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Alzax3
06-03-2013, 09:04 PM
Not really sure whether this is a 'beautiful' or and 'ugly'! (It's not my sort of styling) BUT here's a company that wants you to take an unsuspecting VW Beetle and turn it into something wacky, uncomfortable and impractical - where have we met that concept before? :coat:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Ribble-Colani ... 33806c70ac (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Ribble-Colani-GT-Kit-car-package-VW-Beetle-Classic-based-No-IVA-Rquired-/221197922476?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item33806c70ac)

Good job it doesn't need and IVA with decapitate you at will perspex windscreen, headlights as low or lower than the Nova, and a three part GRP body shell with metal frames for £3,400....... I guess ease of build would be the major attraction?

Spacenut
07-03-2013, 09:54 PM
I guess you can register the car as a re-bodied Beetle to avoid IVA.

My rather dog-eared copy of Hans Neubar's "VW Beetle and Derivates" (Beaulieu Books, 1978) had a picture of the Colani GT which I used to lust after (front three-quarter view, low down, it looked stunning). No details of course, but the example in the book had an aerodynamic roll-over bar with RS badges on, so I guessed a Porsche engine...

Not sure about the claim (made by Colani himself) that the GT was the first proper "kit car", as limited production fibreglass bodies had been made in the 1950s by the likes of Spohn, Aldoff-Plastic, Devin etc., but it may well have been the first to be built in serious numbers. Still has a strong following in Germany, where they do all sorts of strange things...

http://zumann.com/data_images/posts/col ... -gt-10.jpg (http://zumann.com/data_images/posts/colani-gt/colani-gt-10.jpg)

Unfortunately, at the end of the day the spindly wheels, shallow body and sharply cut-off tail didn't do it any favours, and my attention was drawn to the more exotic machines in the book (Nova, Futura and the Brubaker Box...)

My personal preference would have been a replica of the Colani GT2, but I know that the styling also divides opinion. Each to their own I suppose... Nevertheless, I wish the Ripple effort every success!

Lauren

KEITHCANFIXIT
07-03-2013, 10:58 PM
Could be worse , according to today's paper Wil.I.am ( whoever that is) has spent £200,000 converting a VW. Beetle into one hideous looking automobile. Beauty in the eyes of the beholder.........I think not, should have gone to specsavers. Must be nice to have money??????????

CyCo
08-03-2013, 01:56 PM
The Colani isn't that bad a looking car, but there are better looking cars, and kit cars, out there. And I to would love a Brubaker Box. :wink:

As for Wil.I.Am and his custom Bettle... (http://www.autoworldnews.com/articles/3441/20130307/will-spotted-wild-custom-ride-900k-car-made-1958-beetle.htm)

http://images.autoworldnews.com/data/images/full/3778/will-i-am.jpg?w=600

Spacenut
08-03-2013, 06:29 PM
Doesn't do it for me I'm afraid :outahere:

KEITHCANFIXIT
08-03-2013, 09:44 PM
Nor me, but £200,000 if what they say is true, he needs his bumps feeling as they say up north

KEITHCANFIXIT
08-03-2013, 09:51 PM
Oops, got it wrong again dad, apparently it cost $900,000, even more ludicrous, going to have to increase my work charges, obviously I don't charge enough. :outahere:

bushboy
08-03-2013, 11:25 PM
RE William,
More money than taste & common decency.

bushboy

Simpatico
11-03-2013, 09:20 AM
Paint the Colani thing pink and it reminds me of Penelope Pitstop's car with the forced curves

http://www.hotink.com/wacky/wrstuff/05_800.gif

Maybe adding a parasol would double as rollover protection?

Colani's stuff leaves me scratching my head that he is taken so seriously as a designer. Having said that this is the most acceptable thing he has done, presumably before 60s drug culture kicked in!

letterman7
20-03-2013, 02:41 PM
Looks like the love child between our Vokaro:

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b31/letterman7/vokaro_zps15bc9913.jpg

and our old Invader GT:

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b31/letterman7/invader-gt-12.jpg


I love some of Colani's ideas... this isn't one of them. Plus, I couldn't be seen driving something called a "Ribble".

"What's it called?
A Ribble...
Come again??"