Anyone have info on wind tunnel testing?

[Mike S]

Looking at the photos, it appears that the rear pontoons have the ‘textured’ finish, as opposed to the usual ‘smooth’ finish. I have seen this textured finish only once before, it was on an early VIN concours car at the DOA Expo 94 in Williamsburg, VA.

Mike S.

[jawn101]

Looking at the photos, it appears that the rear pontoons have the ‘textured’ finish, as opposed to the usual ‘smooth’ finish. I have seen this textured finish only once before, it was on an early VIN concours car at the DOA Expo 94 in Williamsburg, VA.

Mike S.

I have them too on #2100....

[Shep]

EMDF

I have plenty of photos of this car from back in 2006(?) when it was first listed for sale.

Spent hours with the original owner of the car (while in Vegas). The owner (Dick) was
hoping to get others interested in the car at the DOA Convention in Vegas, but the DOA
cancelled the convention and Dick lost his opportunity to spot-light the car at the event.

Some very interesting "engineering features" are also on this car.

Some other recent history you may be interested to know.

Later,
Rich W.

Ooh, nice! I'd love to hear everything you know about VIN 559! Dick was the owner up until 2009 when he passed away, so his son (also named Dick) took up the torch. The reason I say I'm only the second owner is that the son never got a title transfer as he has the same name, so legally there's only two owners (technically one since I won't officially transfer the title until Saturday, but regardless). I'll send you a PM with my email in case you want to send me scans or anything, but I'd love it if you posted all you know in this thread.

Looks like residential window putty holding that glass in/on.

Any chance of a picture from the "inside"?

Sure thing! Here you go, four that I just took a few minutes ago:
IMG_7289.jpgIMG_7291.jpg
IMG_7292.jpgIMG_7293.jpg

You can see the original markings on the glass with the DMC logo (first one is most legible zoomed in). I never inspected it from this angle before, it appears the glass is actually adhered to the stainless steel via this caulking, rather than being held in with some bracing behind it.

Looking at the photos, it appears that the rear pontoons have the ‘textured’ finish, as opposed to the usual ‘smooth’ finish. I have seen this textured finish only once before, it was on an early VIN concours car at the DOA Expo 94 in Williamsburg, VA.

Good eye! It is indeed textured. I thought it might be dust or dirt or something, so I ran my hand across it, and it made that noise you get when you run your fingernail across one of those lenticular bookmarks. You can see it up close in the pictures above.

[hollywood2311]

I have them too on #2100....

1776 has it too.

[Rich W]

EMDF,

If you happen to be attending DCS 2012 next month, I can bring you a CD of all the hi-res photos
taken back in 2006 (IIRC). The primary focus of the photos were on the parts that are unique to
the 500 series DeLoreans (and indeed, this extended to some of the 600 and 700 series cars too).

I also have a list of at least 50 items that are unique to the 500 series cars, after viewing and
comparing at least a dozen 500 series cars and having worked on a half dozen of them personally.
Most of the 500 series were Engineering cars and one thing they do have are plenty of "holes".

I recall VIN...559 having at least a dozen large holes cut into the "X" support under the hood,
with rubber caps installed. Dick Sr. mentioned something about early experimentation with the
routing of the wires for the inside hood lamp (in the middle of the X support). Seemed logical.

There were at least three large holes (or 4?) in each of the "legs" of the X support and all the
rubber caps are the same as the ones used for the brake fluid access cover. I recall how odd
it looked to have all those rubber caps on the inside of the hood.

Some other interesting info to follow.

Later,
Rich W.

BTW: Checking with EMDF via PM before posting some other details he may not want posted.

[Shep]

If you happen to be attending DCS 2012 next month, I can bring you a CD of all the hi-res photos
taken back in 2006 (IIRC). The primary focus of the photos were on the parts that are unique to
the 500 series DeLoreans (and indeed, this extended to some of the 600 and 700 series cars too).

