Time To "get 'er Done"

[RUCRAYZE]

I don't know about the flying car stuff...but I have to agree w/ carzes on this one. And why not, use EM's existing P4, it's drivable, put that new engine in and that's what they should unveil...a complete working prototype w/ it's own brand new motor! EM already did good w/ their tours, and sent a message that ELIO does exist! Now get it tested using the prototype w/ the new engine and give us the updates!!! I think EM should be able to manage it while they're waiting for the needed funding. We as investors who have skin in the game shouldn't be too lenient...I don't have no idea how much it's costing EM on these tours, the airline tickets, hotel accommodations, salaries and allowances of the staff, etc but I wouldn't have the problem shutting down these tours "for now" and concentrate their money and effort in getting this prototype tested so they can report actual mpg, speed and engine performance....isn't these the real questions we want to hear? It maybe the one the investors wanted to hear instead of where they're going to be on their next tour!!!! I don't need to hear another excuse "how hard it is to start a car company from the ground up" that is apart from the current funding problem. It's high time TO GET 'ER TESTED!!! ( I said tested not done).

I think the tours are a MUST.the 40k reservations are the impressive number currently mentioned in all press releases. Watching a show at 10 a.m. on a Sat morning, or reading posts from LA newspapers doesn't do it. The excitement/positive national press is on hold as up to now there is only "old news". Folks outside this process won't be impressed with the success of one engine running, so it has to be a a continuation of public outreach, and getting it rolling.

 

[JEBar]

I think the tours are a MUST.the 40k reservations are the impressive number currently mentioned in all press releases. Watching a show at 10 a.m. on a Sat morning, or reading posts from LA newspapers doesn't do it. The excitement/positive national press is on hold as up to now there is only "old news". Folks outside this process won't be impressed with the success of one engine running, so it has to be a a continuation of public outreach, and getting it rolling.

agree and we shouldn't forget that reservations (in no small part inspired by reactions to the tour) do bring considerable money into the company

 

[carzes]

I think the tours are a MUST.the 40k reservations are the impressive number currently mentioned in all press releases. Watching a show at 10 a.m. on a Sat morning, or reading posts from LA newspapers doesn't do it. The excitement/positive national press is on hold as up to now there is only "old news". Folks outside this process won't be impressed with the success of one engine running, so it has to be a a continuation of public outreach, and getting it rolling.

I agree that the public appearances should be preserved as long as there is any option to keep doing them. BUT I think that rolling in with a more finalized version would be more effective. If it were me trying to market a proposed vehicle I would MUCH rather be able to say " we just drove this 800 miles to get here and we got even better than projected mileage of 86 mpg", for example, instead of pulling it out of the trailer and saying, "This one LOOKS kind of like the final version, but other than that has NOTHING in common with the projected final version.... But it does drive.....". Which would inspire YOU more?

 

[JEBar]

If it were me trying to market a proposed vehicle I would MUCH rather be able to say " we just drove this 800 miles to get here and we got even better than projected mileage of 86 mpg", for example, instead of pulling it out of the trailer and saying,

I most certainly agree but after thinking about it, reality sets in with the realization that as of now they only have 1 demo vehicle and 1 IAV motor .... an accident involving either or both could be devastating .... by necessity, they have to be very cautious .... hopefully the day is coming when such caution won't be necessary ..

 

[carzes]

I most certainly agree but after thinking about it, reality sets in with the realization that as of now they only have 1 demo vehicle and 1 IAV motor .... an accident involving either or both could be devastating .... by necessity, they have to be very cautious .... hopefully the day is coming when such caution won't be necessary ..

Naturally they aren't in a position to do it right now, but I just think it would be a good thing to make a priority for the near future. It's my understanding that they'll have to build at least a small number of vehicles BEFORE any production lines can be set up anyway. How do you set up a line to produce something that's not even been built once yet? Computer simulations are good, but there's a limit isn't there? It shouldn't take a million bucks to build a couple if the design is already there, even if they have to wait a little for engines.

 

[goofyone]

Naturally they aren't in a position to do it right now, but I just think it would be a good thing to make a priority for the near future. It's my understanding that they'll have to build at least a small number of vehicles BEFORE any production lines can be set up anyway. How do you set up a line to produce something that's not even been built once yet? Computer simulations are good, but there's a limit isn't there? It shouldn't take a million bucks to build a couple if the design is already there, even if they have to wait a little for engines.

Building pre-production vehicles for testing before production has always been a part of the plan. EM has already told us that their priority once the engine is through it's initial testing cycles, of which there are a few more even after the engine is unveiled, is to build more testing engine and install them in a number of prototype vehicles. Some of these prototypes will be used in road testing and others will be crash tested.

