If GM won't build the damn car...

[harshman]

How hard would it be to create a new body from fiberglass or whatever? If GM won’t build it I just might.

[Steve1968LS2]

GM is too busy cancelling RWD platforms in an effort to show how serious they are about RWD cars..

PM Tyler.. I heard he has experience with fiberglass panels :)

[harshman]

If a company started up building this car, can you imagine the demand for it? I honestly don’t believe that building this would be that hard considering some of the fabricating skills out there and the quality that is being done. Build a rolling tube chassis, outfit it with a moderate drive system (500 hp and a 6 speed will do), add a fiberglass body with roll cage and finish the interior – bata-bing you have just created the most sought after car in America. The only difference between what we are doing to our cars and what we could be doing to this car is rust.

[gEtyOpAPiOn]

Have You Ever Seen How They Make Piñatas ? Lol ..ill Prolly Make Me A Maro Like That ...formula = Newspaper Dipped In Sugar Water

[toddshotrods]

It's not really hard, if you are reasonably skilled in bodywork, but it is VERY VERY time consuming! I have been doing custom fiberglass work for years, and am discontinuing the service to automotive customers. The labor is just too much. I have finally realized that even if I had all the "unlimited" customers I want lined up for two to three years, I could still make better use of my time doing other things.

You have to create a plug, which is a perfect, full-size, model of the body first. Molds are pulled off that, and the real parts are produced from it. You carve out the first half and, without access to specialized ($$$) equipment, you have to make templates to get the second side perfectly symmetrical to it. There are a lot of tricks to help do this, but in the end it's still a matter of TIME. Got the whole body modeled and think your home free? HA! Now you have to do inner doors hood and trunk, and jambs for those. If it's a quality piece, they have to be as close to identical as possible, so more templates, etc. Depending on the production materials planned, you also have to account for production shrinkage, thermal expansion, etc, to have good panel fit and gap lines. Almost anything is possible but the materials are pretty expensive, so you're going to spend thousands to do a whole body. Buy the best professional grade supplies or you will hate the job or yourself before it's done.

If it sounds like I am trying to discourage you - I am NOT!!! Just trying to make sure you understand what you're getting into before you leap. I discontinued this type of automotive service, but I have four personal projects that are all getting custom bodywork, ranging from a new front fasica to a complete one-off body. I also have a lot of how-to article series coming up on my site, concerning this subject.

If your wallet is bigger than your ambition, you can model the whole thing in 3D software and have the plug cut on a huge five-axis mill, pay a body shop to fine-tune it, then a production shop to pull the molds and make the parts. I would start figuring the price at around $300 per square foot, excluding modeling time, but that's probably going to come up short.

[boodlefoof]

I have been looking into fabbing my own fiberglass bits for my next project and as stated above it doesn't look like it is particularly difficult... just really really time consuming.

Rather than making a mold and laying the glass inside of it, I plan on building up the panels out of foam or clay and then laying the 'glass over top of that.

For example, I plan on some custom fender flares... I will build up the existing fenders with some material... then sand it to the shape I want. Then, lay the fiberglass on top of it. After the fiberglass cures, I'll pop it off and scrape off the stuff stuck to the backside.

Making a whole body sounds like a bit more work...

[vanzuuk1]

I made the tail piece on my bike , it was not fun but it came out nice.a lot like painting a car , doesn't seem complicated until you try it yourself. I cringe at the thought of doing a whole car from scratch! Make a single part like a rear spoiler and you will get a taste of it.

[TonyL]

im sure a deal could be struck with kris horton and he could provide the full out blueprints on the model he made. Then all you'd need is a company to produce the panels and body for you based on that.

[harshman]

All I want is the car. Perhaps Horton could get with a kit car manufacturer and let them develop it. I’m tellin’ you that it would be one of the most sought after cars out there. Example: the makers of the Eleanor car replica are getting sick amounts of money for their model. I’m no brain surgeon but I do know what would be a hit. Building a well balanced chassis, toss in some good hp numbers, and mix in some exotic four seat concept that will outperform most cars on the road today and, well me amigos you have a genuinely bad ass car.

Start off with a one off model and take it to Taiwan and have them build 100 of them at $13 each – LOL.

[vanzuuk1]

All these difficulties are the reason so many kit cars look like a tennis shoe on wheels. Carmakers spend countless months just in the final tweaking phase. When you say it would be a hit would you sell enough to justify the start up costs? The nova body that year one used would be a good case study.

[toddshotrods]

harshman
Build yourself one. That's the best route, and if the quality is there on yours, and demand is high enough you should be able to strike a deal with a company to pull molds off yours and reproduce the bodies. Worse case scenario, you'll have the car of your dreams. Best case, you'll have licensing and royalty agreements putting cash in your bank account just for chasing that dream.

boodlefoof
use the two-part foam to sculpt your flares. You can lay the 'glass up right over them. Then you have your choice of either encapsulating the foam with an inner layer, or removing it. If you choose to remove it, lacquer thinner or acetone should melt it right out and save you a little skin (from scratching). I do a lot of moldless 'glass work. The project I worked on today is one. It takes less materials, but not usually less time. Also brings with it the possibility of more skin removal (scratching).

vanzuuk1 is really hitting the nail on the head as far as limited production goes. It's really hard to put together a good business case for doing something like this. That's why most of the fiberglass bodies for sale are replicas - half the work is done by just finding a straight vehicle to pull the molds from. A business has to count up ALL the labor, materials, and overhead involved in just getting to the point of production. When the sales projections are developed, breaking even is usually a far-fetched concept, let alone some kind of profit. Even if there is some type of profit on paper, you have to weigh it against other avenues within the same time frame. The one-off kit usually loses in the end. Also, there are a lot of people who say, "if you build it my cash will come", but lose interest before the final product is ready (remember all that time it takes to do it properly?).

