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Top 5 DIY Custom Car Body Mods

Joe L — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 03:16:14 +0000

1. ‘78 Covette Turned into a DIY Batmobile

Using nothing but his bare hands, some high density foam, glossy black paint, and fiberglass, one modder took his beat up ‘78 corvette and resurrected it into the 1989 batmobile. You can even check out a 1960’s version of the batmobile also. For detailed information and FAQ’s check out the batmobile project.

2. Build your own Lamborghini

Thought you couldn’t afford a Lambo? Think again. One man designed and built is own Lamborghini frame, documenting the build with plenty of photos along the way. Although it may not have the ridiculous horsepower under the hood, it has the sexy body. Check out the project build and photo gallery.

3. DIY Retro Mercedes Conversion

Not a whole lot of info is available on this one besides the photos, but this Russian modder did some exceptional body work to make his old Mercedes look like a sleek new one. Perhaps he just used the power of Bondo .

4. DIY Back to the Future Delorean

By modifying a 1981 Delorean complete with gull-wing rise up doors, you can easily construct your own Back to the Future replica. One man documented his entire build process with plenty of detailed pictures to go along with it.

5. Mini-Fridges, Batman Tumbler, Mobile Xbox Live, and more

Sure, we could show you plenty more car body mods, but why stop at the exterior? Learn how to fully customize your ride with these exceptional tutorials from our car and transportation section:

DIY Need For Speed Racing Arcade

Joe L — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 22:03:29 +0000

You’ve probably played the classic racing games like Burn Out, Need for Speed, and Gran Turiso on consoles but using the standard controller just doesn’t cut it sometimes. Learn to build your own racing cockpit through this super comphrehensive step-by-step guide to bring the speed, thrill, and realism of the game to life. This is definitly not your average build tutorial, it’s a 66 page PDF walking you through each nut and bolt of the assemply process.

Above is an example of the intricate level of detail the tutorial. Each page shows these comprehensive diagrams with detailed measurements showing you how to build your own.

Related Racing and Arcade projects:

Build your own AutoGyro Flying Machine

Joe L — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 20:14:34 +0000

An Autogyro is an odd, yet fascinating flying machine which uses a helicopter rotor for lift while a standard plane rotor provides thrust. You can learn to build a DIY autogyro yourself and even build autogyro models using miniature servos. Heck, even a remote Chinese farmer built his own autogyro.

AutoGyro Tutorials:

Early version of an autogyro:

Make a DIY Electric Bike from Drill Batteries

Joe L — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 21:32:13 +0000

We’ve see plenty of DIY electricity and going green projects, and here’s yet another to add to the collection. Check out the video to learn how to build your own electric bicycle out of some old drill batteries and common ingenuity. Check out our other post on electric bikes and also electric cars.

Project Specs (from the designer):

I chose a full-suspension mountain bike frame because the roads and even the bike trails here are so bad. I wanted to isolate the batteries, controller and my butt from the shocks. I also jump off curbs a lot.
I wired pairs of 36-volt Dewalt power tool batteries in series to get 72 volts and then wired each of these pairs in parallel. I can carry two, four, or six battery packs, depending on how long the trip will be.
I replaced my 36-volt, ten-amp controller with a 72-volt, 35-amp version. It also has immediate start, which means the controller does not wait until the wheel is rolling before it puts power to the motor. This lets me get through intersections faster and safer (although I have to be careful or my front wheel lifts off the ground).
I used a rear wheel motor because front wheels here tend to get bent by potholes and fixing one can be expensive if you have a motor mounted in it.
- More info in this article about the project.

Don’t miss these electric projects:

Make your own Dark Night Batman Tumbler

Joe L — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 01:40:09 +0000

This man built a custom Dark Knight tumbler and placed his outstanding design on a go kart for a miniature version. While you can’t purchase the actual vehicle, you can buy his plans and view more about the project on eBay (bidding has ended, sorry). The video below demonstrate the details of the design and overall functionality. Although it’s pretty impressive, it’s nothing compared to this ‘78 Corvette turned into a Batmobile.

Don’t miss: 10 Fantastic Dark Knight Mods

More Batman and Car Projects:

Video: Build your own Self-Balancing Segway

Saikat — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 05:57:34 +0000

This DIY Segway-like scooter is� an exceptional guide to building your own self balancing transportation machine. Although Dean Kamen was first with his patented Segway scooter, they are actually surprisingly simple to build.�� We had covered some simila rprojects with our previous post on Build your own DIY Segway and the very similar – Enicycle: A Self Balancing Electric UniCycle.

In this latest project, Daniel Fukuba restates that a Segway-like personal scooter is very ‘Do-It-Yourself’. Though, it helps if you can get yourself the right tools and hardware. Putting together the custom circuit boards and writing the code is where most of the work goes in.� But then it’s the part that does the balancing and controlling the motion. Under the hood, the scooter has four packs of high discharge lithium ion batteries for powering the motors. The batteries last approx 10 miles on a single charge. Switching power supply to the NPC motors is through the electronic circuit boards. A couple of gyros matted on the base control the pitch and the torque with feedback from the software.

