He is the first manufacturer to develop, produce and sell an aluminum intensive vehicle. His first challenge was to show that these hand made cars, each representing 350 man hours, were even stronger than the steel tube chassis models that he'd built from 1992 to 1996. All this has surely helped his cars become accepted-Steve Tyler, the lead singer with Arrowsmith now owns one and Paul Newman sells them at his Connecticut Volvo dealership. The Panoz is about 80 percent Ford high tech which has sure kept down development charges. Roadster looks gorgeous.
Photographs never seem to do it justice.
The stainless steel tubular bumpers gleamed like the paint work. The roadster's lines, a cross between a 1930s Buck Rogers' spacecraft and a 1999 Apple iMac, were stunning. This is a car that gets a thumbs up from every vehicle on the interstate that comes alongside and one that attracts a crowd with questions at every shopping center stop. The Borg Warner 5-speed manual shift is effortless, the analog dials canted towards the driver, are simple black on white and easily read, and the engine sounds like Caruso. Well, yes and no.