Remember the Shelby Series 1? Released in 1997, it was a strange catfish-faced looking attempt at a supercar that came directly from Shelby American, promising Cobra-like performance with modern-era tech. Instead, it delivered buyers with an Oldsmobile-Aurora-powered parts-bin GM car that suffered from serious quality problems. Just 249 were made, so you're forgiven if you forgot about it. The Series 2, introduced in 2018, promised to fix all of those woes, and now — 25 years after the introduction of the Series 1 — orders are open for a batch of ten Series 2 coupes, built under license by Wingard Motorsports.
While this technically isn't the first run of the Series 2 — four Series 2 cars were sold in 2018, also under license by Wingard — this is the first time that the Shelby Series 2 will be available as a hardtop coupe. Three of these ten total coupes will be made entirely out of aluminum; the remaining seven will get carbon-fiber body panels. Wingard is building the cars as engineless rollers, but has assembled several drivetrain choices for owners to have installed later, including a Windsor V8 with a sequential six-speed transmission or an unspecified "Performance EV" electric package. The chassis is reportedly capable of handling up to 1,100 horsepower, and six-pot brake calipers come standard on all corners, so those available drivetrains can get a little crazy if desired.
Whatever drivetrain buyers choose, they need to come prepared to pay for it. The Series 2 roller starts at $385,600 for a carbon fiber model; aluminum-bodied cars will start at $498,200. The cheapest drivetrain will start at an additional $83,500 — before installation — and climb from there, meaning even those looking to scrimp will be spending around half a million dollars to drive their new Shelby Series 2. The cars, despite being rollers built under license without engines, will get a Shelby American serial number and be recorded in the official registry of Shelby cars.
The original Series 1 was a bit of an automotive oddity, and it's good to see the remaining parts still used to build drivable cars. Let's just hope that for half a million, the interior gets something a bit more... premium this time.
