4 ms·

The Local Motors Micro-Factory will play 3 roles: Build, Sell, & Service. BMW diesel engines are certainly understood in the aftermarket, but you are right the

The Local Motors Micro-Factory will play 3 roles: Build, Sell, & Service. BMW diesel engines are certainly understood in the aftermarket, but you are right they are more complicated. Concerning that point, Local Motors will provide service for the region surrounding the Micro-Factory - for the area where the vehicle is sold. This is an important point, so thank you for bringing it up. We chose a more complicated engine because it is cleaner, and delivers more long-term value. We considered the SL1, but as we compared apples to apples, and presented the choice to the community, the 335d was chosen. The trophy trucks that win Baja 1000 might spend half a million dollars. Clearly, this is not that. But for $50k you can experience Baja, the jumps, the desert of Arizona and you can learn your car inside and out. NJ is about as far from the desert as possible, but if you checkout offroad and baja forums you will see what ppl are willing to invest in their rides - $50k is an investment and it will have to be worthwhile. But in terms of the function and performance you will gain for the dollar, the Rally Fighter is quite competitive. This is one of those things that can not be proven with words, but once we get the build process rolling in the fall we will be able to share more. At that point I hope you will help us find ways to improve the process and include more of what will make it exciting for you (like a vehicle you actually want, for instance!) Thank you for sharing your very specific desires. I hope you will go to the site (local-motors.com) and find a body for your specs. Tell 'em you want it in Jersey!

vaksel 17y ago
Here is the question you need to ask yourself...is your community going to be buying your cars? Seems to me, like the current community is made up of artistic types who'd rather buy a Prius(which probably explains the engine choice). You need to go promote the thing on offroader sites to see the true market conditions, or you'll end up building a car noone wants. You can experience those same jumps in a lifted Bronco. And if you screw up and roll the thing, you won't be out 50K. Yes there are people who have 50K invested in their rigs. But that didn't happen overnight, it happened year to year, a few grand at a time. And very few of those high end rigs get taken offroad + when its time to sell, the people get bent over the table, since you won't find many people willing to spend that much money on a weekend toy. Going to the site now, would be pretty pointless since its just pictures. No guarantee that the thing will even be built. Knowing that it takes close to 2000 hours to assemble a kit car, I don't think we'll be seeing a finished product for a couple of years.
- jrogers 17y ago
 True that the site is a large proportion of design enthusiasts right now, but since that is who normally designs cars, are we any worse off than a normal car company. If you were to jump a Bronco, it would be nothing like the Rally Fighter and we have plenty of Bronco Jumpers in our team to prove it. Short wheel base short travel, Bronco's make for a spine pounding ride over 35miles per hour on a baja desert. As for the site having more than pictures, I recommend clicking the build tab. The Rally fighter will be debuted at SEMA (Nov 09). Many kit cars take 200 hrs to build...Lone Star (7 days), Factory Five same, etc. You must be good to make this time, but 2000 hours is excessive (though possible for certain people on certain builds). The whole point is that we started Local Motors to addres those scary long build times. Come aboard and give it a little try before you declare so unilaterally that it will never work. Are you so desperate for it to fail? We are pretty good at listening to our faults and appreciate all of your criticism. Hope to see you on the site. (www.local-motors.com)
 - deleted 17y ago
 [deleted]
 - vaksel 17y ago
 Yes design enthusiasts are the ones who design cars...but I doubt at GM/Honda/BMW that they are the ones making the engine choice. Nothing wrong with having a diesel option, but you are forcing your customers to pay a premium, for something they don't need. I mean if you are going to use a BMW engine, why not use the one from 335i? If you look at BMWs: 335i sedan 300hp for $40K, 335d sedan 265hp for $45K. So that's a ~$5K premium for the diesel option. I dunno about you, but pretty much every car enthusiast I know, would rather pay $5K less, and get 35 more hp. And lets not forget the fact that the 335i engine has a crapload of aftermarket support, while the 335d has none. I'm not an offroader, so I dunno about jumping etc. But thats sorta the point, desert racers are almost non-existent, there are so very few of them out there, and only a tiny percentage of those can afford to pay $50K for a toy. You pretty much slashed your possible market to a few hundred rich guys who are into offroading. The pictures I was talking about the other designs. I'm not saying the whole idea is a failure, I'm saying that the starting vehicle choice is. Your motto is "Build the car of your dreams", but then you turn around and select a vehicle that only a tiny minority would want.

vaksel 17y ago

Here is the question you need to ask yourself...is your community going to be buying your cars? Seems to me, like the current community is made up of artistic types who'd rather buy a Prius(which probably explains the engine choice). You need to go promote the thing on offroader sites to see the true market conditions, or you'll end up building a car noone wants. You can experience those same jumps in a lifted Bronco. And if you screw up and roll the thing, you won't be out 50K. Yes there are people who have 50K invested in their rigs. But that didn't happen overnight, it happened year to year, a few grand at a time. And very few of those high end rigs get taken offroad + when its time to sell, the people get bent over the table, since you won't find many people willing to spend that much money on a weekend toy. Going to the site now, would be pretty pointless since its just pictures. No guarantee that the thing will even be built. Knowing that it takes close to 2000 hours to assemble a kit car, I don't think we'll be seeing a finished product for a couple of years.

jrogers 17y ago
True that the site is a large proportion of design enthusiasts right now, but since that is who normally designs cars, are we any worse off than a normal car company. If you were to jump a Bronco, it would be nothing like the Rally Fighter and we have plenty of Bronco Jumpers in our team to prove it. Short wheel base short travel, Bronco's make for a spine pounding ride over 35miles per hour on a baja desert. As for the site having more than pictures, I recommend clicking the build tab. The Rally fighter will be debuted at SEMA (Nov 09). Many kit cars take 200 hrs to build...Lone Star (7 days), Factory Five same, etc. You must be good to make this time, but 2000 hours is excessive (though possible for certain people on certain builds). The whole point is that we started Local Motors to addres those scary long build times. Come aboard and give it a little try before you declare so unilaterally that it will never work. Are you so desperate for it to fail? We are pretty good at listening to our faults and appreciate all of your criticism. Hope to see you on the site. (www.local-motors.com)
- deleted 17y ago
 [deleted]
- vaksel 17y ago
 Yes design enthusiasts are the ones who design cars...but I doubt at GM/Honda/BMW that they are the ones making the engine choice. Nothing wrong with having a diesel option, but you are forcing your customers to pay a premium, for something they don't need. I mean if you are going to use a BMW engine, why not use the one from 335i? If you look at BMWs: 335i sedan 300hp for $40K, 335d sedan 265hp for $45K. So that's a ~$5K premium for the diesel option. I dunno about you, but pretty much every car enthusiast I know, would rather pay $5K less, and get 35 more hp. And lets not forget the fact that the 335i engine has a crapload of aftermarket support, while the 335d has none. I'm not an offroader, so I dunno about jumping etc. But thats sorta the point, desert racers are almost non-existent, there are so very few of them out there, and only a tiny percentage of those can afford to pay $50K for a toy. You pretty much slashed your possible market to a few hundred rich guys who are into offroading. The pictures I was talking about the other designs. I'm not saying the whole idea is a failure, I'm saying that the starting vehicle choice is. Your motto is "Build the car of your dreams", but then you turn around and select a vehicle that only a tiny minority would want.