Genius Car Designer Builds 32ft Long 'Plane Car'
INGENIOUS car customiser Mark Ray has indulged his latest flight of fancy by building a brand new plane car. Mark is known for turning heads in his home town of Roswell, Georgia with his unusual car designs, having previously showcased a boat car and his fusion of a 2003 Cirrus SR22 plane with a Chevrolet Tracker. But since selling his original plane car and deciding he needed to go bigger for his next project, Mark has created an even more ambitious plane/car hybrid that measures an incredible 32ft long. Mark told R.Rides: “When people see the plane car they smile, they laugh, they point, they honk the horn, they are waving at me."
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MotorTranscript
00:00Everybody I see that looks at my plane car is always smiling, so it brings happiness to them, and I love bringing happiness to people.
00:08When you see something like this in front of you, it puts a smile on your face, and that's what I'm all about.
00:14My name is Mark Ray. I'm the builder, creator, and developer of the plane car.
00:36When people see the plane car, they smile, they laugh, they point, they honk the horn, they're waving at me, and it's always the same question, does it fly?
00:53I said, unfortunately it doesn't, because there's no wings.
00:56What you're looking at is a GMC Sierra 2500 heavy-duty three-quarter ton pickup truck with a 1974 Cessna Ram aircraft. It was a twin prop.
01:18My plane car is 32 feet long, and she's 12 feet tall in the rear to the top of the tail.
01:26It's completely street legal. I've got headlights and taillights and turn signals, side view mirrors, rear view mirror, it has seat belts, it has a horn, it's got air conditioning, I've got stereo radio, and I've got a backup camera, so if I've got to go in reverse, I can see what's going on.
01:52As far as the way it drives, it drives great.
01:59I've had a passion for cars since I was a child. By the time I was 27, I already had owned 400 cars. I'd buy them, fix them up, sell them, just loved them, just went through them like water. This is the largest project I've ever had.
02:17I removed the cab, all four doors, the roof, the windows, all that.
02:24I'm very proud of this vehicle. It's a big accomplishment. It took me six months to build this.
02:30When Mark first started building the car, it was just an extension of the kinds of things he's always done. He has a lot of creativity, and he had already built a boat car and a prior plane car, so it wasn't too much of a surprise that he wanted to extend on that and build an even bigger plane car.
02:52Obviously, on aircrafts, there is no door to get in and get out of on the passenger side. It's always on the pilot side. So I had this door fabricated with this step to get in and get out of.
03:12It's got LED backup lights, which are really bright at night. I've got my turn signals, I've got my brake lights, and I've installed a rear video camera.
03:25I found the plane at a boneyard, which is like an auto salvage yard for aircraft. The owner of the boneyard told me that this particular plane was just recently part of the set of the Black Panther movie.
03:41So I've got a movie prop right here, mounted on a GMC pickup truck. So my plane car is a little famous.
03:50We hop in, we spin around the neighborhood, we've been to events, we've been to car shows with it.
04:01Here's the other door, the escape door, the escape hatch. Here's my jet fuel. Had to find a place to put my gasoline in.
04:10The hardest part of building this plane car was where to cut the floor and how high to mount the plane on top of the truck chassis so that my passengers could get in and get out without bumping their heads.
04:32I would say I spent anywhere from eight to ten hours a day for six months, Monday through Friday.
04:40The attraction that this thing draws is incredible.
04:43It's just so much fun. I mean, how do you not smile when you see something like this, you know?
04:50I've been asked by people if ever I wanted to sell my plane car or my boat car, and in the past I'd say no.
04:59But then people come along and make me an offer I can't refuse. So if the price was right, I would sell it.
05:09And I'd probably just go out and build another one, bigger and larger.
05:17Building this plane was a lot of fun. It took a lot of imagination, a lot of time, a lot of money, and a lot of effort.
05:27And I really had a blast building it. It just rides down the road smoothly. And I should say it flies down the road smoothly.