If someone builds a quality car like this they will have a $100+K body, and if the rest of the components match that body they'll end up with at least a quarter-mil hot rod supercar. That's why you don't see it much. When most people weigh their personal "business cases" they feel more justified in putting that money and time into other areas of their lives. The best reason to do it is because you really want the end result for yourself.

[Bill Howell]

Very well put Todd. The one issue you left out was that after you get a prototype, and even a customer or two, then you would get into all the government red tape of crash test, epa, smog, blah, blah blah...before you could title it.Translated-another 1/2 mil easy.

[KrisHorton]

I've had a bunch of folks come to me about producing a replica or kit of that design. I'm all for it but so far no one on the other end has come through. I think it'd be awesome to see it realized, but there's a lot of time, money, and thought that would have to go into it. It'd be nice to have a smaller scale version made to see how feasible it would be.

Todd's definitely on the right track with the thoughts on making a plug and going from there, but to even get to that point would be remarkable. It's tough to make it a reality without having a couple 100 grand backing it.

It sure would be nice though huh?

Kris

[boodlefoof]

Todd,

Thanks for the tip! Any input on doing it is appreciated... I'm a total newbie to fiberglass fabrication.

[Rome]

Seems like it might be right up these guys' alley.


http://www.factoryfive.com/table/ffrkits/GTM/GTMkit.html

[toddshotrods]

Very well put Todd. The one issue you left out was that after you get a prototype, and even a customer or two, then you would get into all the government red tape of crash test, epa, smog, blah, blah blah...before you could title it.Translated-another 1/2 mil easy.

I asumed the discussion was on producing body kits and letting the individual build it with the chassis of their choice. Trying to produce a new/turn-key car is a whole nother ballgame - as you just brought out! I had a friend who was determined to do that. I tried my best to convince him to develop a body kit for something like the then new C5 (big enough task in itself). His business is now on hold and he works for someone else... One thing I didn't mention is product liability insurance. That's sure to put a nail in the coffin of most ideas.

boodlefoof
How soon are you doing your flares? As I said I'm going to be doing some tech articles on creative ways to produce custom fiberglass and composite parts soon. If you're ready to start before I do them I would still be happy to walk through it with you. I have LOTS of tricks and tips to help make the process easier and the end result better. If you're interested shoot me an email to kick the ball off.

If you do make sure the subject line makes it clear that it's you. I have a hair-trigger delete button when I am in the bulk mail folder ;)

Kris
It's possible that the people who approached you were cracking the door of opportunity, just in case. As is normally the case in this microwave generation, there is a big fuss with the initial introduction and barely a murmur if big things don't happen in the blink of an eye. The businessperson's toes sticking in the water start to get really cold when the excitement wanes.

On the other hand, I am really surprised that a wealthier individual hasn't looked into building one. There are mega-buck hot rods being built all the time and you would think somoene would have to have that car.

[406ben]

Back in 2003 I graduated from BYU's Transportation Design program. While I was there GM donated a full size 5 axis mill as part of something like a $2 million donation to the school. We used Alias Studio-tools (a 3-d design program) and used a student's concept to carve out a full size buck from modeling foam on the mill. Trust me it was a huge process. We then took a 69 Beetle chassis and modified it quite extensively. I was lucky enough to be paid to be the teacher's assistant for two semesters during the chassis building stage because I was the only one in the program that knew how to weld and work on cars. I got to be the one to dump $1200 of the school's money on 17" wheels and tires:bananna2: . Unfortunately our professor wouldn't let me lower the chassis, the same guy that thought some dorky old school 15" steel wheels he had would have been perfect for the car. :crying: We had a local VW builder put together a dual carb 1300+cc (if memory serves me) rumpety power plant and the car would light up the tires, not bad for a VW I guess.
After I graduated they worked on the mold and fiberglass body for it. I checked back every couple of months to see progress, what a load of work. Personally I think it's a goofy design, but for a bunch of students to start from scratch and make a car, it was a good experience. Dr. Marshall would do anything for money for the program, why don't you throw him $5000 for supplies and a peice of the action when you sell the design to a kit car company, I'll bet he'd go for it. BYU also has a fantastic engineering program and they have a senior project program called Capstone, where members of the community, usually businesses, donate a certain amount of cash to have the students design and engineer a product the business ultimately has rights to. They could come up with a chassis design, and actually make it safe too. Check out this link, www.et.byu.edu/news_xvw.htm (http://www.et.byu.edu/news_xvw.htm) and you can contact Dr. John Marshall of the Transportation Design department @ 801-422-4880 / [email protected] , and in the Engineering dept., contact the head of Capstone, Dr. Robert Todd, @ 801-422-6342 / [email protected] Try it just for kicks and giggles to see what they say, tell 'em former student Ben Meissner (pronounced Myzner) sent ya.

[boodlefoof]

Hey Todd, thank you very much!

I sent you an email... or at least I think I did. I clicked to send you an email and the website gave me a form to fill out with my email text. I hope you got it.

If not, please email me at [email protected]

[mikejkd]

Who do the drawings of that car belong to?

[KrisHorton]

Me. And on the plus side, I have plan views of it too. I'd definitely change it quite a bit if it were to be built, but only to make it more realistic.

Kris

[mikejkd]

It does look a little Ferrari 360ish. I will try to contact you by email.