All you need is wheels, brakes, a frame, a power source, a transmission, some fuel, and some crap to connect the power to the transmission to the wheels and the wheels to the frame. And a seat. Oh, and a steering wheel. Boom. Done.
You can hand-build a car by yourself over a couple days. I mean sure, the engine, transmission, frame, wheels, tires, seat, gas tank, carburetor, brakes, etc are all manufactured by hundreds of people and dozens of companies to get you to that point. But basically, you decide what components to use and how to put them together. It takes you a relatively minute amount of time to assemble them and it's much easier than trying to manufacture all the parts yourself.
Somehow, after building cars for over 200 years, both hobbyists and huge corporations find new ways to build them (and seem to enjoy themselves). They even come out with new ones every couple years and keep finding people to buy them. You'd think the general public would wise up to the fact that it's all the same thing over and over and demand our jetson cars already.
Interesting analogy.. I'll take it a little further in the custom/kit car world, it's not unlike the software world. The last 20% takes 80% of the effort, and you can clearly tell the projects that have had thousands of hours put in with attention to detail versus those that haven't. And, not unlike software you can see as a builder where you came from as your craft matures. Looking at a rolling chassis Lotus Super 7 replica I started building 15 years ago, is not unlike my first SaxBasic (VBA) script I wrote not far around the same timeframe. Fast forward 15 years later and it's like really, what was I thinking ? Contrary to brogrammer theory, this stuff is hard, and takes a lot of years of experience and breadth of knowledge to do well.
All you need is wheels, brakes, a frame, a power source, a transmission, some fuel, and some crap to connect the power to the transmission to the wheels and the wheels to the frame. And a seat. Oh, and a steering wheel. Boom. Done.
You can hand-build a car by yourself over a couple days. I mean sure, the engine, transmission, frame, wheels, tires, seat, gas tank, carburetor, brakes, etc are all manufactured by hundreds of people and dozens of companies to get you to that point. But basically, you decide what components to use and how to put them together. It takes you a relatively minute amount of time to assemble them and it's much easier than trying to manufacture all the parts yourself.
Somehow, after building cars for over 200 years, both hobbyists and huge corporations find new ways to build them (and seem to enjoy themselves). They even come out with new ones every couple years and keep finding people to buy them. You'd think the general public would wise up to the fact that it's all the same thing over and over and demand our jetson cars already.