The car was designed and moulds created by Russell Church about 12 years ago. He then created a very strong tubular spaceframe to pick up Messerschmitt front suspension that had just been remanufactured by Brian Perry and himself. This car was conceived on the back of Brian's Spacey powered Schmitt now with Mike Grossman. Russell went the extra stage and thought why not create a one man commuter car using broken twist and go scooters. So the front, or Pod, was kitted out with Messerschmitt style steering, the brakes could be Schmitt but in fact I think all were looking to go for a Vespa based disc option allowing use of Vespa alloy wheels. (a conversion technically possible to put on a Schmitt). The screen is a Ford Mondeo on end with pentographic wiper, only an engineer would get off on that bit of work as you have to make it, so satisfying. The rear of the spaceframe has a thick plate on it. Then you select your front end damaged scooter bought for peanuts. Chop off the headstock and mount the supplied plate onto it instead. This is then bolted to the Pod and the instruments and wiring passed through to create the controls with pedals instead of twist grips as suits. Thus you now have a vehicle for one or a vehicle offering covered accomidation for one plus two open air pillion passingers as the rear of the scooter remains intact. There is a choice of 50cc up to about 500cc to choose from. Out of five I think we have a Gillera 180cc, 250 Lambretta, 250 Honda Insite and one incomplete. I have the remains of a Spacey and access to an Insite cheap. With the 250cc the machine is lively enough and as fast as you like.
Unfortunately Russell lost pateince with the project as people mucked him about. Also getting registration was an issue. However I used laterial thinking and got mine registered simply. These things are as big a problem as you let them be. He also did not have storage and before we knew it he had destroyed the mould tools. There will therefore only ever be 5 Pods. A pity as I believe they would have sold well. It is also a green use of teenage stuffed scooters. The car is actually pretty simple as the complicated stuff is in the donar scooter. The Pod itself is over engineered and very strong. The only real question was doors. These could be made but the car works fine without them.
A really interesting and rewarding project and I have more than pictured to get things to completion. You can see that the interior metal with pedal cover and optional steering parts are all present, bent, formed and ready to go. However these are all options as each person has a slightly differing take on what the car should end up achieving. It is just I have goodness knows how many Schmitts to restore etc and adding a Larmar and Scootacar to the stash means I probobly will never do this project as I do not commute and Dalmatians do not ride pillion!
So there you have it. A modern micro of sorts, possible a take on the Austrian Labeil as Norbert Mylius - nothing is new in automotive developments really.