Building prototypes is more expensive than most people realize. We have been told on several occasions that the hand built prototypes cost about $500,000 each to build. Of course the total cost for the pre-production vehicles and testing will be significantly more as not only does EM need a number of test vehicles but they also need to pay for all the testing. The numbers I have heard mentioned several times is a cost of $30+ million and about six months time to complete vehicle testing and development and make the Elio production ready. Right now EM's fundraising priority is securing the $30+ million they need to make the vehicle ready for production.

 

[06Jan2013]

Building pre-production vehicles for testing before production has always been a part of the plan. EM has already told us that their priority once the engine is through it's initial testing cycles, of which there are a few more even after the engine is unveiled, is to build more testing engine and install them in a number of prototype vehicles. Some of these prototypes will be used in road testing and others will be crash tested.

Building prototypes is more expensive than most people realize. We have been told on several occasions that the hand built prototypes cost about $500,000 each to build. Of course the total cost for the pre-production vehicles and testing will be significantly more as not only does EM need a number of test vehicles but they also need to pay for all the testing. The numbers I have heard mentioned several times is a cost of $30+ million and about six months time to complete vehicle testing and development and make the Elio production ready. Right now EM's fundraising priority is securing the $30+ million they need to make the vehicle ready for production.

I'm new to the forum, but my username is the date I started following the Elio saga. I have sat in both the P3 and P4, and have looked them over quite thoroughly. There is absolutely no way that either of them cost $500K to build. At best/worst, if you count all the money paid to engineers & designers to design the vehicles, and the money paid to show the vehicles off, and the money paid to the engineers/designers after the vehicles were built, you might come up with six figures expended, but that is not the cost to build the vehicle. We have been repeatedly told that the Elio could be build (in mass production) for $7300. If that is even remotely accurate, it would be reasonable to assume that the cost of the materials going into the vehicle (labor excluded) would be less than that. Even allowing for steep volume discounts, the parts/materials costs of a completed prototype would be less than $10k. Let's double that and call it $20k. Add another $30k for labor (600 hours @ $50/hr), and you have a $50k vehicle.

There is no way they should have paid more than $50k for either of those prototypes, and that is a huge stretch. After all, they are using a salvage engine that hasn't even been rebuilt/refurbished. No functioning A/C. No ABS. No traction control. Incomplete exhaust system. No trunk latch. And on the P3, no windshield wiper, no functioning right window, and a totally misplaced shifter as well.

The claim is off-the-shelf parts. The custom stuff mostly consists of a hand-welded frame and body panels. Even if the first copy of the P3 or P4 cost $50k, it would not cost an additional $50k to build an exact duplicate. Same jigs, same molds, and same off-the-shelf parts. It would have been very easy and cheap to build 2 or 3 copies of each, then use 1 for display and the other(s) for testing.

I have been doing some work with custom car builders, and you can get some pretty amazing vehicles built for $100k. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but $100k to "build" the P4 is a wild exaggeration and/or overpayment, and the $500k figure is pure fantasy.

 

[goofyone]

I'm new to the forum, but my username is the date I started following the Elio saga. I have sat in both the P3 and P4, and have looked them over quite thoroughly. There is absolutely no way that either of them cost $500K to build. At best/worst, if you count all the money paid to engineers & designers to design the vehicles, and the money paid to show the vehicles off, and the money paid to the engineers/designers after the vehicles were built, you might come up with six figures expended, but that is not the cost to build the vehicle. We have been repeatedly told that the Elio could be build (in mass production) for $7300. If that is even remotely accurate, it would be reasonable to assume that the cost of the materials going into the vehicle (labor excluded) would be less than that. Even allowing for steep volume discounts, the parts/materials costs of a completed prototype would be less than $10k. Let's double that and call it $20k. Add another $30k for labor (600 hours @ $50/hr), and you have a $50k vehicle.

There is no way they should have paid more than $50k for either of those prototypes, and that is a huge stretch. After all, they are using a salvage engine that hasn't even been rebuilt/refurbished. No functioning A/C. No ABS. No traction control. Incomplete exhaust system. No trunk latch. And on the P3, no windshield wiper, no functioning right window, and a totally misplaced shifter as well.

The claim is off-the-shelf parts. The custom stuff mostly consists of a hand-welded frame and body panels. Even if the first copy of the P3 or P4 cost $50k, it would not cost an additional $50k to build an exact duplicate. Same jigs, same molds, and same off-the-shelf parts. It would have been very easy and cheap to build 2 or 3 copies of each, then use 1 for display and the other(s) for testing.

I have been doing some work with custom car builders, and you can get some pretty amazing vehicles built for $100k. I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but $100k to "build" the P4 is a wild exaggeration and/or overpayment, and the $500k figure is pure fantasy.

I need to find this magical shop that charges only $50/hr for custom vehicle manufacturing. What a joke, all the shop owners I know need to charge more than that simply to cover overhead costs. You claim to have knowledge of custom car building however your numbers are so far off base they are simply laughable.

