While the design of the Elio in interesting to me, I find just as interesting the company organization and planning for this project..I'm privately hoping they're starting the P6- P30s now. Some work, such as engine builds, can get going. That first engine took forever! But I guess until they crash one, they won't really know about structural changes, which may delay body panels (they might have to tweak frame dimensions, and thus panel sizes), or some such) and other items that might change if some small engineering tweaks are needed.
To me the wonderful and hard question is: when does Paul say, "that's it, let's get 'em built. This is Elio 1.0!" Where will the final design compromises be -- cost, mpg, safety, manufacturability? What they learn about safety either in crash testing or in test driving (how well glued down is this beast at 95 mph, for instance) may drive some changes and cost increases. What a balancing act!