Reply to Chris Melia

[Andre40]

Chris Melia suggests that Ray Christopher has done a new deal with an ex-director of CAV. This is not correct. There are two ex-directors, Oliver McLeod-Smith and me. Oliver is a medical doctor, who wasn’t passionate about cars or the GT40 and he is now involved in some medical patents, one I believe being a drip-free needle for blood tests. Oliver and his partner, James Fisher who now heads up CAV, made a great deal of money with their Snakeboard invention. Oliver might hit the jackpot again with his medical products. You can read all about it in my story – ‘CAV –the true story’.

Ray offered his monocoque to CAV but it was rejected and CAV went on to develop its own monocoque in stainless steel. Ray then offered it to another company and this company, the largest replica manufacturer in the world, also turned it down, as it’s developing its own GT40. I wish I could tell you more now but I can only reveal what’s on the cards once I’ve had a meeting with the owner. This will hopefully be quite soon and when the news breaks it’ll turn the world of GT40 building upside down! This company did in fact buy Ray’s monocoque but it’s a million miles from the original design and will no doubt one day become an historical collectors piece.

Sit tight. There are more stories from Cape Town!

Andre 40

[Chris Melia]

Hi Andre 40
Well it looks like the story I was relaying was half right, at least this new player the (largest kit car manufacturer in the world) had purchased Rays Christopher's monocoques and is going to produce the GT40 in probably large numbers at lower prices, and it looks like you may be involved along the way.
It would also appear that they are going down the Monocoque route.

The good thing is that my post has informed the forum that, this is the silence before the storm.
I also wonder just how competitive this new car will be, and if it poses a real threat to existing manufacturers especially those dealing with the fluctuating exchange rates.

I encourage you to keep this forum informed, and thank you for posting, I am sure that people about to purchase a GT40 kit in the near future will want as much information as possible.

Regards,
Chris

[Chris Notley]

The major reasons why so much interest is being shown in South Africa as a location to produce low volume cars is its low production costs, very attractive exchange rates and a government export tarrif incentive subsidy of 30+%
Hence the reason why for example Noble have their cars produced in SA. Lee learned his lesson after many attempts to put his designs into profitable production here in the UK and failed.