Invicta, Farbio, Vemac
Discussion
Are you asking for names of start up companies that didn't start or are you asking about those three?
We have:
Invicta
Farbio
Vemac
Kimber
Strathcarron
Melling
Arash
Farboud
Spectre
Ascari
Evante
Panther
Parradine
Connaught
That's just the recent ones from the UK. There are more if you count resurrected brands:
Marcos
Jensen
Durable Car Company (Morris Minor!)
Frogeye car company (not certain if that name's right, made Healey sprites)
Many were doomed by endless changes and irrelevent novelties. How much did the rotating headlights on the Panther Solo cost? How many times did Farboud tweek their engine spec? Many seemed to offer less and be less relevent as they were developed.
The real problem is the shear cost of entering the market. It is virtually impossible to get a car good enough to sell into the market place without massive resources and the break even points are often a very long time in the future. Some mass produced cars never make a profit, not on the cars, not on the spare parts and not on the finance deals. What chance doe a new start up company have?
The last of the small players are Morgan. TVR have gone, Reliant have gone.
Perhaps the best shot at a new start up would be to make an existing car design. This leaves us with many of the above cars as the production tooling exists. TVR, Jensen and even the Morris Minor might be good places to start as there is a large market for spares and restoration already there. There is plenty of scope to branch out into something new such as an LS1 for the TVRs or fibreglass bodywork for the original interceptor.
We have:
Invicta
Farbio
Vemac
Kimber
Strathcarron
Melling
Arash
Farboud
Spectre
Ascari
Evante
Panther
Parradine
Connaught
That's just the recent ones from the UK. There are more if you count resurrected brands:
Marcos
Jensen
Durable Car Company (Morris Minor!)
Frogeye car company (not certain if that name's right, made Healey sprites)
Many were doomed by endless changes and irrelevent novelties. How much did the rotating headlights on the Panther Solo cost? How many times did Farboud tweek their engine spec? Many seemed to offer less and be less relevent as they were developed.
The real problem is the shear cost of entering the market. It is virtually impossible to get a car good enough to sell into the market place without massive resources and the break even points are often a very long time in the future. Some mass produced cars never make a profit, not on the cars, not on the spare parts and not on the finance deals. What chance doe a new start up company have?
The last of the small players are Morgan. TVR have gone, Reliant have gone.
Perhaps the best shot at a new start up would be to make an existing car design. This leaves us with many of the above cars as the production tooling exists. TVR, Jensen and even the Morris Minor might be good places to start as there is a large market for spares and restoration already there. There is plenty of scope to branch out into something new such as an LS1 for the TVRs or fibreglass bodywork for the original interceptor.
A refreshing topic not dealing with the decay of society 
I guess a lot go down the pan for the reasons suggested, too gimicy, too expensive for what they are (after all a badge is worth something on the resale market and you can't create one overnight easily), reliability not as good as the mainstream alternatives. I guess its a sign of too many people aiming to produce essentially the same product in a small market. Its probably as cut-throat as the supermini market is but without the massive potential profits if you get it right. I guess its a case of all chasing the same £.
As an aside I have often thought it would be cool for someone to start building Sprites again, but with modern tech for both chassis and engine. I'm sure with enough parts bin robbing it could be done using a single manufacturers componentry, aim to get it in the low tax bracket, in the £7-10K price region and you'll see them fly out the showroom come summer. Similar size to a Se7en type chassis but taken to a monocoque and mass productionised. Have the underneath using a simple lightweight rear setup and with a super cheap budget engine maybe one of those buzzy 3pots from an C1/Aygo/107.
I guess a lot go down the pan for the reasons suggested, too gimicy, too expensive for what they are (after all a badge is worth something on the resale market and you can't create one overnight easily), reliability not as good as the mainstream alternatives. I guess its a sign of too many people aiming to produce essentially the same product in a small market. Its probably as cut-throat as the supermini market is but without the massive potential profits if you get it right. I guess its a case of all chasing the same £.
As an aside I have often thought it would be cool for someone to start building Sprites again, but with modern tech for both chassis and engine. I'm sure with enough parts bin robbing it could be done using a single manufacturers componentry, aim to get it in the low tax bracket, in the £7-10K price region and you'll see them fly out the showroom come summer. Similar size to a Se7en type chassis but taken to a monocoque and mass productionised. Have the underneath using a simple lightweight rear setup and with a super cheap budget engine maybe one of those buzzy 3pots from an C1/Aygo/107.