[I'm further discussing this with Rich via PM]

I also have a list of at least 50 items that are unique to the 500 series cars, after viewing and
comparing at least a dozen 500 series cars and having worked on a half dozen of them personally.
Most of the 500 series were Engineering cars and one thing they do have are plenty of "holes".

I recall VIN...559 having at least a dozen large holes cut into the "X" support under the hood,
with rubber caps installed. Dick Sr. mentioned something about early experimentation with the
routing of the wires for the inside hood lamp (in the middle of the X support). Seemed logical.

There were at least three large holes (or 4?) in each of the "legs" of the X support and all the
rubber caps are the same as the ones used for the brake fluid access cover. I recall how odd
it looked to have all those rubber caps on the inside of the hood.

I thought those looked out of place. There are four, and I did notice they were the same as the brake fluid access cover. In case anyone's interested, here's the link to a picture of the area Rich is talking about [link] (and scaled down to 640x480 here if anyone wants low-res). The reason the picture is named "Problem14" is that the top carpet is one of 21 problems I have yet to fix.

BTW: Checking with EMDF via PM before posting some other details he may not want posted.

After reading Rich's PM, I told him I'd share the details myself, since all the info is still fresh in my head. Rich remembered seeing VIN 559 on a TV show, and indeed it was! The show's called Pawn Stars, airing on the History Channel, and the episode name is "Chum Dog Millionaire". The guy looking to sell VIN 559 on the show is the aforementioned son Rick, who came over last Saturday. He told me he posted an ad on craigslist trying to sell VIN 559. He got a call from someone working for the show asking if they can come over a month or so later to try and buy the car. Rick said he was moving within a week, so if they were willing to fly him back to Las Vegas where it was located, he'd be more than happy to be on the show. They asked to call him right back, and 45 minutes later, they asked if he would be available the next day at 7 AM. He agreed, so they sent the guys down there. Rick's very much like me in that he rarely wears plain colors, and most of his wardrobe has some sort of design on it. For the History Channel, this is a no-no, so he got a black T-shirt and wore it. They made him sign a confidentiality agreement, and anyone that was within sight of the camera either had to sign one as well, or be a very long distance away so they couldn't tell what was going on.

They started filming, and they talked about it (I haven't seen the episode yet, so don't spoil anything!). Then they offered him $8,000, and he just laughed. They stopped filming and said they wanted to just pretend they were going to try to buy it for the show, even though they had no interest in doing such since it was way out of their price range. So they did a second take, and left. He didn't get a T-shirt, mug, hat, copy of the episode, no certificate, nothing. They didn't tell him when it was going to air either, so one day weeks or months later he's driving his truck, and suddenly he's getting calls like crazy. He's in an area that has spotty reception, so he waits until he's in a better area, and he had at least 22 voicemails "from people he hadn't heard from since high school", asking why he didn't tell them he was going to be on the show. Confidentiality agreement means he couldn't. But hey, it's just more to the already fascinating history of VIN 559.

[Dangermouse]

Do a search on here for Pawn Stars and you will find it.

I'd do it for you but it's too much of a pita on the phone

[SIMid]

This has been an interesting read!

Love to know all the items as I want to see if I can spot them on my D. I do have the textured pontoon.

[Dangermouse]

Do a search on here for Pawn Stars and you will find it.

I'd do it for you but it's too much of a pita on the phone

mmm, looks like I lied - it isn't on here.

This is the best I can do, and it's not great (doesn't spoil anything for your though):

[David T]

This kind of topic comes up once in a while in all car Marques. It makes a car more interesting and maybe worth more money. Without any paper trail or photos it is just conjecture. Like saying the car belonged to someone famous. It may also be possible some of this was done in a QAC center or the parts were used as engineering mock-ups before being released to use for production cars. Without some kind of paper we are all just guessing. You have to be very skeptical about only a verbal history.
David Teitelbaum