John Z. Delorean's Forgotten Dreams

On March 16^th 2005 the world lost one of car design’s greats, John Z. DeLorean. Delorean is best known for cars Like the GTO, or the Firebird, and who could forget the DMC 12, but we are going to be discussing Four cars designed by DeLorean that never made the production line.

The first of the four is the DMC – 80 as DMC began running into financial troubles DeLorean looked into various options that could help keep the company afloat, one of these options was commercial busses. Presumably busses would have sold better than sports cars, and so the DMC-80 was born. The Bus would have been American built, with three options of water cooled 6 cyl powerplants, and two options for transmissions. Development was fairly far along and brochures had been printed by the time the project was killed.

The Second car was the 1984 DeLorean Sedan, a four seat Delorean with an uncanny resemblance to the Lancia Medusa. The car was a joint venture between DeLorean and Guigario, it is unclear how far it got, the initial intent was to build 10,000 a year, the only physical evidence we have ever seen is drawings, but contracts state that a working prototype had been built in 1981. Four types of doors were considered, traditional Gullwings, Front Gullwings with standard doors in the rear, four standard doors, or extra large gullwings.

Here’s where things start to get confusing we know that in the late 1990s and early 2000s DeLorean was working on two new models, the DMC2 and the Firestar, to fund the models he started DeLorean Time a watch brand that manufactured $3000 injected stainless steel watches, the purchase of one meant the owner had the opportunity to purchase one of the first new DMC vehicles when they reached production. Details of the two cars are very hush hush, and because of the secrecy surrounding the projects the known information about the two has blurred and it becomes hard to identify which specs belong to which model.

We know the Firestar would have been based on the original DMC 12, but it would shed its stainless steel panels in favor of Carbon Fiber ones which would have shaved the weight down to, believe it or not, just over 1,500lbs, it would have been larger as well, and had a wing of super bird proportions sprouting out of the tail. It was confirmed that the Firestar would have kept the DMC12’s Iconic doors, The Original DeLorean’s weak engine would have been replaced with a ford sourced 500HP V8 that would have pushed the DeLorean from 0-60 in 3.2, so good news for Marty because 88mph would not have been a problem at all, as the car would have had a top speed of 215MPH. A working prototype was built and a few grainy photos exist of it today.

The DMC2 is much less documented, reports exist that it would have been based on a Ferrari Chassis, Delorean Himself said it was a mid engine 13L V12 mill, it was also said to be extremely aerodynamic. The DMC2 was reportedly Developed in Texas, and nearing completion when it was killed. No photos exist of this car the pictures to the left were believed to be the DMC2 but are in fact it’s the Norwood A12.

Delorean passed away in 2005 taking his plans along with him, but his legacy lives on in DMC, the company that won’t Die, after considering using the Pontiac Solstice to make a Comeback DMC will be manufacturing Electric Sports cars, John Z. DeLorean’s Iconic cars and the tragic scandal associated with them have outlived him.