When it comes to hobbies, what's the first thing that spring to our somewhat limited minds? Reading, traveling, listening to music, fishing, i.e. most of the stuff that you'd find at the bottom of a resume. Some of us though, take this hobby thing to a whole new level. I build a small remote controlled car from scratch, while "he"'s built a large 1:1 scale functional car just for the heck of it. Who's "he" ? He's a bigger better man than I am. And he works right here in an office right across the hallway from me.
To cut a long story short, yesterday the AC in my office met its maker and so I had to move to another office across the hall in order to escape certain death. One thing lead to another and this "he" (who shall remain nameless at his request) showed me a picture (look right):
A funny beastly 4 wheeled "car looking" machine, no doors, kinda "square", in bright red. Much to my surprise, he then revealed to me that it's...HE BUILT THE RED BEAST himself, and what's more, it actually works, which is to say that you get in it, sit down, start the engine and drive it around.
It's amazing how people surprise you with stuff. And it's even more amazing when that "stuff" is a homemade vehicle, built by a dude you've been working with for some time. Not something you stumble upon daily wouldn't you say? :)
Anyway, before you make any comments about how the car looks, about the fact that it's not the slickest looking, Porsche like, luxurious "voiture", here's some facts about how it was built, straight from the...builder himself:
"The car has been built in Fagaras, by me and a good friend of mine (very good welder). It took about 50 days and ~ 3000 Euros in total to build. As a concept, the basic idea was to build a low budget, robust vehicle that will successfully handle our country's (crappy) roads.
The body is made out of welded square bars and galvanized 1 and 1.5 mm iron (tin) plates. It's thought out to withstand a potential crash test (which he actually thinks of carrying out), by creating separate successive crash bend zones.
It's powered by a 1.6 longitudinally placed engine from a Dacia Nova, with a gearbox from a normal Dacia. It uses body parts and joints from a Dacia pickup truck and Dacia Nova, 14 inch rims, ventilated front brake discs, etc, and it's been presented to the Romanian Automotive Authority in order to earn the right to be driven on public roads."
Here's the original quite in Romanian, straight from the man himself:
"Este construita la Fagaras cu participarea unui bun prieten (care sudeaza foarte bine). Timpul in care a fost costruita a fost de aprox. 50 de zile. Din punct de vedere conceptual prototipul abordeaza urmatoarea tema: Constructia unui vehicul robust care sa reziste cu succes pe drumurile patriei noastre fara costuri exagerate. Astfel: - Caroseria este realizata din bare patrate sudate si tabla galvanizata de 1 si 1,5 mm sudata cu protectie de CO2. Are zone succesive de deformare (crash test in plan). - Motorizarea este de Dacia Nova (asta am avut:) 1,6 (motor asezat longitudinal) - Cutie de dacie clasica. - Articulatii fata: Dacia papuc diesel - Articulatii spate: Dacia Nova - Garda la sol 200 mm - Rotile sunt pe 14 (Ar fi trebuit sa fie min pe 15, dar asta este:) - Discuri fata ventilate (puntea fata de papuc diesel) - Spate tamburi (puntea spate nova) Conceptul a fost prezentat la RAR Bucuresti. Costuri : 3000 Eur fara motor si cutie"
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