Manufacturers Trip

The week of June 27, 2011 I made it out to ERA and Factory Five Racing manufacturing facilities.  Staying in Burlington, Ma. allows for a 2hr. drive to ERA head quarters and an hour and fifteen minute drive to FFR.
 ERA
 My first stop was ERA.  Once I got there Peter was able to get a break from phone calls long enough to show me around the facility which consists of two large shop spaces.  One area was a fabrication area, the other was a final assembly area.  There were cars at various stages of completion.  A close look at an unfinished frame showed some great welding.
  After that Peter offered to show me their other building.  Just up the road and around the corner they have another building dedicated to the GT40.  Love the looks of that car, and I'm sure it would be awesome, but its definitely out of my price range.  Still seeing the shop was great.
FFR
  The next day was a trip to Factory Five Racing.  Once I arrived I met up with a couple other folks who had also planned a tour of the facility.  One guy was local to Mass. and the other was from Florida and had just recently received his roadster from FFR.  The facility consists of one large warehouse area broken into different areas for the various tasks.  After hanging out in the showroom for a bit Rick took us on the tour visiting beginning with the customer support/ office area.  It looked like 5-6 folks had desks in there.  Then we moved to a stocking area where parts are picked and packaged depending on the customers order.  From there we moved to an area where R&D fabrication occurs.  Inside they were working on the 818 model chassis.  After that we moved on to the production metal fabrication area.  This area consisted of welders working on chassis and other parts based a production schedule posted on a white board.  I was impressed by their quality control procedures and the sophistication of their welding machines.  Beyond that area was a place for all the fiberglass work.  The CNC machine was setup for cutting roadster trunk lids and there was an array of doors curing all around.  The final area was the aluminum and final assembly area.  Pre-bent aluminum hung on the wall and chassis were lined up awaiting aluminum assembly.  From there it was back to the showroom where we were presently surprised with an opportunity to meet Dave Smith himself.  He was on his way to a meeting with folks from Horsepower T.V., but he took the time to talk with us for a bit on his way out.  Once he left Rick fired up a car in the showroom for one of the guys just to let us hear it.  Then he hung out to answer all our questions and let us sit in any of the cars we wanted to.
  All in all it was a great trip to both places and I feel very good about the decision I've made to go with Factory Five.  I'm ~6 years away still, but I'll be ready when the money is saved.

Visit Time

The wifey happens to have a conference opportunity in the Boston area.  I'm going along and while she is at the conference I'm planning on visiting the Factory Five facilities, and possibly the ERA facilities as well.  I scheduled my visit at FFR with Sally.  Review to follow...

The Beginning and Selection

This all really got started for me around 2003-2004. My wife and I were planning for our wedding and we merged finances.  That is when we decided to open the replica savings account. We've been saving ever since, and slowly but surely we're getting closer.

To begin my quest I started researching online for replica manufacturers. Of the many options available I initially liked the Unique Motorcars replica, then I found the ERA site and it's wealth of information and thought that would be a great option. Finally I found my self looking into the Factory Five Roadster.

Factory Five really does seem to be the best bang for the buck in my opinion. The fact that there are companies making many aftermarket parts and an entire forum devoted to Factory Five really made it the right option for me.

I just got the Factory Five MKIV manual for Christmas, and this is where the adventure really begins...