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Guys appreciate the feedback but please refrain from the business 101 college lessons for now.
At this point it is a 27 piece endeavor to do this(including custom built lighting solutions)
I am currently optimizing the design and building the first mule on my own car(bought specifically for this project) Lessons learned from that phase of the project will dictate whether or not I even bring the kit to market. The entire goal isn't to create a profitable revenue stream but rather to build a showcase portfolio piece for my design business. There really isn't any money in creating parts for a 25yr old car. I'm breaking into more exotic platforms and this is more or less a trial run.
Back to a vehicle that will be debuting in two months.
I may not be able to get back to this project until the winter(I'll try though), I have several Porsche projects running as well as the fore mentioned deadline looming.
I will be out at SEMA and Sevenstock if anyone wants to hang out.
Well I hope everything works out, You obviously have some talent. Looking at your website I have to say the renders are impressive. Its really a shame that your design wasn't picked for the FF818 it's stunning. ( I really like the idea of the 818 but it's not very attractive) on a side note the Kanza looks like it could easily adapt to Boxster chassis. Those cars are begging for a rebody. Also a C5 corvette is begging for rebody, with a body that is all bolt on panels that may be the best possible re-body project. Good luck in your future projects. I plan to follow progress on this and other projects.
Well I hope everything works out, You obviously have some talent. Looking at your website I have to say the renders are impressive. Its really a shame that your design wasn't picked for the FF818 it's stunning. ( I really like the idea of the 818 but it's not very attractive) on a side note the Kanza looks like it could easily adapt to Boxster chassis. Those cars are begging for a rebody. Also a C5 corvette is begging for rebody, with a body that is all bolt on panels that may be the best possible re-body project. Good luck in your future projects. I plan to follow progress on this and other projects.
haha re-body all the things!
Thanks for the compliments, really appreciate it. A lot of the projects on my site are old(including the 818), most of my current work is still under NDA.
The 818 was interesting, I was asked to participate by the president of FF, the contest started out really promising. Near the end of the deadline myself and a few other well known designers asked FF to finalize the contest rules. At the time it was very unclear about who maintained design rights throughout the build process. FF decided that they would keep rights of all designs submitted whether those contestants won or not. So me and about a half dozen of the best designers pulled out in the last week. FF now has more than 700 designs(about only 5 worth something) in their possession without lifting a finger. Then what do they do? Their lead engineer got all butt hurt because he thought he was a great designer and was upset that the contest was even outsourced in the first place. So he threw a stink fest which caused the president to turn in house for the exterior treatment of the design. In the end they got what they paid for, a sub-mediocre design and a lot of their potential customers ended up going else where.
I do have plans on buying an 818 frame and doing my own body. Possibly selling the design back to FF as an alternate. As much as I like the upcoming Local Motors SF01 https://localmotors.com/localmotors/lm-sf-01/activity/ I like a mid engine platform more. And since LM won't be bringing the SF01 to light in the next year, and the Sector 111 Drakan is way too expensive the 818 sounds like a great starting point, I have an RE sitting around waiting to get dropped into something(most likely the GT7)
Please explain how you "bolt on" the back half of the car past the doors?
Originally Posted by gmonsen
People who see this as a "body kit" are missing the point, assuming Greg ever decided to try to get this built. This is a new body on the Rxy chassis. The pieces would bolt up just like the stock body, conceptually. This would not be screwing, riveting, and gluing a bunch of fiberglass over the Rx7 shell. It would mostly be a new body.
I see people saying $18,000 is a high price. It should cost well over that, imo. For what he would be offering $18,000 is a steal. The bottom line here is that this is for people who can afford $20-100,000 motors in their FD's. If you want to make your car look flash cheaply, there are a lot of body kits out there for all the model builders with their glue sticks.
I was curious as to what happened with the 818 project. The end seemed very strange and turned me off to getting one; especially since it was hyped to be some sort of end all be all kit car... without a roof or windows... and from what I've read quite a few fitment issues too.
Originally Posted by Rotr8
There really isn't any money in creating parts for a 25yr old car.
You don't need ton of money to make something super nice look at this video
Nearly 700 hours of custom fab time is a ton of money. Keep in mind this is done by someone experienced in doing it. Want to do this on your own? Triple the time at least.
Nearly 700 hours of custom fab time is a ton of money. Keep in mind this is done by someone experienced in doing it. Want to do this on your own? Triple the time at least.
if your craftsmanship are good, it can be done easily
I like the style but just hate the skyline tail light, doesn't seem to suit at it all.
No question that if you have the skills you could do this. Look at the hours though. The creators of that video obviously know what they're doing. They spent 670 hours doing the rear bumper & diffuser. Add in front bumper (guess 450hrs), front fenders (guess 300Hrs), roof (guess 240hrs), doors (guess 240Hrs), and rear hatch (guess 240hrs). If you value your time at $10US/hour that is $20KUS, more than rotr8's target kit price and you still haven't paid for lights, hardware, supplies, and equipment to make the panels. You would have a design just to your tastes though.
