Ewhen wrote:
Province of Quebec is not exactly the best
place to build hand-made cars, because of
compulsory no fault insurance, plus stringent
requirements in fabrication of such vehicles.
So, my question is, how much it may cost [approx]
in other Provinces and States to park a turnkey
Locost in front of one's house, licensed-insured and
ready to go.
Here is a breakdown of our cost building a sev7en.
(Approximate-minimum)
Donor car 1000.$
New wheels and tires 700.$
Mechanical parts to donor 800.$
Steel for frame (bolts nuts nd'brackets) 250.$
Stainless for suspensions,windshield frame 200.$
Windshield Safety glass 150.$
Aluminium and fiberglass for bodywork 600.$
Seats,belts,gauges,steering,mirrors,etc. 950.$
Paint 400.$
-----
Sub-total 5050.$
Prov. of Quebec inspection
hand-built vehicles
1)Police inspection (for stolen car parts) 170.$
2)Engineer fee, frame chassis susp.appr. 1500.$
3)Mechanical inspection for hand-built 375.$
4)No fault insurance drivers over 25 years 400.$
old, below that, it runs into thousands
Sub-total 2445.$
Total 7495.$
And suppose one likes to sell his "Lokost"
because he wants to build another one, and needs
space (my case) How much he should ask for it ?
It takes approx.1600 man-hours to put one together
during leisure time. How much is worth leisure time
Ewhen
thank you ewhen, those are some pretty good numbers for baseline, imhop, that include some of the information that tends to get forgotten in the mental rush of building, once again "the devil is in the details". (in our next episode bullwinkle asks, "how much did i pay for washers mr peabody?!?"
)
i'm curious though, once you've paid the "engineer" fee, is that for the single frame or will it cover all the frames you build of that design? we don't have a chassis design approval requirement out here in california. ..
you bring up a very important point if one plans to go into production, my estimate, with jigs,4-6 hours to cut the metal for the chassis, 8 hours to weld up a book chassis without putting on any tabs/suspension mounting points/floors/etc. then another day at least putting on the tabs, 1/2 day minimum to put on a floor(better to plan a day imhop). .. and thats just the basic chassis with many many things still to be done. i suspect you could build another for less if you had planned to from the beginning but would have spent twice as much time building the first one to do so meaning some 3000 labor hours for the first one and maybe 6-800 per unit after that. than there's picking up materials, sweeping up the shop, and a myriad of other small things that all add up. build something as eyepopping as what pook is doing right now and the time goes up exponentially, curved tubes, double mitered cuts, and so on all take more time. .. my excursion into the world of self employment lasted 6 years with a goodly profit but i definitely wasn't working a 40 hour week to do it, more like 50-60 after everything was said and done. (
i hate paperwork!!
) those numbers are wag's of course and i take a break every couple of hours to stretch and drain which would affect the totals.