looks great!

 

[Woody6799]

Looking good Nick! She will get there. You know its a long road...

 

[99cobraUgotbit]

I used to have a 99 cobra vert. I thought it was the bees knees. Then the terminator came out.

Yea you need to lower it badly. Any pics of the engine bay?

 

[Geno-04]

Good luck with your build.

 

[Nicwitha99]

Thanks Stang Lover, its been a bumpy road but we are getting there

 

[Nicwitha99]

Long road full of twists and bumps, but its getting there. Thanks for all the help Woody6799

 

[Nicwitha99]

99cobraUgotbit, I installed H&R race springs since these photos...I kept all the iso's but i'm going to take the front ones out just to bring the front down a bit more.....I have lots of engine parts at the shop right now getting powder coated, but I should have them by the end of next week with some more pics to follow.

 

[99cobraUgotbit]

One thing I hated about my 99 was it didn't say cobra on the bumper!

Good luck on the build.

 

[whitedevil95]

Please lose those bullitts. They do not belong.

 

[soccerman002]

Did you do anything w/the engine while the heads were off, or just do a quick head gasket swap (besides what you shared in the pics)?

 

[Nicwitha99]

Nothing bothered me more than that 6cylinder bumper 99cobraUgotbit. Thank god my girl got me the 01 bumper for xmas along witht the cobra r hood...way more pics to come.

 

[Nicwitha99]

yeah the buillitts came with it whitedevil95...to be honest I wasn't crazy about them at first either...I wanted to go saleen, and now i'm looking at some of the rovos. I gotta get her making some decent power first!

 

[Nicwitha99]

soccerman002, When I took the heads off I brought them to a machine shop to have them rebuilt and measured. Ended up that everything looked really good with them so he just cleaned them up a bit and gave them back. The inside of the motor looked good too except for the #2 piston that has some pitting of some sort on it. It has 83,000 miles on it and really didn't have much wear. I just did a compression test on the motor and i'm 180 on every cylinder, except #2, I got 165 on that one, but as long as i'm above 153 i'm good, or at least i was told that.

 

[Woody6799]

Here's your video bud.

[video]http://s1159.photobucket.com/user/nickwitha99/media/IMG_0411_zps8kuvekvi.mp4.html[/video]

 

[Blueline]

Looking good nick! Keep up the good work

 

[rdvenom99]

Sweet ride and nice job getting it back in shape! I used to have a 99 rio red cobra vert and loved that car. Why no shots of the finished engine bay? Did you every reach out to the person you bought it from to let them know how much they suck?

 

[Nicwitha99]

Here's your video bud.

[video]http://s1159.photobucket.com/user/nickwitha99/media/IMG_0411_zps8kuvekvi.mp4.html[/video]

Thanks man

 

[Nicwitha99]

Sweet ride and nice job getting it back in shape! I used to have a 99 rio red cobra vert and loved that car. Why no shots of the finished engine bay? Did you every reach out to the person you bought it from to let them know how much they suck?

Thanks man, yeah i'm having some fun with this 99....I have a couple more shots coming up....Never reached out to the kid, figured it was just a waste of time, 19 year old with nothing but excuses probably, hell get his one day. Now at least I know everything is done and done the right way.

 

[BlksvtCobra01]

Nice build clean Cobra Used to have an 01 it was a fun reliable car. Throw some gears in that car it will make a big difference go at least 4.10.