1980 De Lorean DMC-12 The De Lorean DMC-12 sports car was manufactured by the De Lorean Motor Company for the American market in 1981 and 1982 in Northern Ireland. It is most commonly known simply as the De Lorean, as it was the only model ever produced by the company. The DMC-12 featured gull-wing doors with a fiberglass "underbody", to which non-structural brushed stainless steel panels were affixed. The De Lorean became a household name when one was featured as a home-made time machine in the Back to the Future movie trilogy. The first prototype appeared in March 1976, and production officially began in 1981 (with the first DMC-12 rolling off the production line on January 21) at the DMC factory in Dunmurry, Northern Ireland. During its production, several aspects of the car were changed, such as the bonnet style, wheels and interior. About nine thousand DMC-12s were made before production stopped in late 1982. Today, about 6,500 De Lorean Motor Cars are believed to still exist. In October 1976, the first prototype De Lorean DMC-12 was completed by William T. Collins chief engineer and designer (formerly chief engineer at Pontiac). Originally, the car's rear-mounted power plant was to be a Citro?n Wankel rotary engine, but was replaced with a French-designed and produced PRV (Peugeot-Renault-Volvo) fuel injected V-6 because of the poor fuel economy of the rotary engine, an important issue at a time of world-wide fuel shortages. Collins and De Lorean envisioned a chassis produced from a new and untested manufacturing technology known as Elastic Reservoir Moulding (ERM), which would contribute to the light-weight characteristics of the car while presumably lowering its production costs. This new technology, for which De Lorean had purchased patent rights, would eventually be found to be unsuitable for mass production. These and other changes to the original concept led to considerable schedule pressures. The entire car was deemed to require almost complete re-engineering, which was turned over to engineer Colin Chapman, founder and owner of Lotus. Chapman replaced most of the unproven material and manufacturing techniques with those currently being employed by Lotus. The Backbone chassis is very similar to the Lotus Esprit. The original Giorgetto Giugiaro body design was left mostly intact, as were the distinctive stainless steel outer skin panels and gull-wing doors. The DMC-12 would eventually be built in a factory in Dunmurry, Northern Ireland, a neighborhood a few miles from Belfast city centre. Construction on the factory began in October 1978, and although production of the DMC-12 was scheduled to start in 1979, engineering issues and budget overruns delayed production until early 1981. By that time, the unemployment rate was high in Northern Ireland and local residents lined up to apply for jobs at the factory. The production personnel were largely inexperienced, but were paid premium wages and supplied with the best equipment available. Most quality issues were solved by 1982 and the cars were sold from dealers with a 12 month, 12,000-mile (19,300Эkm) warranty and an available five-year, 50,000-mile (80,000 km) service contract. The De Lorean Motor Company went bankrupt in late 1982 following John De Lorean's arrest in October of that year on drug trafficking charges. He was later found not guilty, but it was too late for the DMC-12. Approximately 100 partially assembled DMC's on the production line were completed by Consolidated International (now known as Big Lots). The remaining parts from the factory stock, the parts from the US Warranty Parts Center, as well as parts from the original suppliers that had not yet been delivered to the factory were all shipped to Columbus, Ohio in 1983с1984. A company called KAPAC sold these parts to retail and wholesale customers via mail order. In 1997, De Lorean Motor Company of Texas acquired this inventory. The Back To The Future De Lorean DMC-12 A total of about 9,200 DMC-12s were produced between January 1981 and December 1982. Almost a fifth of these were produced in October 1981. About 1,000 1982 models were produced between February and May 1982, and all of these cars had the VIN's changed after purchase by Consolidated International to make them appear as 1983 models. Despite being produced in Northern Ireland, DMC-12s were primarily intended for the American market. Therefore, all initial production models were left-hand drive (designed to be driven on the right side of the road), limiting its popularity in Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Britain and Japan, where traffic travels on the left. Only 23 right-hand drive factory licensed De Loreans were ever produced; these cars were converted from left-hand drive models by Wooler Hodec, in Andover, Hampshire. The DMC-12 has been featured and mentioned in many films and on television, most notably as the time machine designed by Dr. Emmett Brown in the Back to the Future trilogy. Brown's rationale for choosing the De Lorean was stated in the first film: "The way I see it, if you're gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style?" Brown also started to say that the car's stainless steel construction was apparently ideal for "flux dispersal", an aspect of time travel. Exactly why or how is unknown, because he was cut off by the arrival of the time machine, which he had sent a minute into the future as a test. The choice of the De Lorean was actually for the purpose of a gag in the film that occurs when the car arrives in the year 1955 and is mistaken for an alien spacecraft due to its gull-wing doors. More information ...