Getting Started: The Car

All conversions start with the proper base car. If you are looking to start a converison you want to try and find a DMC with the following features.

1981 DMC-12
5-Speed Manual Transmission
Gray Interior
2nd Generation Hood with Accent Grooves - NO Fuel Door

Depending on how you buy your Delorean you may be able to offset some costs by selling off the following pieces.

Rear Louvers
Engine Cover (Keep the hinges)
Rear Side Window Glass

My Conversion

Car #1 - February-November 2003

I purchased my first Delorean in mid-February of 2003. Believe it or not I only paid 10,000 for it and felt I got a pretty good deal. Of course I didn't know too much about Delorean at the time aside from the basics. She was a good car and in no time I started tearing into her for my conversion.

I'd be lying if I said this was an accurate conversion. Due to time and budget I cut a TON of corners. I raided a couple kitchen supply stores and ended up using bread pans, salad tubs, and lord knows what else to finish the car in time for a local convention in June of 2003.

By the end of 2003 we needed to sell the car for personal reasons. After car sold, I swore that I would do another and take the time to do it CORRECTLY and ACCURATELY.

Here is a good Youtube slide show of the first car and some of the work that went into it.

Car #2 - March 2005 to Present

I said I would start another car and in March of 2005 I took the plunge again. Danny Botkin at Delorean Motor Company California had an excellent restoration canidate come in. She was mechanically in tip top shape and the stainless was in great shape - that was about it :)

The interior was sun fried as were the front and rear fascias. A little time and a little money fixed all that mess. All told I put about 20k to get the car up to speed Delorean wise.

I decided early on to take my sweet time with this one. Between work, family, the old BTTFParts.com message board and everything else, this conversion was going to take forever. After 2 1/2 years I'm nearing the end of the tunnel.

Unlike the my first car, I've tried to do a pretty good job of recording just what I did and how I did it. That's where a good portion of this website will come from. A good amount of updates are already up on the Youtube Channel. I'll try my best to cover all the details of just what it takes to do something like this :)

Let's get started shall we?