(Find the 100% Hot Wheels Shelby Series 1 on Ebay here)
When any list appears of the men and women who have had the biggest impact on the automotive industry, chances are Caroll Shelby’s name will be somewhere near the top. The Texan-born former chicken farmer turned speed freak created some of the most culturally important cars of the last century, and chances are even non-car people will be familiar in some way with his creations.
But for all the incredible work he did with the AC Cobra, Ford’s GT40, scores of Mustangs, and even the Dodge Omni, Shelby never actually designed and produced a car from the ground up. The Series 1 changed that.
Talk of a Shelby supercar began in the mid 90s, and on paper the plans for the Series 1 looked promising. The brief was a modern day Cobra successor, utilising a carbon fibre body, aerospace inspired chassis design, and a 350bhp Oldsmobile-built V8 from an Indycar and all for under $100,000.
Production was set for 1998, with prototypes going on show at the 1997 Los Angeles and Detroit motor shows. The future looked bright for Shelby but then… well. All manner of things began to go wrong, and the project became beset with delays that would make Britain’s HS2 rail project look timely.
To keep costs low, Shelby partnered with General Motors to provide OEM equipment such as gauges and interior parts, but more importantly the heart of the Series 1: Oldsmobile’s venerable Aurora V8. And this is where the first hurdle arrived. Frustratingly, GM engineers refused to hand over the coding to allow Shelby to adjust the ECU. This meant the promised 370bhp power figure was now down to 320bhp. This was still good for a 0-60 time of 4.4 seconds and 170mph, but Shelby figured this still wasn’t enough and offered a supercharged version; for an additional $30,000. This would have been a hard pill for any potential buyer to swallow, even if the Series 1 kept the promised sub $100,000 cost. But as the project hit more obstacles, the tag price continued to climb.
An overworked Shelby team missed the 1998 deadline, and updated Federal safety laws for 1999 meant the design had to be altered, increasing production costs and jacking the RRP up with it. And the problems just kept coming. The soft-top roof assembly was poorly designed, and heavy. The carbon fibre bodies were porous, causing issues with paint finish. The jigs used in stress-relieving the heat-treated aluminium chassis weren’t strong enough to prevent warping and had to be totally re-designed. The rear suspension assembly on one prototype cracked with a loud bang hours before a scheduled media day, with the replacement part cracking too. All of this needed fixing, requiring money and time that simply wasn’t there.
Despite a run of 50 early production cars and over 200 customer orders, the Series 1 looked doomed. In an attempt to bring some stability (and revenue), Carroll Shelby sold a 75% stake of his company to automotive supply giants Venture Industries. Venture took over manufacturing and found there were all sorts of issues with the fit of various different body panels, issues that they never entirely ironed out. They did find a solution for the paint problem however, but in the form of adding layers of filler over the carbon fibre bodies. By the time the first cars rolled off Venture’s production lines in 2000, they were now 250 Ib heavier thanks to all that filler.
But they were at least screwed together a little better; when Brock Yates of Car And Driver took one for a test drive in the summer of 2000, he found the Series 1 to be rather well built, noting (on the inside at least) that the “fabrication level seemed excellent”, and praised the car’s stability, precise steering and handling. But he and the Car And Driver team also went through two separate press cars and three breakdowns to record their verdict, as a mixture of clutch and engine issues disabled both vehicles. Yates concluded by saying the Series 1 was “rapid but flawed” and remained a “work in progress”. This for a car that whatever dealers left on board were now asking $180,000 for in standard form, $200,000 when supercharged. Yates’ colleague Frank Markus was scathing, writing “with a Looney Tunes $200,000 sticker, I don’t care whose name is on it, I ain’t drivin’ it without a bag over my head.”
By the time Shelby got on top of things, GM had folded the Oldsmobile brand and an increasingly unwell Carroll Shelby had bought his shares back off Venture. The remaining unassembled cars had to be sold as kits, and of a proposed 500, only 249 cars were finished as complete vehicles. Production dragged on until 2005, but these later models required the owner to source an engine an transmission of choice.
