Somewhere, in a garage of 4 bumbling youths
The Story and the Brief
Click 4 Story hehehehehehe
Vinnie leaned against the workbench, eyeing Jazz’s latest failed project. “You know, Jazz, we’re running low on ideas for Quirk Express. Our last episode was a real snooze-fest.”
Jazz frowned, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I know, I’ve been trying to come up with something new, but nothing seems right. We need something that’s gonna blow people’s minds. Something that actually stands out for being really out there…”
She kicks the rusted van sitting on the low hoist in front of her, “This piece of shit couldn’t even get enough people to leave comments about what they want done to it as a project. That’s how uninteresting it is. This really was a bad choice for a star car even if we consider the two potatoes and a bag of chips we paid for it”
Vinnie sighs, “Well, what did I tell you before? It’s an Asia-only JDM minivan used for hauling people around, has a hilariously underpowered 4-banger, is a great workhorse but like… other than being a nostalgic icon for a few amount of people, it has no distinct character”
Jazz stares blankly at the car, “ Yeah I thought I was being smart with this one. I guess I have a different vision of them because my parents back in Taiwan had such great things to say about them. And you’re right, other than being a reliable hauler, it’s just a rustbucket to the majority.”
“I mean it’s not the end of the world,” Rachel poked her head out from behind a stack of tools. “We should hit up some online forums and see if anyone’s selling anything interesting. Maybe we can find someone who’s looking to get rid of what they think is their grandma’s old clunker, but is actually a rare find.”
Mike, the garage’s resident car nut and all-around weirdo, chimed in. “Yeah I’ve been thinking, we should hit up some of the local junkyards too. See if we can find something that’s just begging to be restored into a star car.”
Vinnie raised an eyebrow. “Yeah I suppose we could try going to the junkyard, or asking around in online forums, or visiting pretty much any online marketplace really.”
Mike nodded enthusiastically. “Uh huh! They got all sorts of weird and wonderful stuff in there. I’m sure we could find something that’ll give enough fuel for another viral video for Quirk Express?”
Jazz gives herself a minute. She has been a mechanic for years with these 3 goofballs in this workshop. Other than servicing and fixing up regular cars, they also have a reputation for working on oddball cars, hard to find parts for and probably not local by any means. One day she had a bright idea for opening up a YouTube channel to share her odd finds while working in the garage, and her journey of working on them. She named it “Quirk Express” since the channel’s main focus was banking on how interesting and quirky a car was. She’s had some ups and downs with the videos they’ve produced, but this recent one was a proper flop, all because she misjudged how boring her last find would be to the viewers.
“Alright, I may have fucked up pretty bad with this one. And people probably expect a redemption episode after that last one. Can’t afford to skulk around, better get to it,” She thought.
“Yeah, it sounds like a plan, guys.” Jazz smiles and looks back, “Let’s split up. I’ll go with Vinnie and have a look around at the local junkyard, you two can stay back and look on marketplace, craigslist, ebay, gumtree and local forums and what not,” she says as she gets the keys to her NSX.
“Wait, no,” Vinnie cries out while laughing, “Don’t take the Honda, let’s take Mike’s Scout instead in case we decide to bring some spare parts from the yard, eh?”
As Vinnie and Jazz borrow Mike’s car to head towards the junkyard, Mike and Rachel settle in with their laptops. Rachel starts scrolling through all the typical marketplaces while Mike settles on looking at local car forums. “Okay, let’s see…there’s this guy selling an old school bus for $2500. And this other guy wants to get rid of a '96 Excelsis for $4000… Uhhhh…”, Rachel’s voice drowns out as she gets lost in the adverts.
Mike chuckled. “Those are both great leads, but I think we need something more…quirky. Something that our viewers don’t expect to see, because they’re not something you get to see on an everyday basis.”
As they searched both online and in the junkyard, hoping to find something truly unique. A car that they will fall in love with for how unconventional and weird it is, and share the same feelings with their viewers all the while making great content around it so their channel hits off for good.
because discourse update sucks, the story is hidden up there in case you missed it tee hee
Brief
If anyone has ADHD and can’t read for more than 3 seconds
Meet Jasmine aka “Jazz”, a car enthusiast with a penchant for the unconventional. She followed the steps of becoming a car mechanic from her father from a very young age, and not only has she inherited her dad’s garage but she has upscaled it quite a bit as well.
She has also recently started looking for weird, quirky and interesting cars of their times as a hobby, something that has led to her side hustle on her relatively new Quirk Express YouTube channel. It has gained a cult following among those who appreciate the weird and wonderful creations of the automotive world.