You claim that $50K is enough to build an engineering prototype vehicle to engineering specifications front the ground up however in my first hand experience in vehicle restoration projects I have spent over $25K on a single vehicle simply in properly repairing rust damage to the chassis and body. This is not even an unusual amount to spend on this portion of a restoration and does not include the cost of stripping a car to bare metal, or painting and reassembly after the metal repair.

While many of the mechanical components may be off the shelf they still have to be integrated into a fully custom built vehicle which takes time and time is money. $500K is actually not an unrealistic number at all when you take a step back and realize that Technosports had to build, or have built, a complete custom chassis to exacting engineering specifications with hard mounts for items such as the engine, transmissions, and suspension in exactly the correct locations as per the engineering drawings, a completely custom fiberglass body, a completely custom dash board and other interior hard moldings, a one-off wiring harness, and fully outfit the interior of the vehicle along with the countless other things it takes to build a hand built vehicle.

Having a custom one-off fiberglass body could easily cost EM in the six figures all by itself. To do this requires recreating the entire body, or each of the body panels, using polystyrene foam which including carving and sanding the body panel lines and contour details into the foam. Then laying layers of woven fiberglass mat are applied by hand to form the panels before resin is applied and everything is sealed and allowed to cure. As if all that did not take enough time the panels need to be carefully trimmed and then finished which includes body filler and sanding to ensure the panels are ready to be primed and painted.

EM could save money on some aspects of the E-series pre-production builds as they can do some thing differently, such as having tooling made to allow body panels to be reproduced more economically, however building the E-series will be more expensive in other ways as EM has told us they will be building these using a process meant to recreate the production line build experience as these vehicles will need to be constructed as closely as possible to what will roll off the production line however without the benefits of the actual production line equipment. This will undoubtedly result in increased labor costs in building the E-series pre-production vehicles however EM does need to do things this way so testing will reflect production models as accurately as possible.

 

[06Jan2013]

No rust. No stripping. No restoration. Engineering drawings already done. Just a simple build from plans. Supposedly all the CAD word has been done. This really isn't rocket surgery. Even granting a "complete custom fiberglass" body (as opposed to SMC), and a "completely custom dashboard", and "other interior hard moldings", once they did one set, the second set is cheap. The wiring harness is nothing. Take the Metro harness and you're done. It might need a custom harness with a modern, EFI engine, but we're talking about the existing units. As for "fully outfitting" the interior, again, not brain science. Paul Elio has claimed to have the data on all of the costs of the vehicle. The parts are numbered, and are not countless.

This is not a high-tech, whiz-bang super car. This is a simple, off-the-shelf vehicle that is supposed to be easy to work on by an owner with average mechanical skills. For a realistic assessment of the max reasonable cost to build the 2nd copy of a prototype, take a look at Factory Five Racing's 818. Hand-build chassis. Custom interior & body. Donor car parts. You'll find that my $50k figure is both realistic and extremely generous.

What the forum members might be asking themselves is whether it is reasonable to believe that EMI is capable of selling a fully-spec'd production vehicle for $7300, when they can't build an under-spec'd prototype for testing for under $0.5M. The numbers just don't work. And again, we are discussing the direct costs from the time of turning the first wrench, to driving it out of the shop.

 

[WilliamH]

No rust. No stripping. No restoration. Engineering drawings already done. Just a simple build from plans. Supposedly all the CAD word has been done. This really isn't rocket surgery. Even granting a "complete custom fiberglass" body (as opposed to SMC), and a "completely custom dashboard", and "other interior hard moldings", once they did one set, the second set is cheap. The wiring harness is nothing. Take the Metro harness and you're done. It might need a custom harness with a modern, EFI engine, but we're talking about the existing units. As for "fully outfitting" the interior, again, not brain science. Paul Elio has claimed to have the data on all of the costs of the vehicle. The parts are numbered, and are not countless.

This is not a high-tech, whiz-bang super car. This is a simple, off-the-shelf vehicle that is supposed to be easy to work on by an owner with average mechanical skills. For a realistic assessment of the max reasonable cost to build the 2nd copy of a prototype, take a look at Factory Five Racing's 818. Hand-build chassis. Custom interior & body. Donor car parts. You'll find that my $50k figure is both realistic and extremely generous.

What the forum members might be asking themselves is whether it is reasonable to believe that EMI is capable of selling a fully-spec'd production vehicle for $7300, when they can't build an under-spec'd prototype for testing for under $0.5M. The numbers just don't work. And again, we are discussing the direct costs from the time of turning the first wrench, to driving it out of the shop.

With all due respect, I suspect you may have spent too much time watching Chip Foose and the "A Team" on "OverHaulin'"
Designing new front and rear suspensions is not quite like building custom cars.