00:13 COMM: Paul Bacon first featured on Barcroft
Cars with the futuristic Cosmotron which he sold to Martin Smith.
00:21 PAUL: If I could keep them all obviously I
would, but these cars cost a lot of money to build, and if you don’t sell the older
one, you can’t build a new one.
So, they have to go.
00:30 COMM: He’s invited us to see his latest
project, the Automatron.
Though not yet finished he’s been working on the car for around a year.
00:39 PAUL: This car has been the most expensive
car I’ve ever built.
And it’s also been the most labor intensive up to now.
I think that’s mainly down to the bespoke nature of nearly every part is custom on this
car.
I wanted to go actually retro but not just back to the 30’s or you know to the 50’s.
I wanted to go right back to the days of the horse drawn carriage.
You know, to leaf springs and things like that.
And then somehow incorporate that into the car, which admittedly doesn’t look a lot
like that at the moment but once it has the body that’s when, you know, that sort of
inspiration should really come through.
01:13 PAUL: It started life as a 1924 Singer Sport,
there’s been a few modifications made but what we are trying to do is bring it back
to looking and feeling more like it would’ve done originally.
On the front here, these are one off wheels in the style of an old style race wheel with
the skinny rubber from an Austin 7.
We’ve also got the drilled suspension ramp, racing moon tank, and then we’ve got holden
heads fitted to the V8 which is the supercharger.
And also we’ve got custom pedals, and this is the automatic shifter; we’ve got drive,
neutral, reverse and park, and this is all controlled with a mechanism from a very old
manual drill that was found at a lot man’s sale strangely enough.
So then - the seats on Automatron, these are custom laser cut sides to give the feel of
an aircraft seat and then just for now, this is from my fencing Once the car’s done,
these will be finished in slatted French-polished oak, so probably not a lot more comfortable
but a little bit more stylish.
02:23 PAUL: This is the rear end of Automatron.
We’ve got the biggest street legal tires that you can have.
Also, we’ve got the quick change rear axle, lever arm shock absorbers.
02:37 Also we’ve got the radiators, and the cooling
fans, and the fuel tank.
02:43 PAUL: This is the switch gear of Automatron.
It’s a switch gear from a Lancaster Bomber.
This would have turned on all the essential systems within the aeroplane, and in Automatron
as well, this is the main thing that starts the car.
03:00 COMM: Today Paul is taking his half finished
creation out for its very first drive on the road.
03:07 PAUL: It did have a few technical issues;
we had some debris in the fuel filter, couple of starting issues, nothing I can see as a
real problem but, you know, when the car was driving, it was fantastic, and if anything
- too much power, but that’s never a bad thing.
03:28 COMM: With his first test complete, he can
work towards finishing Automatron.
03:33 PAUL: There’s a few small pokes to iron
out, after that the bodywork will be built onto the car, that will be smoothed out, and
then the body will be removed from the car, and then the whole car will be stripped down
into its component form, and each piece of the car will be plated or painted, and then
the car will be reassembled.
But that’s a long time in the future, and that’s a lot of work.
03:56 COMM: Thankfully, the amount of time Paul
spends in his garage hasn’t had an adverse effect on his relationship.
04:03 PAUL: Building a car like this could really
have an impact on your life, but you have to strike a balance between family and going
out and leading a normal life; very easy to become obsessed with this sort of thing.
I think I keep the balance pretty good.
04:18 KIRSTY: Paul’s hobby hasn’t impacted on
our lives in a negative way, if anything - it’s made it better ‘cause we get to go out,
meet lot’s of nice people, get to go to lovely places, and so yeah, it’s really
good, I fully support it.
04:36 PAUL: That’s how to lose control, and nearly
die.
04:40 COMM: Barcroft Cars will be back to see the
finished results later in the year.