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Kit car

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Kit-car on a VW beetle chassis.
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Kit-car on a VW beetle chassis.

A kit-car is an automobile that is available in kit form, i.e. you buy a set of parts that you have to assemble yourself. Usually many major mechanical parts such as the engine and transmission are taken from one or more donor vehicles. Kits vary in completeness from as little as a book of plans to a complete set of all the components required. The definition of a kit car is usually taken to mean that a number of examples are produced by a manufacturer for sale to the public. A car built at home as a one-off to the designs of its builder is termed a Special.

Contents

History of the Kit Car

Kit cars have been around from the earliest days of the automobile industry. The Englishman Thomas Hyler White developed a design for a car that could be assembled at home in 1896 and technical designs were published in a magazine called The English Mechanic.Alan Sutton, "Mr White and his Motor Cars", The Automobile, June 1986 In the United States the Lad's Car of 1912 could be bought for US$160 fully assembled or US$140 in kit form.

It was, however, not until the 1950s that the idea really took off. Car production had increased considerably and with rust proofing in its infancy many older vehicles were being sent to breaker yards as their bodywork was beyond economic repair. An industry grew up supplying new bodies and chassis to take the components from these cars and convert them particularly into sports cars. Also, in the UK up to the mid 1970's, kit cars were sometimes normal production vehicles that were partially assembled as this avoided the imposition of car tax as the kits were assessed as components and not vehicles. The Lotus Elan, for example, was available in this form. Often the cars could be taken home and completed in as little as a weekend.

Current kit cars are often replicas of well-known and expensive classics and are designed so that anybody who has got some technical skill can build them at home to a standard where they can be driven on the public roads.As per the survey of nearly 600 kit car owners in the USA, England and Germany, evaluated by the author Dr. Ingo Stüben, 100-1500 hours are required to build a kit car, depending upon the model and the status of the semi-finished product that has been acquired. Published in: Bausatzkraftfahrzeuge (Kit Cars) als ein Beispiel technischer Freizeit- und Mobilitätsinnovation, Tectum Verlag, Marburg 2000 The AC Cobra and the Lotus 7 are particularly popular examples. From outside, these replicas look like the original but their bodies are usually made of fiberglass mats soaked in polyester resin instead of the original sheet metal. These kit cars enable vintage or classic car enthusiasts to possess a vehicle of a type that they may not be able to afford and to take advantage of modern technology.

Considering that the idea of kit cars was already established in England at the end of the 19th century it is surprising that many people are unaware of such vehicles especially as the Volkswagen based dune buggy appeared in relatively large numbers in the 1960s and 1970s.Volkswagen Buggies are based on the chassis of the Volkswagen Beetle, often shortened. To use this, the old body is separated from the chassis and a GRP-body from the kit supplier shop is fitted Cf. also the publication: Ingo Stüben, Kit Cars. Ein Weg zum neuen Volkswagen, editiononline.de, Hamburg 2004 Many car drivers react sceptically when they first hear about kit cars as it appears to them to be technically impossible to assemble a car at home and also use it on the public roads. They may also be worried that such a car would not subsequently pass the mandatory quality inspection (road worthiness test) that is required in most countries.To obtain permission to use a kit car in Germany, every such vehicle with a speed over 6 km/h without a general operating license (ABE) or an EC type permission (EC-TG) has to undergo, as per the § 21 of Road traffic licensing regulations (STVZO), a technical inspection by an officially recognized expert of a Technical Inspection Authority. See also § 16 STVZO and § 18 (1) STVZO.

In the United Kingdom it is necessary to meet the requirements of the SVA (Single vehicle Approval) regulations.

Several of today's sports car producers such as Lotus and TVR started as kit car makers.

Dutton Sierra kit car chassis and GRP bodywork prior to installation of mechanical components.
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Dutton Sierra kit car chassis and GRP bodywork prior to installation of mechanical components.

Kit Car Manufacturers

Australian Kit Car manufacturers

Canadian Kit Car manufacturers

Dutch Kit Car manufacturers

Estonian Kit Car manufacturers

German Kit Car manufacturers

Mexican Kit Car manufacturers

New Zealand Kit Car manufacturers

Swedish Kit Car manufacturers

UK Kit Car manufacturers

According to figures given to the magazine Total Kit Car the most popular kit in the United Kingdom is made by Robin Hood Sportscars who sell 700 kits a year.[List of the top ten selling UK Kit Cars in 2005]

United States Kit Car manufacturers

See also

External links

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Notes and References

 

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

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