Makes $15K-$18K start to look like an incredible bargain.
Last edited by BizarroTerl; Oct 1, 2015 at 12:13 PM.
You're wasting your breath(or keystrokes), most on this forum don't think anyone's time has any value.
This guy's time is definitely has value, but when another company will sell you an entire body and tube chassis for less, you have to bring up the point that 18k is a lot. The 818 coupe with much improved front end, full body, whole tube chassis with a double adjustable suspension full interior, wheels etc,etc for 18k.
This guy's time is definitely has value, but when another company will sell you an entire body and tube chassis for less, you have to bring up the point that 18k is a lot. The 818 coupe with much improved front end, full body, whole tube chassis with a double adjustable suspension full interior, wheels etc,etc for 18k.
Much improved is being very generous, polishing a turd still leaves you with a turd
Although I do have an entirely new design for the 818, which I've been thinking about just buying the chassis itself, no horrible bodykit & interior.
Originally Posted by BizarroTerl
Why does the 818 looks like a Zcar with a bad body kit?
SOOOOOOOOOOO now we have the RX-Vision, and of course I can't go through my day without thinking that I can adapt the front bumpers styling to better align with the Vision's
I'm very open to explore the idea of offering two different bumpers. I will have to really center my thought of repackaging the styling of the Vision to the H-points of the current kit and to the H-points of the FD itself to see if it can be done while still capturing the spirit of the Vision.
One thing I think will benefit both bumper treatments is to take the outline of the Visions DRLs and develop a closed lense housing inside that profile. The current bumper can have the standard light housings and the Vision inspired housing can have the blank body color-match panel that we see on the Vision.
Thoughts?
I certainly won't have time to attack this until Q2 next year, too much client work right now. I thought Id be able to get back to this in Q1 but several new jobs popped up.
Now that we have the RX-Vision, I definitely think adapting some of Mazda's "kodo" styling into your design would be a great idea to at least toy around with.
The idea would be "modernizing" our cherished FD using Mazda's own present-day styling ques.
Great ideas, though be aware that if you follow the styling cues too closely, it will always be considered "an RX-7 trying to be an RX-Vision" situation, sort of like those "R35 GT-R-style" front bumpers made for the Infiniti G35. Something to consider. Now, if you can make it BETTER than the RX-Vision, that's a different story
I think you can do it. I'd love to see the the Visions smooth side curves integrated onto the FD, would still keep the bubble roof though.
Here's the FD overlayed with the RX-Vision (pretty close to actual size, pretty sure there's only a 3"-4" length difference)
Man that's a low concept:
Great ideas, though be aware that if you follow the styling cues too closely, it will always be considered "an RX-7 trying to be an RX-Vision" situation, sort of like those "R35 GT-R-style" front bumpers made for the Infiniti G35. Something to consider. Now, if you can make it BETTER than the RX-Vision, that's a different story
I think you can do it. I'd love to see the the Visions smooth side curves integrated onto the FD, would still keep the bubble roof though.
Here's the FD overlayed with the RX-Vision (pretty close to actual size, pretty sure there's only a 3"-4" length difference)
Man that's a low concept:
yeah just to double check your math I did a similar overlay with the difference in the two wheelbases being 275mm here's what I got. I also aligned the images according to driver head location, because we know that the concept has a great stance(not stanced, but actual designer terminology indicating ground plane and silhouette proportions) and will probably come up to a height that will produce good approach angles. By also doing this we see that the windshield base start in the same spot. This is good becuase we can take some of the rake out of the Vision and poof! we have all but the same exact greenhouse as the FD
Great ideas, though be aware that if you follow the styling cues too closely, it will always be considered "an RX-7 trying to be an RX-Vision" situation, sort of like those "R35 GT-R-style" front bumpers made for the Infiniti G35. Something to consider. Now, if you can make it BETTER than the RX-Vision, that's a different story
I think you can do it. I'd love to see the the Visions smooth side curves integrated onto the FD, would still keep the bubble roof though.
Here's the FD overlayed with the RX-Vision (pretty close to actual size, pretty sure there's only a 3"-4" length difference)
Man that's a low concept:
True, true, I dont want to get too intense with copying. I think if I took my oil cooler inlets and pushed them down and out then retrimmed the front air dam to pronounce it more it will do the trick without having to do too much. The key is to be aware of crossing the line from inspiration to copying.
Nice, I aligned my overlay based on the front door seam, just seemed to synch up the two designs a bit more, and was just a rough estimate based on total length difference and rim size (guesstimated at 17" on the FD in the pic.) Your version is def. more technical. ..I think whatever different cameras lenses were used are affecting the angles on the different FD images (red vs. yellow) because the cabins are lining up almost exactly the same in both overlays, yet the yellow rear bumper in yours appears much farther out.
I can't wait to see a real photoshoot with an FD and the RX-Vision.
..I think whatever different cameras lenses were used are affecting the angles on the different FD images (red vs. yellow) because the cabins are lining up almost exactly the same in both overlays, yet the yellow rear bumper in yours appears much farther out. 
