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Buchanan (car)
Encyclopedia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n kit car
Kit car
A kit car, also known as a "component car", is an automobile that is available as a set of parts that a manufacturer sells and the buyer then either assembles into a car themselves, or retains a third party to do part or all of the work on their behalf...
manufacturer. It made sports car
Sports car
A sports car is a small, usually two seat, two door automobile designed for high speed driving and maneuverability....
s in the 1950s.
The original body produced by Buchanan was a fibreglass item based on an Aston Martin
Aston Martin
Aston Martin Lagonda Limited is a British manufacturer of luxury sports cars, based in Gaydon, Warwickshire. The company name is derived from the name of one of the company's founders, Lionel Martin, and from the Aston Hill speed hillclimb near Aston Clinton in Buckinghamshire...
DB3-S racing car. Buchanan borrowed a DB3-S and pulled moulds from it while it was in Australia. The styling was altered by filling in the scallops either side of the bonnet and reshaping the grille opening to be oval. Because the target market was for rebodying of early model MG
MG (car)
The MG Car Company is a former British sports car manufacturer founded in the 1920s by Cecil Kimber. Best known for its two-seat open sports cars, MG also produced saloons and coupés....
s, the Buchanan moulds were cut and extended between the door openings and the rear wheelarches, adding several centimetres to the body length.
Racing car kits were also produced, consisting of this type of body plus a fabricated X-frame racing chassis manufactured from steel channel sections welded face to face to form box sections. The chassis used mechanicals from an FJ Holden
Holden
GM Holden Ltd is an automaker that operates in Australia, based in Port Melbourne, Victoria. The company was founded in 1856 as a saddlery manufacturer. In 1908 it moved into the automotive field, before becoming a subsidiary of the U.S.-based General Motors in 1931...
, with the front suspension crossmember and rear axle assembly being shortened to suit the narrower body.
The Buchanan Cobra was introduced in 1958 as a production vehicle based on Standard 10 mechanicals. Only 7 were manufactured.
Buchanan car list
Buchanan Cobra number 1 was known to be sitting in an industrial shed in Warners BayWarners Bay, New South Wales
Warners Bay is a suburb of the City of Lake Macquarie in New South Wales, Australia, and is located from Newcastle's central business district on the eastern side of Lake Macquarie. It was named after Jonathan Warner, who settled the area....
awaiting restoration as at November 2006.
Buchanan Cobra number 3 is a complete running car and is raced through the Victorian Racing Register on a regular basis in Victoria as of May 2007
"Wally Mitchell's" MGY Based Holden Powered Buchanan is currently undergoing a full ground up restoration by current owners Mathew Liersch and Clark Watson with an estimated completion Date set for 2011.