Jazz is on the hunt for her next star car – something that’s more than just a curiosity, but an honest-to-goodness head-turner. She’s not interested in your run-of-the-mill, hum-drum daily drivers.
No, she wants cars with character, quite a lot of it in fact. Cars that’ll make you go “What in the actual fuck were they thinking back in the design room?”
Think of it like this: If a car is so bad it’s good, or so weird it’s wonderful, Jazz wants to see it. If it’s a hodgepodge of mismatched parts, a really well executed prototype or concept, or a styling exercise gone wrong, she’ll take a closer look. If the car was weird fresh out of the factory, that’s fine. If it was done by a tuning house or some mad workshop with nothing but crazy intentions, that’s totally acceptable too. The main takeaway is Jazz’s point of drawing the line is very broad and she’ll accept a lot of bullshit before even she says “Nuh uh”. (Refer to the checklist section of the Calculator)
In this challenge, Jazz will be evaluating a collection of cars that fit her eccentric criteria. She’ll pit them against each other, comparing and contrasting their quirks and features. And let’s be real – some of these cars might just break down on the spot, while others might make you wonder why they were never popular or put into mass production.
Jazz is willing to drop around $20-28,000 dollars to add something really funky to her collection. these budget allowances are subject to change if Jazz finds a car that is truly exceptional or rare. As in, if she finds value in something that has tons of personality and can provide good content for not a whole lot of price, she’d rather save that money for other stuff. But for the most part, she’s willing to stretch her budget to find the perfect quirky ride!
So, what’s your peculiar ride? Is it a late 90s-era rebirth of a '50s classic, or a record breaking factory sleeper with super hi-tech interior? Does it have an engine that’s been modified to run on pizza crusts or a transmission made out of fuckin adamantium itself?
If you’ve got a car that’s weird or quirky or interesting enough to make Jazz do a double take, send it our way. But be warned: she’s not afraid to speak her mind, and if your ride is just plain awful with zero character or personality for redemption, she’ll let the world know.
Rules and Regulations
I will preface this by saying, this is a used car round. Which means I will provide you with a calculator, you will put in the stats for your car in the calculator as necessary and it will throw a price at you that estimates what your car’s price will be when selling 2nd or whatever hand. More on that later.
Allowed Car Trim Years: 1990-2015
Road Legality: Generally, recommended. But if it’s just a wee bit illegal, like having illegal exhaust mods, or having gray area modifications done etc, that’s something the crew can work on. If it straight up lacks basic legality stuff like appropriate headlights and what not, yeah nah that’s 
.
Emissions Standards: WES 7 for 1994 or before. WES 8 for 2001 or before. WES 9 for 2009 or before. WES 10 onwards.
Techpool: 60M combined for 1990-2010. 65M combined for 2015.
Fuel Type: Follow your car’s intended market segment. Don’t expect me to accept a car that’s basically a corolla underneath and it needing to run 98.
Used Price Limit:
$20,000 according to the spreadsheet for 1990-2010.
$28,000 according to the spreadsheet for 2011-2015.
Techpool and Quality Management:
- Negative techpool is STRICTLY BANNED.
- Negative quality is PERFECTLY ACCEPTABLE.
Advertisement Standards:
Quite possibly the first CSR round to have something like this might be tweaking on this one. Because I don’t know what the lore reasoning is for your car being quirky, like why it looks like a half chewed bubblegum, why it has Babymetal logos on the sides, why the doors had to open like Rolls Royce doors, why there’s a cute tiny V8 inside what seems like a knockoff DeLorean, etc…
I expect you to provide me with an advertisement and lore tidbits that are sufficient enough to justify your car’s existence. If you DON’T do this, I will simply assume why your car be quirky like that, which might end up being not very favorable for you.
Look I’m not asking for a 2000 word report I just want some validation for why your car is the way it is. I know a good chunk of us send the hosts lore tidbits for our car submissions while attaching the car file, and it generally helps. This is no different, and a wee bit more elaborate.
Usecases for the potential star car
Obviously once the crew is done milking the car for content, that won’t be the end of it. And they’re usually not the type to part ways with a car they like anyway. So chances are, they’d like to keep it around in the garage.
What will it be used for? It depends.
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If it’s good enough for general use, is livable, running costs aren’t too bad, one of them would probably just use it as a daily of sorts. It might even become a very iconic car for the channel.
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If it’s less economic to run, isn’t the most livable in general situations, and fits a certain kind of niche like trackday, rock climbing, adrenaline rush hunting etc, then it’d be a weekend cruiser/toy for the crew.
