DMC's New Electric Delorean

[sk8norcal]

[Punx0r]

It's excellent to hear that new Deloreans will be built. An electric option is the cherry on top

[Hillhater]

The Delorean was a poorly conceived, overweight, bad handling,.. car in its ICE form.
..so now its even heavier ..
A classic case of over funded enthusiasm !

[Punx0r]

They may have been a flop as a supercar, but come on, they're awesome!

[Kingfish]

A buddy of mine owned a Delorean back in 1986 and was quite a trip to ride in. Total chick magnet. We lived in Tracy, California at the time; he worked in Pleasanton and I at LLNL and later in Fremont. One evening we’re heading westbound on I-205 just approaching the base of Altamont Pass and my pal pulls into the left lane to pass a slow-poke when this car races right up our behind like some sort of asslick buttwipe, so my pal speeds up to move out of the way and get back over to the right – and that’s when the car behind hits us with the lights: CHP

We pull over and roll down that tiny window; the orficer had never seen a Delorean before. He says pointing to the little window “Is that all there is?” and my pal replies politely yes, when the SfB cop says “OPEN IT UP! OPEN IT UP!” So my pal opens up the gull-wing door and it hits the POS cop in the head! (privately we were laughing – I mean this prick was so small-town inbred). The cop proceeds to write my pal up for speeding. We tried to protest but we could see he was on a jihad and would have arrested me – a passive passenger. To get out of the ticket, my pal had to attend Saturday traffic class. Is that FU or what?

Sometime that year we went to the West Coast meeting of Delorean owners at a place called the Candy Store in Burlingame (Bay Area); a large garage full of collectable and limited production automobiles through history, many of which had been seen in Hollywood movies. Aside from dinner, the main presentation was about how to affect repairs on the Delorean stainless steel body work:

The bodyman took a welding hammer used for chipping slag and drove it hard through the front right fender so it produced a hole. Attendees were in disbelief, but the guy continued to show us how to fix this damage first by heating with a torch and then with simple metal-working to pound the dent flat and remelt (or forge together) the metal to where the hole no longer existed. He finished it off by sanding it down with a metal scrubby – just like at the end of the youtube video above. When he was finished, you couldn’t tell it was ever damaged.

We took that car all over the Bay and into Sacramento and Modesto trawling for nightlife. Eventually though he sold it to raise money to go back to Penn State and finish his degree.

The motor he had was an inline 5-Cylinder Volvo with an 8-quart oil reservoir; very difficult to get that motor hot. And it really did get up and go if you wanted it; handled very well too. The one giant flaw in the design was tiny windows in the summer (had to run A/C), and that the spring to hold the gull doors open would relax in the heat. I never ever saw him drive his car with the doors open; that’s just lunacy. Also suffered from tiny rear seats - like it was designed for small children. One last flaw: Low road clearance; not made for dirt or gravel.

Definitely a cool car though. Glad to see someone is breathing creative life into it.
Happy riding Shotgun, KF

[Hillhater]

The motor he had was an inline 5-Cylinder Volvo with an 8-quart oil reservoir;

Thats unusual ?....Deloreans were fitted originally with a Renault supplied V6.

[cal3thousand]

Those whiteblock T5's are bullet proof. So many iterations of the 2.3l engine putting out 500+ HP on huge boost in Europe it's silly.

[Punx0r]

If this was back in 1986 I doubt it was a T5 engine!

[Kingfish]

Doubts about T5: I couldn't say one way or the other; it was a straight-5 aluminum block with large jugs, and spooned in tight into the engine compartment. I thought 5-cyl odd at the time, and that is the reason why I remember it. Presumably that was one of the common engine choices, though vaguely I recall some sporting V6's though couldn't say if that was late or early models, however the Volvo engine was preferred (at least in my pals' eyes). I can tell you that the waterpump was very difficult to replace, and that you nearly had to jerk the motor to get to the starter or alternator.

~KF

[Hillhater]

All the factory built Deloreans were fitted with the PSA / Renault / Volvo V6 3ltr motor.
That motor was specially developed for the Delorean, there were no "factory option" motors.
However, since the V6 was rather pathetic, there is/was a lot of aftermarket engine swaps with every thing from bigger versions of the newer V6s, Northstar V8's Turbo Nissan straight 6's , etc being used.
I suspect your buddy had a an aftermarket upgrade version ......wise man. !