The scooter in the video is completely aluminum and uses expensive batteries. It can be made a lot cheaper with less costly batteries, any other material (even wood) and any motor. Yes, even with leftovers lying around. Side by side, the aluminum scooter cost $4000 to the $1000 for the wooden version (The real thing retails for $5000). Most of the stuff can be found online and also on eBay as tipped in the video.

The best thing about this DIY electric machine is that you can juice it up any way you’d like. Zipping around town in one of these is sure to grab some eyeballs.� Go over some of our popular ‘self balancing’ projects which show the principles behind the Segway scooter:

Build your own Portable Air Conditioner

Joe L — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 03:02:59 +0000

With roasting temperatures this summer, it would be an awesome treat to have a personal, handheld air conditioner. Follow this detailed build tutorial and learn how to make your own portable AC unit.� We also featured a similar air conditioning and heating project which uses an awesome device called a peltier plate (one side gets hot, the other side gets cold).� This build is actually for an electric car, but it can easily be used for next to a computer or in a common living area. By the way, even better would be to build yourself one of these:

Related Projects:

MIT’s Speedy Motorized Shopping Cart

Joe L — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 03:21:11 +0000

A few MIT students build this motorized shopping cart out of parts from an old go-cart.� While some students spend college parting, these cool kids used their time to build this babe-magnet of a ride.� You can check out the video demo above and check out the build blog for even more info.

More of our Car and Transportation projects:

Open Source POV Bicycle Wheel Animation

Joe L — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 03:21:05 +0000

We recently covered a fantastic POV system which displays animation or pictures on your bicycle tires as you ride.� Instead of buying that kit, you can learn to make your own quite easily.� This open source POV bike tutorial walks you through the build process of making your own system.� As you can see in the picture above and the video below, the results are fantastic!� Here are a few specs about the project:

16 RGB (Red+Green+Blue) LEDs
Arduino compatibility (Supposedly)
Single layer printed circuit board, suitable for home fab
All through hole componentes, suitable for beginners
Hall effect sensor, for image synchronization
Least number of componentes possible
Unfortunately, only one side of the wheel is illuminated
Fits 26″ wheels for now

Above is the circuit board which attaches to your spokes.� Below is a video demo of the system.

Remote Surveillance Spy Vehicle/Office Unit

rich — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 23:10:29 +0000

Our loyal reader, Rich, posted this awesome tutorial about making a surveillance spy van. If you’ve seen any mystery or action movie, you’ve seen a van stuffed full of fancy electronics and spy equipment.� Now learn to make your own.� Our project involved taking a brand spanking (okay, two years old) Citroen Relay and turning it into a mobile office with a standalone runtime of 8-10 hours. The applications are endless! This particular model has been given the surveillance treatment with a roof mounted pan-tilt-zoom camera hooked up to internal computers and recording equipment.

See also:

Inside you’ll find furnished walls and floor which hide the guts of the system (power, insulation, wiring, batteries etc) and a two person desk setup. The design essentially revolves around a ’shell’ built inside the van. Carpeted wooden hardboard makes for a sturdy floor and paneling system, each of which can be removed individually for easy access to electrical components and batteries. The shell is insulated with glass matting (the same stuff that keeps your house warm!) meaning the vehicle is kept at a nice temperature in winter and summer. We’ve used two fluorescent on independent switches at either end of the vehicle, and emergency LEDs overhead.

We’ve got a battery monitor on the wall, next to the monitors, which displays voltage and amp draw at all times. The capacity is also obviously shown. This means you can see the effect plugging in a component has right away, e.g charging a mobile phone or laptop. We used damned expensive crystal matt batteries for longevity and sturdiness which should power the computers, monitors, lights and occasional use of the a/c for around 8 hours or more if you’re careful with the power use.

When you plug the van into mains power, the system detects this and starts charging the battery. The entire battery can be charged in 3.5-4 hours. If mains power is removed, the system flicks over the battery power “in 0.02s”, so none of the onboard components will lose power. There’s lots of clever stuff too, such as float and trickle charging if the vehicle is left stood for a longer period of time.

The computers are the focus of the vehicle and where work is done. For this particular vehicle we used one ‘normal’ spec computer (dual core 3.2ghz, 2BG ram etc) and one ’super spec’ (quad core, 4GB ram) computer to handle the intensive data the roof mounted camera would need. We used a separate 4 way capture card to improve performance. Internet comes in the form of a decent wireless router and a 3G dongle if your out of range. Computers are located under the desk and of course can be removed and upgraded in the future. There’s also dual plug sockets x6 for anything you might need to plug in (phones, laptops etc).

Climate control – no mobile office would be complete without it! The temperature is adjustable from 22 to 28 degrees (trust me, that’s way too hot ). Plus the a/c will dehumidify, which is useful when two or more people are camped inside the van for a long period of time (say, overnight).

Add in a few basic home comforts such as executive seats, blacked curtains for either end of the rear cab, coat hooks and a whiteboard opposite desk, we think this is the perfect budget office (or surveillance!) vehicle, which lends itself well to upgrades in the future. If you’d like any more info about the build, more photos, or even a demo if you’re in the UK, please email me: r[at]suspicionindustries.com.

This vehicle is for sale right now.

Check out more of our DIY car projects and always send us your projects so we can feature them on the site.