The Del Boy DeLorean
But can 3-wheeler go Back To The Future?
IT’S an extinct old banger more associated with Del Boy in Only Fools And Horses than with time travel... until now that is.
The self-proclaimed son of US carmaker John DeLorean is building a three-wheeled Reliant Robin version of the decade-hopping classic featured in 1985 blockbuster Back To The Future.
Ty DeLorean’s DMC 21 – complete with remote-controlled doors that open upwards – even features a supposed ‘flux capacitor’, the time-travelling device that sparked up at 88mph in the film starring Michael J Fox as Marty McFly. But the invention has landed him in hot water with the Texan DeLorean Motor Company’s lawyers, who served him with legal papers while he was showing off his prototype at the British Motor Show last month.
Mr DeLorean, 40, from Newquay, Cornwall, southwest England, has long insisted he is the son of the disgraced automobile mogul, claiming he was conceived in a one-off secret liaison between his mother and the late businessman.
John DeLorean lost his company after being charged with attempted drug crimes. He was later acquitted, but his fall from grace was spectacular before his death at 80 in 2005.
Now his supposed son says he is fully prepared to fight and win a court battle over trademark infringement. For two years he has been converting Reliant Robin cars using original DeLorean plans from 1981.
Adapting inventor Doc Brown’s line from Back To The Future, Mr DeLorean joked: ‘It will do 100mph so 88 isn’t an issue, but where we’re going we don’t need four wheels.’
His website states the DMC 21 is available for pre-order for £20,000 (€23,000), with a percentage of sales being given to the Michael J Fox Foundation For Parkinson’s Research, set up by the actor, who suffers from Parkinson’s disease.