The Series 1 remains an intriguing “what if?” moment in Shelby history, especially since it seems it wasn’t actually that bad to drive, and all the ingredients were there to make a brilliant sports car. John Branch of Silodrome wrote back in 2020 “If a Shelby Series 1 has been thoroughly de-bugged it will prove to be one of the great American sports cars of its era.” And despite the flawed reputation, it seems collectors are starting to appreciate the Series 1 a little more, with second hand values rising gently and currently holding north of $100,000, with some lower mileage cars even hitting over $200,000.
I was a little obsessed with the Series 1 as a child after reading about it in Auto Express and on the pages of Supercars.net, a site that dictated a lot of my early collecting habits. I had a green Bburago Shelby that I coveted highly, and once I had seen the larger 1/18 version on sale in my local Woolworths I was constantly adding it to Christmas lists.
On my recent roadtrip in the US, I stopped by the Shelby Heritage Center in Las Vegas and was slightly sad a Series 1 wasn’t on show somewhere, nor did the very wonderful guide talk about it during our brief tour. But a few days later in the Petersen Museum Vault, I found a gorgeous Centennial Silver Series 1 tucked away next to a Dodge Viper (the fifth Viper ever built no less) and I made a vow to scour the numerous diecast shops along my route for a Series 1 diecast of any sort. Aside from the Bburago 1/18 which Santa still hasn’t brought me, joint top of my list was the 1/64 scale Hot Wheels version.
Hot Wheels “100%” line first appeared in 1999 and was way ahead of the current curve of premium 1/64. Models were a league ahead of contemporary mainlines, with high levels of detail, opening parts and rubber tyres. They also came complete with their own display case (the same cases still used by RLC cars no less!) and by the time the series had disappeared in 2008, an impressive array of cars had been released in 1/64, 1/43 and 1/18 scale.
The Shelby Series 1 casting was designed by Larry Wood and arrived in 2002 as part of a two car set alongside an original Cobra 427 S/C. The first colour released in this set was Centennial Silver with blue stripes, with the second (and final) blue version seen here released in 2003.
Not all 100% Hot Wheels cars were true 1/64, but my very rough calculations lead me to believe that the Series 1 is one of a number of models in the series that was accurately scaled. And it’s surprisingly small; the real car was two inches shorter than the contemporary Porsche Boxster, ten inches compared to the Corvette C5.
The Series 1 is quite a handsome car in my opinion; the quintessential sportscar shape with its long bonnet and squat rear. None of the muscular lines have been lost in the Hot Wheels version, and the stance and proportions are perfect.
And for a diecast of the mid 2000s, the detail is pretty damn good. There’s a separate part for the exhaust, and whilst the painted on head and tail lights look a bit flat against modern diecast, the paint finish is decent at least.
Opening the forward-hinged bonnet reveals the miniature Aurora V8, and whilst the detail wouldn’t cut it these days against premium metal from brands like Tarmac, GFCC, and even Hot Wheels own Elite64 line, it’d hold up against a Matchbox Moving Parts or a Majorette Mainline.
It’s quite a weighty diecast too thanks to a metal base, and will glide across your desk with ease. It sits on neatly replicated three-piece Speedline wheels and wiiide rubber tyres mimicking the Goodyear Eagle F1s of the real thing.
I never tracked down a diecast Series 1 in any scale during my US trip, but luckily the 100% car isn’t a particularly uncommon model and I was able to secure one via Ebay on my return.
To find one without any paint damage however is a bit harder. The market is flooded with cars that may be complete with their original packaging but have suffered from never being liberated from their bases. When sold new a rubber band wrapped around the front axle and body to hold the bonnet shut in transit. This doesn’t cause an issue if the band was cut pretty soon after purchase, but there seems to be many on the second hand market that have never had it removed. And those bands are notorious for degrading and reacting with the paint, scarring it or even eating through to the metal underneath. My example was luckily free from this though I did have to pick some sticky lumps of old banding out of the wheel arches!
If you decide to add one to your own hoard, make sure you take a good look at the front wings! But if you do find a good example, don’t hesitate. This is a fine model of a significant piece of Shelby history.
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