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John DeLorean was a flamboyant automobile
industry executive, that spent many years at General Motors. he
was responsible for bring the Pontiac GTO to production, which
was their most popular sports car produced. Some people inside
GM predicted he would even become CEO one day after his
successful stints at both Pontiac and Chevrolet.
John DeLorean left General Motors to pursue his dream of
staring his own car company and in 1975 work started,
to make the sports car of his dreams. The company was founded in
Detroit, Michigan, and later moved to a Park
Avenue skyscraper in New York City.
The car that was to be later called the DeLorean DMC-12 was to
have a rear engine with a distinctive top-hinged gull-wing doors
and stainless steel skin. He enlisted the help of Italian
designer Giorgetto Giugiaro to design
its unique shape. Its engine was sourced from a joint V6 design
that Renault, Peugeot and Volvo were working on at the time,
while the engine may have been adequate in the cars they were
intended for, many people criticized it for its lack of power in
such a heavy car as the DMC-12.
Challenges presented themselves all the way along the cars life,
the initial expected release date was pushed back from 1979 to
1981, the expected price of the car doubled and several quality
issues affected the early built cars. As well as all this the
company struggled financially despite good early sales of the
hot sports coupe.
When looking for a factory to produce the cars John De Lorean
contacted several international governments to see what deals
could be struck to help the company get established, the best
deal come from the British government who were keen to have a
large factory set up in Northern Ireland, a spot that had large
unemployment at the time.
There were about 8,000 cars made between 1981 and 1983 in
Dunmurry, Northern Ireland, of which 6,000 are still on the
roads, mostly in the USA. The car got very bad press from many
motoring magazines at the time, it was often considered too
heavy and slow with poor handling when compared to other cars of
the time like the corvette. John DeLorean often laughed this bad
publicity off as the car magazines favoritism for the big
companies. John De Lorean pressed on with work to create a 5
passenger sedan similar to the DMC-12 to be called the DMC-24 as
well as bus that saw one prototype being built the DMC-80. Many
criticize John DeLorean for trying to do too much too quickly as
by 1983 the company was in serious financial difficulty. The
factory in which the DeLorean cars were built was put into
receivership by the British government, who many people also
blame for the downfall of the company.
John DeLorean Spent countless hours in the final year of the
company trying to gain more financial backing to keep the
company afloat and in 1982, DeLorean was charged with selling
cocaine to undercover police. DeLorean always claimed he got
involved with drug deals by accident and DeLorean was later
acquitted of all charges (due to entrapment). At the peak of DeLorean's
success he personally owned two large estates and a 20 room
Fifth Ave Apartment in New York, by 1999 he filed for
bankruptcy. John DeLorean died on 19th March 2005 after a stroke
at the age of 80, the final years of his life were spent in
retirement in the New England area.
In 1983 the Dunmurry factory closed with the loss of 2,000 jobs
and taking over $100 million in British government subsidies
down with it. The last cars were made with the final parts found
around the factory, the
very last one was gold plated which was a special order for an
American Express campaign. Every thing in the factory was
auctioned off from the parts that were sold to an American
company who now provide support for the 6000 DeLorean's still on
the road to the dies and tooling that were used as weights at the bottom of
the Atlantic.
The DeLorean cars now have a large group of enthusiasts who
cherish their prized possessions, some cars are now selling
second hand for around the same price they were over 20 years
ago, something that may not have been achieved if not for the
hit 1985 movie Back to the Future which used a De Lorean as the
basis for a time machine. In actual fact 7 cars were used for
all the stunts and filming in the movie, some can still be seen
lying around at LA's Universal Studios.
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