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If it fails to do even that, but somehow manages to be a very cool car with head-turnability, it will be repurposed as a show car, or something you occasionally bring to car meets to mess with people.
Scope of The Builds, and Priorities
What’s that? You need clearer directions and need to know all the acceptable criteria?
Glad you asked, because everything related to those is included in the spreadsheet.
Here’s some basic points before we finally head over to that though. I promise the next one takes you to google sheets C:
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Ask yourself, is this something you’d see popping up on facebook marketplace or craigslist every other day? If so, this might not be it.
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Is the wow factor limited to a few slightly odd and goofy features like multicolored panels, or a really big blown engine in an otherwise completely pedestrian car with no visual cues and engineering done to accommodate such power? You might need more oomph than that.
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Look at CSR - 124 for general directions for what worked back then, what didn’t and what could work. Things did change a lot since then however, so that’s not a definitive guideline.
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Execution IS KEY. I realize something like a Toyota Sera is just a fruity Tercel with mostly fixture work, or an SVX is just a highly advanced ahead of the time car with also more fixture work. That is correct. How do I judge then? On how you executed everything. The design, the engineering, the coherence of it all. If you slap a few bumper bars and a few pieces of patchworks and call it a day, good luck getting through.
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Is your name betterdeals, or do you make at least similar products? Those cars certainly have an audience and a market, this is not one of them unfortunately. 2D panels converted to 3D to make boxy asymmetrical trollmobiles is funny once or twice. With enough creativity and the same basic principle however, you could make it work…
The Calculator
Not my cleanest job, but I’m also not a very skilled spreadsheet cruncher. However I did end up setting a relatively complex used car calculator, something that I plan to use more in the future and potentially let the community use it as well if it turns out to be really good I sure hope so.
Tutorial
- Click on File > Make a Copy
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You’ll create your own separate copy of the calculator. This is how it’s supposed to be done as you can’t edit the base calc
No shit. -
Only parts you need to really worry about:
- Quirks and Features checklist
- Top Left, main calc. Put down your details here. Try not to fuck the stats up. Because I will be putting these down and if your values differ from what I get and your car ends up being overpriced, you might get binned.
- Right hand side, gearbox type selection. Do not forget this as this attempts to offset some of the penalty for having certain types of gearboxes or vice versa.
- Built in Fuel Economy calculation section.
And that’s really it, not really that complex I want to kill myself just look at the coding.
Inspirations
These won’t exactly be 100% within the era-range I’ve chosen, but they’re supposed to serve as guidelines.
Jesus Christ here we go
Suisei Toyota Mega Cruiser Last time’s winner
Pop culture icon reference, not supposed to be an actual inspiration by itself.
Pontiac Tojan, first production car to reach 200 MPH, and stunning looks IMO.
Lincoln Mark X Concept
Volkswagen XL1
BDSMW Gina
Alfa SZ
Toyota Sera
Retromodern mid-oughts American goobers like the SSR
Breadvans like Pulsar NX and Mazda RX500
BRAT
Crossing Vehi
Mid-engine family egg
Fiberglass 944, and French too
Your mechanic’s worst nightmare
Somewhat tame Kaido Racers
I hate myself
I expect to see a decent bit of effort put into the overall design if I get something like this^
FWD TT non-RS
Pajero Evo
Nissan Figaro
CHINA ____ GEELY
Any Mitsuoka ever
Toyota Will Series
Lexus 2054
Any SAAB concept ever
U500 Unimog
Mini 1300 Marcos
I am LOSING my FUCKING mind
Street Legal Golf Carts
^Here^
Submission Methods and Deadlines
Submission Deadline: September 8, 2024. 11:59 PM (UTC+10)
Naming Convention: CSR 163 - [forum username] as the Engine Family and Car Model name.
Engine Variant and Car Trim are free.
Extensions: In case of entry droughts or delays caused by late deliberation or update patches, there will be extensions provided as necessary.
Submission Method: Message your .car file to me on this forum; Make a reply on this forum post with at least one advert of the car.
Resubmissions: You’ll be allowed A SINGLE RESUBMISSION before deadline finishes.
LINK TO THE USED CAR PRICE CALCULATOR
I understand this is a bit of an outlandish CSR Round and I hope everyone cooperates so we can depart from the usual “Cram the fastest, comfiest, feature-creepiest car in the most efficient price and form factor possible” formula. It gets a bit boring.
So let’s give engineering priority the middle seat for once and have some fun in this CSR!
I need to sleep try not to explode the discussion for when I wake up
