World's first 'Internet community' car debuts
This is the Rally Fighter and it's due to debut at the 2009 SEMA car show in Las Vegas on November 3rd 2009. That's the Specialty Equipment Market Association show, which takes place every year in the US to allow aftermarket car part makers to show off their wares - and if ever there was a specialist car, the Rally Fighter is it.
Local Motors is a completely unique type of car manufacturer, because anyone who's interested in cars can sign up to be part of its online community (www.local-motors.com) and either submit car designs of their own or vote on existing ones, the most popular of which is eventually built. Not only that, the community also has a say in how it's powered and even where it will be made; once a model is finalised, its production is setup in a region appropriate to the type of car it is, with buyers actually helping to build their own cars.
The Rally Fighter, which was designed by competition winner Sangho Kim then developed by the Local Motors web community, is being built in Wareham, Massachusetts, by a group of buyers. Once 3,000 are knocked out, the process of building Local Motors's second model will begin, whatever and wherever it may be.
The Fighter is powered by the six-cylinder twin-turbo diesel engine from the BMW 335d, giving it 425lb.ft of torque and an impressive 43mpg. Amazingly, it has a huge 20 inches of suspension travel so it can tackle sand dune rallying, yet it's fully road legal. It costs $50,000 (about £30,000) though is not planned for sale in the UK.
