CSX3015 is one of two 427 Super Snake Cobras ever built. Originally delivered as a 427 Competition roadster and sent on a 1965 European promotional tour, it was converted in 1967 into the street-legal Semi-Competition spec that defined the Super Snake designation. It sold at Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale in 2007 for $5,500,000.
Fast facts
- One of two 427 Super Snake Cobras ever built, alongside CSX3303.
- Delivered on September 7, 1965 as a 427 Competition roadster. Shipped and invoiced to Ford Advanced Vehicles in England.
- Sent on a 1965 European promotional tour with CSX3014 and two R-model Shelby Mustangs, chassis 5R107 and 5R209.
- Converted in early-to-mid 1967 into the Super Snake configuration, reclassified as a 427 Cobra Semi-Competition (S/C). The conversion added the road-legal kit a Competition car lacked: mufflers, windshield, and bumpers.
- Featured in the February 1968 Road & Track, with the period photographs showing the wide hips and noses that distinguish the 427 Competition roadsters.
- Retains the original body, the 1967 aluminum Super Snake hood, the original 1965 date-coded engine block (stamped 5M17, December 17, 1965), and the original 427 Competition 377 rear end with its period oil cooler and pumps.
- After Shelby American, passed to S&C Motors in San Francisco, then to Tony Maxey, who later died crashing the sibling CSX3303 off a cliff.
- Sold at Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale 2007, Lot 1301, for $5,500,000.
History
CSX3015 left Shelby American on September 7, 1965, shipped and invoiced to Ford Advanced Vehicles in England for a European promotional tour. The tour group included CSX3014 (its near-sister 427 Competition chassis) and the two R-model Shelby Mustangs 5R107 and 5R209. The cars returned from Europe in late 1966 with CSX3015 still in 427 Competition specification.
In early to mid-1967, CSX3015 underwent the conversion that defined its identity. A 427 Cobra Competition was a race car. It carried no mufflers, no windshield, and no bumpers, and it could not be registered for the street. Shelby American developed a road-legal conversion that added those parts and reclassified the car as a 427 Cobra Semi-Competition (S/C). The two cars given the full conversion package, CSX3015 and CSX3303, were the only Super Snakes ever built. The February 1968 Road & Track features the converted CSX3015 with the wide hips and prominent nose that mark a 427 Competition body under street kit.
The companion Super Snake had a separate path. CSX3303 was a 1967 427 street car that Shelby American retained as a promotional vehicle before converting it to Super Snake specification for entertainer Bill Cosby. Cosby’s record album titled “200 MPH” took its name from the car, and the legend among Shelby people is that Cosby drove it once and returned it.
Following its time with Shelby American, CSX3015 was sold to S&C Motors in San Francisco. The car later passed to Tony Maxey, who also came to own CSX3303. Maxey was killed when he drove CSX3303 off a cliff, an event that ended that chassis’s intact history. CSX3015 survived.
The car retains its original body, the original 1967 aluminum Super Snake hood, the original 1965 date-coded engine block stamped 5M17 with the December 17, 1965 date, and the original 427 Competition 377 rear end with its period oil cooler and pumps in place. The Super Snake hood in particular is the visible signature of the conversion and is unique to the two cars that received it.
Sales history
- 2007: Barrett-Jackson Scottsdale, Lot 1301. $5,500,000.
Authenticity and current configuration
CSX3015 is a documented original. The body is the original 427 Competition shell with the post-conversion 1967 Super Snake aluminum hood fitted. The 1965 date-coded engine block carries its original stamping (5M17, December 17, 1965), and the 427 Competition 377 rear end is the unit fitted in period, complete with the rear-end oil cooler and pumps that accompanied the competition specification. The conversion mechanicals (mufflers, windshield, bumper installation) are the 1967 additions that made the car street-legal as a Semi-Competition.
The Super Snake designation does not mark a separate production model. It marks the specific 1967 conversion treatment that Shelby American applied to two existing chassis. Any other car claiming the Super Snake name traces back through the spec sheet to one of those two conversions or it is not what it claims to be. For wider context on the 427 program and the Cobra production hierarchy, see the history of AC Cars and the birth of the Shelby Cobra and the Cobra Authority buyer’s guide. A documented late-production Mark II 289 Cobra like CSX2208 sits on the small-block side of the same program; CSX3015 is the headline 427 example on the other end.
For wider Shelby program context, see behind the headlights of the Shelby Cobra.
All images courtesy of Barrett-Jackson.
Last updated: May 16, 2026
Leave a Reply