Welcome to Brook's site for the Votus - the Lotus inspired, Volvo powered (hence the "Votus" badge), low-cost (locost) Lotus 7 replica being built by Dan Meisner, Marc Bremmer, and myself. We started building the chassis of the car in October of 2004, and started the motor for the first time on Wednesday, Aug. 31, 2005. We drove it out of the driveway for the first time in May of 2006. The car is powered by an early 70's Volvo 1800 (2 litre, 4 cyl.) drivetrain. We are getting direction from Ron Champion's book Build Your Own Sports Car for as Little as £250 - And Race It! We used the CAD drawings found at the McSorley Locost website for very accurate chassis measurements. Since chassis completion in mid-2005, it's been up to us to engineer and assemble the car. It's been an amazingly fun challenge and very educating. We are really starting to see the results presently, as the bodywork that we're creating makes it look like the real thing! With all the visible progress, I'm going to be updating every week, so check back often! If you have any questions or comments, feel free to ask Dan at dan@corvidcreations.com
Corvid Creations home page (check out my sculpture & furniture)
Below are the most recent developments on the car. Click here to see pictures of the car's progress from it's very beginnings. We now have some pictures of the donor car, courtesy of Aaron Meisner, Dan's brother who lives across the alley from him and who has been immeasurably helpful with this project. See below for the donor car pictures.
Latest update:
I'm sorry about the mess that this website is. I promise to redesign the website so it's easier to navigate when the car is finished. That date is rapidly approaching! Yay! I have added some more pictures to this update page instead of making a new page. Please check out the video that we took two months ago, below, and the latest pictures of the car just below that. The cosmetic component of the car is largely finished, with just the exhaust and winscreens left to tackle. The car is ready to be registered and will likely be street legal by mid-May. After that, to boost performance, we will likely have to dump some money into the motor for a valve job and some new brake components. As the video attests, it's already a quick little car even though it's only running on 3 cylinders! I'm scared of the day when it's running tip-top...
We've got a video of the Votus on the road. This video was taken in March. We'll put up another video when we take care of some cooling issues and when the windscreens and exhaust are installed.
Check it check it out! We built this muthafukkin' car from SCRATCH!
A view from the rear. Since the last pictures posted at the bottom of this page, we have added the front fenders and turn signals, wired all of the lights, painted the wheels, made the bonnet, the spare tire carrier, the rollbar, and installed the seat belts.
Missing the windscreens and a pair of racing stripes, but otherwise a beauty.
Vroom.
And somewhat of a finishing touch, the VIN plate. It's a car.
Here's our kind-hearted donor car, the Volvo p1800. It's a beautiful machine, but it wasn't in good structural condition. Here is living proof that becoming an organ donor can make the world a better place.
A shot of the p1800 interior. Recognize the gauges and the shifter?
Below are the older pictures of this progression, beginning mid-February...
Dano and Aaron have just painted the bodywork. I think the official name of the color is Jaguar racing green. But who are they kidding; it's British Racing Green.
A view of the painted scuttle with the dash in place and all of its components installed. You can see the painted nosecone and fenders as well.
A detail of the right side dash gauges. Guess what time this picture was taken? Fukkin' right, that's a working clock.
A view from above of the car with bodywork in place and most of the wiring done. The front fenders haven't been mounted yet, they're just sitting on the tires right now. The paint scheme will be as follows: nosecone, fenders, and scuttle are BRG, the aluminum bonnet, side panels, and rear aluminum will stay their natural color, and when we put the bonnet in place, we're going to put some very lovely racing stripes in Lotus Yellow, from the nosecone to the scuttle.
Most of the wiring is done; we still have the indicator lights and the alternator left to wire. For the lighting we used the wiring loom from the donor Volvo, for the motor wiring we created our own new wiring. See the coil in the lower right corner? That came from the donor Volvo. Next time I'll get a detail shot of the bracket that holds the coil in place. It comes from an '04 Renault Formula One. No joke, this car has Formula 1 engineering. Watch out, Ferrari! Here comes Votus!
A view of the rear end with gas tank and fender in place.
A view from the rear with one of the lights wired up. There will be two per side. This was a very cold day/night (a high of 22°f/-5°c), so we worked exclusively inside and used the propane heater. Check back in March for more updates!
click here to see pictures of the Votus from the very beginning.
Corvid Creations home page (check out my sculpture & furniture)
Latest update
Votus -TM. All photos and logos copyright © 2004 - 2007 Brook Halvorson