Where does Noble fit? In view of all the failures I thought it was a stunning achievement to get the previous model so far - and then apparently it was all thrown away. Now Lee Noble is supposedly about to come back to the market with Fenix (presumably risen from the ashes) while his name is used on a rival product which does just a fraction more for two and a half times the money. Which if either will prosper?
We're still here...
http://www.radicalsportscars.com/
Despite the credit crunch, business is still out there...we've taken 20 orders in the last 10 days!
http://www.radicalsportscars.com/
Despite the credit crunch, business is still out there...we've taken 20 orders in the last 10 days!
Official Radical said:
We're still here...
http://www.radicalsportscars.com/
Despite the credit crunch, business is still out there...we've taken 20 orders in the last 10 days!
Well done for finding a formula which works, and making it work for you.http://www.radicalsportscars.com/
Despite the credit crunch, business is still out there...we've taken 20 orders in the last 10 days!
Farbio's doing OK, forgotten how pretty the Vemac was, hadn't forgotten how pretty the Invicta wasn't; haven't seen one for a while but weren't they at Salon Privé last summer?
Those not already dead seem to be dying by inches: Trident popped up again with a bio-diesel Iceni... not sure who the target market is, and some new images of the Arash AF10 were circulated recently. Talking of which - Arash Farboud seems to be on a one man mission to prove that the only way to make a small fortune in the car industry is to start with a big one. Still, without him there'd be no Farbio - incidentally wasn't the styling a moonlighting job by one of the Lotus guys (Russell Carr?)
As for FBS - the more I've seen, the more I'm convinced this is an object lesson in how not to go about things. Although the Breckland Breira was based on a mass market donor (Pontiac Solstice), and it did have a bigger engine - it retained the interior (which even Americans thought was crap, and they can't do them for toffee), was uglier than the Solstice and the one I saw was still LHD (!).
In addition to the stated issues, but I think a fundamental problem of many of these is that they are over-optimistic: clearly you need the passion but a healthy dose of realism is handy too. There seems to be a 'If you build it, they will come' attitude that history just doesn't support. Sorry to be harsh, but the Spectre, Invicta S1, Parradine, Iceni, Connaught simply didn't/don't cut it in terms of aesthetics or quality when compared to the competition - and just being different will only get you so far.
And aren't development costs horrific enough without feeling the need to re-invent the wheel? Didn't the Connaught start by being promised as a hybrid and still ended up with a propriety V10? Hardly anybody has a good word to say about the Ford 4.6 V8 but it's been used to good effect many times, and surely there are other suitable candidates out there. Not only have I never heard any criticism of Morgan based on their use of BMW units the way they've managed it, they've made it a positive.
Getting the basics right is enough, and a sufficient challenge in itself: make it look right, go right and screw it together properly.
I might be wrong but if they perform, the provenance of some of the components doesn't seem to matter - seen a few snide remarks about the Noble M12's powerplant but on the whole this didn't seem to hurt it's prospects
Don't how typical I am, but personally think there are waaay to many gizmos that I could live without in modern cars (though I think the non-ABS M600 is a step too far) and would trade a fully loaded spec for simplicity an quality.
I sincerely hope I'm proven wrong, but I'm afraid that Noble and Climax will soon be added to the 'whatever happened to' list?
Those not already dead seem to be dying by inches: Trident popped up again with a bio-diesel Iceni... not sure who the target market is, and some new images of the Arash AF10 were circulated recently. Talking of which - Arash Farboud seems to be on a one man mission to prove that the only way to make a small fortune in the car industry is to start with a big one. Still, without him there'd be no Farbio - incidentally wasn't the styling a moonlighting job by one of the Lotus guys (Russell Carr?)
As for FBS - the more I've seen, the more I'm convinced this is an object lesson in how not to go about things. Although the Breckland Breira was based on a mass market donor (Pontiac Solstice), and it did have a bigger engine - it retained the interior (which even Americans thought was crap, and they can't do them for toffee), was uglier than the Solstice and the one I saw was still LHD (!).
