When you look at cars currently in production it is clear that there is a standard in place. Despite there being a wealth of different car manufacturers many of their cars appear the same. This is because we are now a long way from when the first car was built in 1885 and the tastes and preferences of the average population appear well understood. Safety standards and road designs also mean that most cars have to behave in a certain way. Yet this is all very boring. Car manufacturers need to step outside the box a little and reinvent the modern-day car. We have done some digging and found some of the strangest car designs in the world.
The Ghostbusters Car
While this car was based on a simple Cadillac it became so much more. The ECTO-1 is a 1959 Cadillac ambulance conversion and there are a known 400 that were made. That makes this car pretty rare and given the number of bells and whistles that it featured it definitely ranks highly in the strange list.
The Peel P50
A car that was designed with the modern road user in mind, the Peel P50 is certainly different. It is the smallest car ever made with a length of a staggering 54 inches from front to back. The car only has three wheels and only 50 were produced in the 1960s. The company has started to manufacture a similar car today.
The Batmobile
I know, I know if we choose cars from movies then, of course, we will find some strange ones but you can actually buy the batmobile from the Dark Knight and use it on the road. It costs $1 million and has been driven by the presenters of Top Gear.
The Fastest
Today many cars try to advertise based on speed but none are really pushing the boundaries. The fastest road car available today is the Koenigsegg Agera RS that costs around $2 million and can reach speeds of 284 mph. Yet it really isn’t that strange at all. However, the ThurstSSC is a different story. Made in 1997 it reached a speed of 763 mph thanks to its jet engines. The car is faster than the speed of sound meaning you may see it and hear it arriving right after.
Beetle Bubblecar
The 1960 Beetle Bubbletop car is clearly a car that was designed before creativity was lost. This is a car that looks like something Homer Simpson designed in one particular episode. The car was a custom job shown at a car show for strange custom work, so it was never a commercial model. Yet it still captured the hearts and minds of people then and shows what can be created when people stop trying to conform. The Beetle bubble top car looked like a mixture between a spacecraft and a go-kart and modern car designs could learn a lot from it.
The DeLorean
The DeLorean is world-renowned because of its role in the movie Back to the Future but it deserves recognition even without this special appearance. The DeLorean used Gull Wing doors where the doors open out and then up into the air. These are not very practical as you would likely need three car spaces to safely open the doors. The company behind the DeLorean, DMC did go bankrupt suggesting that sometimes being bold doesn’t pay off but the car has since become legendary.
The truth is that the modern car user is easy to please. While people say they want something new and innovative most just want something that their neighbor will like. The majority of cars today all look the same and complete the same tasks. While you can get them in different colors and slightly different shapes they are all basically the same model. We have reached a time when the world is crying out for something new. Perhaps DMC care to try one more time?
