After years of people looking at our Tow Mater replicas and asking "Where is Lightning McQueen?", we have decided to take that step and build him.  Lots of people have taken a red sports car of various makes/models and applied decals to make it resemble Lightning McQueen, but we are going to actually build a correct replica - from scratch - not using an existing car to start with.  In fact, we started with the original Lightning McQueen, using 3D scans of the one at Disneyland California.  

Using these scans, we sliced the car like a loaf of bread, and built each of the pieces individually out of wood, then reassembled them back into the "loaf" again.  

Once we settled on the correct size (actually 10% larger than the original to make it the size of a real car), the wooden sections were covered in a string mesh, and the corners were sculpted from expanding foam.

The body is then covered in burlap soaked in plaster of paris; which is then covered in drywall mud to allow us to continue shaping and perfecting the body.  The custom made "Lightyear" tires are now coming together as well - big 295/65-15s wrapped around 15x10 Aero Nascar wheels.

Then about 12 boxes (42 gallons) of drywall mud were slowly spread over the burlap, allowed to dry and layered again.  Hours of sanding to get a pretty good shape going.  Windows were laid in place to build the recessed openings for them.  Then this layer was sealed with polyurethane.

Next, 2 layers of fiberglass mat were laid on, then covered in a thickened layer of fiberglass resin (tinted red).  

Now off to the bodyshop, where the resin layer is sanded down, and bodywork with normal body filler is done over that...

Back from body and painted in bright red.  This form is looking amazing!  Unfortunately, this is just another step in the process.  Now we have to make a mold of this form in order to make the actual body will will use from that mold.  That means messing this great paintjob up by laying fiberglass all over it...

Parting lines for mold panels are laid out; then the mold is made in pieces front rear to front (simply because the rear piece was simpler than the front nose.  This process took about a month to complete, making 1 panel every 2-3 days because of the overnight curing times needed before each piece could be removed from the body, cleaned up, and put back on to support the next piece.  Each panel featured flanges that allowed pieces to be bolted together to assemble the final mold.

The mold was then mounted to a rotisserie, braced, and taken to Pro-Glas in Rogers Arkansas, where they sprayed chopped fiberglass into the mold to make the final body.  You can see a video of this process on our YouTube channel.

The body was pulled from the mold (actually the mold was disassmbled from the body because of all the complex curves), then the windows were cutout.  Ride height, tire/wheel combos, and rear spoiler are mocked up.  Next comes the chassis...

Making the mouth:  this process took a few tries, but eventually we got the look we wanted by comparing it to another LM picture we had.  Making the mouth required cutting a hole in one of the new bodies, then shaping the mouth from clay and cardboard until it was close to the final look.  A mold was made of that, then a form was pulled from that mold, refined even further; then a mold was made from the refined mouth and the final product was produced by Pro-Glas.