In addition to the stated issues, but I think a fundamental problem of many of these is that they are over-optimistic: clearly you need the passion but a healthy dose of realism is handy too. There seems to be a 'If you build it, they will come' attitude that history just doesn't support. Sorry to be harsh, but the Spectre, Invicta S1, Parradine, Iceni, Connaught simply didn't/don't cut it in terms of aesthetics or quality when compared to the competition - and just being different will only get you so far.
And aren't development costs horrific enough without feeling the need to re-invent the wheel? Didn't the Connaught start by being promised as a hybrid and still ended up with a propriety V10? Hardly anybody has a good word to say about the Ford 4.6 V8 but it's been used to good effect many times, and surely there are other suitable candidates out there. Not only have I never heard any criticism of Morgan based on their use of BMW units the way they've managed it, they've made it a positive.
Getting the basics right is enough, and a sufficient challenge in itself: make it look right, go right and screw it together properly.
I might be wrong but if they perform, the provenance of some of the components doesn't seem to matter - seen a few snide remarks about the Noble M12's powerplant but on the whole this didn't seem to hurt it's prospects
Don't how typical I am, but personally think there are waaay to many gizmos that I could live without in modern cars (though I think the non-ABS M600 is a step too far) and would trade a fully loaded spec for simplicity an quality.I sincerely hope I'm proven wrong, but I'm afraid that Noble and Climax will soon be added to the 'whatever happened to' list?
seansverige said:
And aren't development costs horrific enough without feeling the need to re-invent the wheel?
I refer you to the rotating headlights on the Panther Solo for a perfect example of this. I mean how much did that cost!seansverige said:
Didn't the Connaught start by being promised as a hybrid and still ended up with a propriety V10?
There might be a market for that engine. From an emissions point of view it must have been a nightmare. The regulations become harder and harder to meet when the cylinder size is much below 300cc. At a 2.0 V10 they are well into a major engineering problem.seansverige said:
Hardly anybody has a good word to say about the Ford 4.6 V8 but it's been used to good effect many times, and surely there are other suitable candidates out there. Not only have I never heard any criticism of Morgan based on their use of BMW units the way they've managed it, they've made it a positive.
Rover used it too and if a mass market make chooses it then it must have something going for it. What are the critisisms?seansverige said:
Getting the basics right is enough, and a sufficient challenge in itself: make it look right, go right and screw it together properly.
Which is why LSIS and exo skeleton cars are doing OK. They are the easiest to put together.seansverige said:
I might be wrong but if they perform, the provenance of some of the components doesn't seem to matter - seen a few snide remarks about the Noble M12's powerplant but on the whole this didn't seem to hurt it's prospects
Some customers do care. A lot.Plenty of kits have suffered due to their being "only" based on a lesser make of car.
Apparently the Aston V12 suffers from customer perception that it is only two Ford V6s so it isn't just kits.
seansverige said:
Don't how typical I am, but personally think there are waaay to many gizmos that I could live without in modern cars (though I think the non-ABS M600 is a step too far) and would trade a fully loaded spec for simplicity an quality.
I sincerely hope I'm proven wrong, but I'm afraid that Noble and Climax will soon be added to the 'whatever happened to' list?
For an LSIS car you are right but everyone has their expectation of "essential equipment" and this grows with every generation.I sincerely hope I'm proven wrong, but I'm afraid that Noble and Climax will soon be added to the 'whatever happened to' list?
Long ago people thought that 5 speed gearboxes were excesive. Go back further and the timing of the ignition had to be done manually which was considered perfectly acceptable.
Haven't had time to read all this, but 'last of the small players had gone' just Morgan left...
?????
Never heard of GINETTA then?
On a roll.... in a recession.... is the expression!
and of course, DARE UK Ltd [Ginetta G4, Ginetta G12, Dare DZ, Dare TG, are still quietly moving along doing what comes naturally - new car soon -, not gone bust, not gone to the wall].
?????
Never heard of GINETTA then?
On a roll.... in a recession.... is the expression!
and of course, DARE UK Ltd [Ginetta G4, Ginetta G12, Dare DZ, Dare TG, are still quietly moving along doing what comes naturally - new car soon -, not gone bust, not gone to the wall].
Edited by dandarez on Friday 25th December 15:25
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