So, I've been working on this idea for the last week or two after being inspired by a few mods I've combined and was fiddling with. I've been fascinated by amphibious vehicles for a while, and have a number of grey-box concepts for how best to do it. I was playing with the giant tire mods from the ATV thing, and just happened to stick them on a FWD Covet. After fiddling with it some, i noticed it actually floated and moved around on the water fairly well. This sent me down a rabbit hole designing a buoyant, front engine, FWD (paddlewheel) vehicle with rear retractable wheels. I even 3D printed some mock ups to test buoyancy. By making it FWD, i eliminate the need to retract front/rear wheels on the water with a more conventional design, and only need to worry about retracting a un-powered set of wheels. Even with the center of mass forward of the midpoint, the engines torque rotates the rear down, and causes it to behave like a mostly conventional boat. Not sure how best to retract the rear wheels out of the water though when floating. would like any input. Everything is WIP right now. Rear suspension concept is just a simple swing arm right now to keep weight and complexity down.
looks cool! edit: if you have not finished it yet, tag it "WIP". Experimental usually means you have completed it, but it is still being worked on.
i could see this being a weird sandstorm performance custom thingy and i have one question will it have a wendover v8
Not really planning on any specific engine. Probably a V6 of some kind. Whatever makes it perform well on land and water and more importantly.... fits. I'm basically planning on a RWD drive-train installed backwards. XD
I've got most of the engine under the windshield line I'm pretty confident i could get at least a V6 in there. maybe a V8. Might have to use a transverse drive-train. nothings set in stone yet.
Another hour or two fiddling with the shape. I like bug-eyes, but i think I'm gonna ditch them. They look very derpy here.
It'd look cool with a one piece light bar on the faceted/beveled area that comes to a point on the nose.
I do like the off-roader roof light look, So it'll probably get some there at some point. I do like lightbars. I tilted the bugeyes and it helps some. It might get a lightbar there, or verticle ones on the front fenders once it has them. Kinda trying to avoid the busy crossover headlight look.
Also, a second thought here. Would you be able to take a Jato mod and add the rocket to the bottom rear of the vehicle so when in water, it'd actually be fast. Just imbed it into the hull of your car so only the thrust nozzel is poking out. You could remove the thrust animations or make them invisible and it'd be just like a Jet Ski engine. It'd be even cooler if the wheels were able to be tilted up like the deluxo in Gta 5 when it enters water. Hope this one gets released, be a cool unique vehicle for the beam community.
Probably not putting a JATO under it, but if i use a transverse engine, there'd be a output shaft nearly perfectly located for a dedicated prop or jet drive.
I think some thin LED lights that go along with the body's lines would be quite nice. (Front and Rear) And the engine from a 1st gen Pessima (Base model) Can do it well if its light, or maybe the higher trim engine (Which is faster)
